TEXAS PINBALL FESTIVAL 2022

After the 2020 and 2021 shows were cancelled, we’re back in Frisco for the 2022 edition of the Texas Pinball Festival. We’re in the familiar surroundings of the Embassy Suites Hotel and Conference Center which has hosted the show since 2014.

As you can see, the weather is excellent and the temperature is good enough not to need a coat when outside in the daytime. The Embassy Suites hotel is the accommodation and dining part of the complex, but the attached Conference Center is where the Texas Pinball Festival is hosted.

A separate team run the Conference Center, and there is a dedicated entrance at the end of this corridor for those not staying in the hotel.

The show opens to the public at 5pm on Friday 25th March, but we got to the venue on Wednesday evening. Even then, the organisational team were hard at work preparing the 1,600+ show registration packets for guests who pre-purchased their tickets this year or had tickets rolled-over from 2020 or 2021 when the show had to be cancelled.

On Wednesday evening the main show hall was almost completely empty but it wouldn’t be long before the first stands and machines arrived.

Sure enough, by Thursday morning there were multiple machines on the show floor, although most were still in their boxes.

CoinTaker had a display of four Alien pinballs by Pinball Brothers – two Standard Version and two Limited Version models.

There is also a Funhouse game with the new Funhouse: Rudy’s Nightmare kit from Pedretti installed. This adds new rules, a colour LCD main display, a new speaker panel with upgraded speakers and sound system, and a secondary LCD on the playfield replacing the mystery mirror.

Marco Specialties are representing Stern Pinball and are expected to have two dozen of the latest Stern machines on their stand. On Thursday morning the stand was still under construction.

All machines and vendor items came into the Main Hall through the loading doors at the rear. Games were checked in and recorded before moving to their designated spot in the staging area. This allows machines to be unloaded quickly and the truck in which they came to be moved out of the way to make space for the next delivery.

Promotional banners hang from the ceiling throughout the hall and the connecting corridor. With such high ceilings, it’s no small task to attach them.

The Texas Pinball Festival is run by Paul McKinney and husband and wife team Ed and Kim VanderVeen. They operate out of the organisers room which is also the ticket desk where guests can either pick up their pre-purchased ticket packages or buy daily tickets if they didn’t pre-register.

This year, the tournaments have been given their own, larger space on the mezzanine level.

When we first visited, none of the tournament machines had yet arrived, but it was clear the new space would be a good fit for tournament play.

By Friday morning the show hall was taking shape, with just a few hours to go until the guests would be admitted. We took a look around to see the work taking place and what those guests can expect to see.

It’s traditional for there to be a Safecracker game near the entrance dispensing custom TPF magic tokens, and this year is no different with a new token design for the 2022 show.

Meanwhile, qualifying for the Wizards and Classics tournaments began at 10am in the new Tournaments Room. It was busy in the room right from the very start with games being played and competitors collecting their registrations.

You can watch the live stream from the tournaments on the Wormhole Pinball Twitch channel.

Outside the Main Hall, a second ticket desk had opened up to cater for those buying on-the-day tickets. Most guests appeared to have pre-registered as the queue for on-the-day tickets was much shorter.

For those looking for food options, pizza, tortilla chips and other snacks were available from a counter just outside the Main Hall.

For more choice, three food trucks were parked just outside the Conference Center entrance.

The doors to the Main Hall opened on-time at 5pm on Friday and there was an immediate inrush of guests eager to check out all the latest games and snap up the best deals from the many vendors.

Friday also sees the start of the seminars at the Texas Pinball Festival. In fact, they begin even before the Main Hall opens with the first talk taking place at 3:30pm.

Here’s the list of seminars. We’ll add more details to them as they progress.

Friday

3:30pm – Shipping A Pinball Is Easier Than You Think – Dino Gaspari

Dino operates the shipmypinball.com website which offers low-cost worldwide shipping of pinballs through several major shipping companies along with discounted insurance.

He demonstrated how the online service works and explained the various options for collection and delivery, along with their associated costs.

4pm – The Forgotten Tales – Mirco Playfields

Mirco was launching the new Tales of the Arabian Nights upgrade kit called The Forgotten Tales.

This is the latest official “2.0” kit following the recent Funhouse: Rudy’s Nightmare, and it comes with a new speaker panel featuring a full colour display, improved 2-way speakers, new artwork and seven RGB inserts. These inserts correspond with the seven new tales incorporated into the new software.

