I bought my first pinball machine — a 1993 Midway Twilight Zone — in April 2001. What a joy it was, and I couldn’t have chosen a better title. A classic Pat Lawlor design that feels as much like a Rube Goldberg machine as a pinball machine, it’s still one of my favorite titles of the DMD era.
But the game that had originally turned me on to pinball, an epiphany really, was a 1993 Williams White Water that I saw at Knott’s Berry Farm earlier in 2001. As a fan of anything on rails, the incredible ramps are what caught my eye. But the whole immersive experience of artwork, great music and speech, and a playfield featuring a rafting trip with Insanity Falls, Big Foot, a whirlpool, and (of course!) white water rapids just sucked me in. Yes, I have a vivid imagination
I immediately began learning as much as possible about the hobby, including its history and how to repair games. I joined the RGP newsgroup and made a lot of invisible friends who eventually became (and remain) real friends, and I studied Clay Harrel’s websiteand videos for hours and days and months.
Well over 500 games have passed through my hands since then, and the number of pinball machines, electromechanical (EM) arcade games, and various other coin-operated devices that are currently set up and playable in my arcade stands at 302 as of December 2018.
My other interests include vintage computing, model railroading, Arduino microcontrollers, old books, travel, and spending as much time as possible with my wife and four kids.
peckarcade.com 