The new tales are The Voyage of Sinbad, The Treasure of Ali-Baba, Flying Horse: The Lost Lands, Save Scheherazade, The Palace Race, Flying Carpet: Escape from the Cave and The Cyclops & The Hydra.

The kit comes with a new FAST Pinball controller, a new larger subwoofer and an autolauncher to replace the manual version in the original game, while the software features new music and new call-outs from the original voice artist, five additional multiball modes and two new video modes.

The kit costs €2677.50 (around $2,950) from Mirco Playfields and is sold initially in a Beta form before being available as a full production version.

Despite repeated questioning from the audience about production problems with his playfields which are used in Jersey Jack Pinball machines, Mirco said he wasn’t able to talk about that subject.

6pm – Completing Cactus Canyon – Chicago Gaming Company

Butch Peel from Chicago Gaming Company described the process of developing the company’s latest ‘Remake’ title, Cactus Canyon. He explained how they wanted to keep the existing playfield layout and artwork while enhancing many aspects of the game.

Those enhancements included full RGB LED lighting throughout, updating the whole electronics system and speakers, producing new high-resolution graphics to be displayed on a full-colour LCD display, and additional additional gameplay into the software.

7pm – Indie Pinball Designers, Inquire Within – FAST Pinball

Co-Founder, Aaron Davis, and the company’s newest employee, Brian Madden, took to the stage to talk about the latest products from FAST Pinball.

In particular they talked about their new initiative for developers of game mods which make integrating a mod’s functionality into the game much easier, especially if that game is already running on FAST Pinball controllers.

8pm – Jersey Jack Pinball – Jack Guarnieri & Steve Ritchie

Jack and Steve spoke about their history working together in the pinball business when Jack’s Pinball Sales company was one of Stern Pinball’s biggest distributors and Steve was designing games for Stern. They went on to explain how the opportunity arose for Steve to join Jersey Jack Pinball in August last year.

Steve said he had just cut the first whitewood – the initial playfield which is used to fine-tune the shots and placement of components – for his first game for Jersey Jack Pinball.

Jack said it wasn’t impossible to company would launch two new titles this year, saying their next game should be announced by July/August.

9pm – 43 Years Of Adventures In Pinball – Todd Tuckey

Todd was joined on stage by his TNT Amusements colleagues John and Frank to relate stories from their many years in the pinball and coin-op games business, including some of the company’s early TV advertisements and news show appearances.

You can watch videos of all the seminars on the Texas Pinball Festival’s Twitch stream at twitch.tv/texas_pinball_seminar.

Saturday

Saturday begins, as usual at TPF, with the swap meet organised by the DFW Pinball & Arcade Club and held in the car park for the Convention Center.

The weather continued to be fine and there was a good number of both sellers and buyers out in the sunshine. Officially the swap meet began at 8am but there were plenty of early birds looking to grab that irresistibly juicy deal.

The seminar schedule resumed at noon in the show’s dedicated Seminar Hall.

12pm – How To Find, Buy & Own Your First Pinball Machine – Nick Greenup

Nick explained the common mistakes and the preferred ways to get your own pinball machine. He included the different services offered by distributors and the service levels you should be looking for according to your mechanical and electrical abilities.

1pm – American Pinball

American Pinball’s newly-promoted Executive Vice President, David Fix, led this seminar.

He was joined by Barry Engler, Joe Schoeber and Steven Bowden to talk about the company’s upcoming production schedule with reruns of earlier American Pinball titles alongside their current release, Legends of Valhalla.

Along with announcing artist Christopher Franchi would be working on one of their upcoming releases, David awarded prizes of two Legends of Valhalla backglasses and a playfield from the game for those who got questions about the company correct.

2pm – Q&A with Legendary Doctor Who Actor – Sylvester McCoy

The TPF’s special guest star was Sylverster McCoy who was usually to be found in the main show hall greeting guests, signing memorabilia and posing for photos, but in this seminar he answered questions about his life in acting with particular focus on his roles as The Doctor in Doctor Who and Radagast the Brown in The Hobbit.

He proved to be exceptionally entertaining, humorous and down-to-earth, recounting tales from the making of Doctor Who and how he developed his interpretation of the role.

3pm – P³ Chapter 2: Things Have Gotten Weird – Multimorphic

Multimorphic’s head, Gerry Stellenberg, was next. After briefly explaining how the P³ pinball platform was developed he talked about the creation of the company’s newest release, Weird Al’s Museum of Natural Hilarity.

Gerry was joined by T.J. Weaver the mechanical engineer on the game, Stephen Silver who was the lead designer, and Scott Danesi who created the sound package.

Gerry had a Standard Edition and a Limited Edition model in the room to illustrate the differences and demonstrate how the interactive topper operated. He talked about the design challenges and current production timelines for both the Weird Al game kit and the P³ base system.

4pm – Inside Connected Pinball – Jay Adelson, Ryan White, Ken Cromwell, Joe Schober & Scott Danesi

Jay is one of the founders of Scorbit, the hardware and software platform which connects pinball machines around the world.

Joining Jay for this discussion on the benefits and possibilities which come from connecting a pinball to a central server to record and share machine data were Ryan White of Chicago Gaming, Ken Cromwell of Jersey Jack Pinball, Joe Schober from American Pinball and Scott Danesi from Multimorphic.

5pm – Restorations & Rethemes: Pimp Your Pinball – Ken Head & Jeff Miller

Ken began this seminar by detailing his history in pinball repairs, restorations and customisations, how he grew his collection and his business to the point where he is currently doing one complete restoration or repainting a month.

Jeff founded the company Pinball Pimp, having a design and print background in his earlier career. He described his initial pinball work, creating backglasses, playfield plastics and cabinet stencils to the point where Pinball Pimp has stencils for over 330 different titles.

The two explained the techniques they use in their restoration and customisation projects, answering questions from the audience about the best methods, products and companies to use.

6pm – So You Think You Know Pinball? Trivia Quiz – Martin Ayub & Jonathan Joosten

The action moved from the Seminars Hall to the Cypress Lounge for the regular So You Think You Know Pinball? prize pinball trivia quiz hosted by Pinball News Editor, Martin Ayub, and Pinball Magazine Editor, Jonathan Joosten.

The duo asked varied questions about pinball and provided two possible answers to each. Players moved to the left side of the play area if they thought the first possible answer was correct, or the right side for the second possible answer. Those who picked the correct answer continued to the next round.

When there were just a few contestants left, they all got to pick a ticket for one of the many prizes which included a Guns ‘N Roses playfield, a Legends of Valhalla backglass, translites for The Avengers: Infinity Quest, Deadpool and Godzilla as well as multiple hoodies, T-shirts, baseball hats, mugs, and much more generously donated by the quiz’s sponsors Jersey Jack Pinball, American Pinball, Stern Pinball, Spooky Pinball, ColorDMD, Sunshine Laundromat, Pinball Magazine, Pinball News and the Texas Pinball Festival.

8pm – 2021 TWIPY Awards

This fifth edition of the annual awards show began at 8:30pm in the Seminars Room with Imoto Harney and Jack Danger compering.

The results for each category were:

• Best Music and Sound Effects: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Favourite Home Brew Pinball Machine: Ferris Bueller, Brian Soares and Reby Hardy
• Best Theme: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Favourite Pinball Location: Next Level Pinball Museum, Hillsboro, OR, USA
• Favourite Accessories: Insider Connected Kits, Stern Pinball
• Best Toys and Gimmicks: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Favourite Pinball Convention: Pinball Expo, Chicago
• Best Theme Integration: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Favourite Website: Pinside
• Best Rules: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Best Animations and Display: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Favourite Pinball YouTube Channel: TNT Amusements
• Best Callouts: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Best Pinball Mod of 2021: The Mandalorian, Animated Interactive Grogu
• Favourite Pinball Streamer: Dead Flip, Jack Danger
• Best Lightshow: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Favourite Pinball Topper of 2021: Halloween, Spooky Pinball
• Favourite Pinball Podcast: Kaneda’s Pinball Podcast
• Best Artwork: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Favourite Mobile App: Pinball Map
• Best Playfield Gameplay and Layout: Godzilla, Stern Pinball
• Game of the Year: Godzilla, Stern Pinball

You can see a full breakdown of the voting on the twipys.com website and can watch the whole presentation on YouTube, with the show starting 30 minutes into the recording:

We took the opportunity of the awards ceremony to join a large group heading to the local Hard 8 BBQ smokehouse for dinner, so only caught the very end of the event. It appeared to be well attended and appreciated by the live audience, although there were obviously technical issues over the sound quality and the order of the award announcements which, we are told, will be addressed for next year’s ceremony.

10pm – TWIPY After Party – Marco Specialties, Pinball Life & Texas Pinball Festival

Once the awards were over, attendees could dance to music provided by DJ mTort, Scott Danesi and DQB.

Meanwhile, the Main Hall was busy throughout the show, with the most guests visiting on Saturday. We took a tour of the hall, taking pictures and playing a few select games. We revisited on Sunday when it was a little quieter so we could shoot out Thirty Minute Tour video which you’ll find below.

Let’s see who else had a stand at TPF.

In addition to the display above, there were regular free shuttle buses from the Texas Pinball Festival to the National Videogame Museum which is located around four miles north of the TPF’s venue.

We saw the History of Pinball exhibition during set-up, but by opening time more machines had been added.

One of the two Airway machines above had the playfield removed and placed in front of the game so people could see how the balls which drop through the holes are guided under the playfield.

Here’s our list of the 316 pinballs we counted in the Main Hall on Sunday morning at this year’s show:

300	Junk Yard
Addams Family, The	Jurassic Park Pin
Addams Family, The	King Pin
Addams Family, The	Kiss (Bally)
Air Aces	Kiss (Bally)
Alice Cooper’s Nightmare Castle	Kiss (Bally)
Alien	Kiss (Stern)
Alien	Last Action Hero
Alien	Lectronamo
Alien	Led Zeppelin
Alien	Legends of Valhalla
America’s Most Haunted	Legends of Valhalla
Apollo 13	Legends of Valhalla
Apollo 13*	Legends of Valhalla
Astro	Lethal Weapon 3
Attack from Mars	Lethal Weapon 3
Avatar*	Lexy Lightspeed: Escape from Earth
Bad Cats	Lights, Camera, Action!
Bali-Hi	Lost in Space
Batman (DE)	Lost World
Batman (DE)	Lucky Strike*
Batman Forever	Mandalorian, The
Beat the Clock	Mandalorian, The
Big Casino	Mandalorian, The
Big Guns	Mandalorian, The
Big House	Mandalorian, The
Big Lebowski, The	Mandalorian, The
Billy Madison	Mandalorian, The
Black Jack	Mandalorian, The
Black Knight 2000	Mandalorian, The
Black Knight 2000	Mandalorian, The
Boys Night Out	Maverick
Breakshot	Meteor
Bride of Pinbot, The Machine	Monster Bash
Bride of Pinbot, The Machine	Monte Carlo
Bride of Pinbot, The Machine	Mr. & Mrs. Pac-Man
Cactus Canyon remake	NASCAR
Cactus Canyon remake	NBA Fastbreak
Cactus Canyon remake	NBA Fastbreak
Cactus Canyon remake	Night Moves
Cactus Canyon remake	Nine Ball
Cactus Canyon remake	Nitro Ground Shaker
Cactus Canyon remake	Nitro Ground Shaker
Cactus Canyon remake	Nitro Ground Shaker
Cannon Lagoon	No Fear
Capt. Fantastic (Home Edition)	No Good Gofers
Caribbean Cruise	Oktoberfest
Centigrade 37	Paragon
Champion Pub, The	Paragon
Checkpoint	Party Animal
Cirqus Voltaire	Party Zone, The
Cirqus Voltaire	Phantom of the Opera
Cleopatra	Philina
Cleopatra	Pinbot
Cleopatra	Pinbot
Comet	Pink Panther
Comet	Power Play, Bobby Orr’s
Comet*	Primus
Congo	Prospector*
Congo	Revenge from Mars
Corvette	Rick and Morty
Count-Down	Rick and Morty
Creature from the Black Lagoon	Riverboat Gambler
CSI	Rocket
Cyclone	Ro-Go
Dale Jr	Rollercoaster Tycoon
Demolition Man	Rollergames
Diamond Jack*	Rollergames
Dike Doke	Rush
Dirty Harry	Rush
Dirty Harry	Rush
Disco*	Rush
Doctor Who	Rush
Doctor Who	Rush
Doctor Who	Rush
Doctor Who*	Rush
Dracula, Bram Stoker’s	Rush
Earthshaker!	Rush
Elf	Rush
Evel Knievel	Rush*
Evel Knievel	Safecracker
Evel Knievel	Safecracker
Evel Knievel (Home Edition)*	Satellite
Evel Knievel*	Scorpion
F-14 Tomcat	Scorpion
Fireball (Home Edition)	Shadow, The
Fish Tales	Shadow, The
Fish Tales	Sharkey’s Shootout
Fish Tales	Sharpshooter
Fish Tales	Simpsons Pinball Party, The
Fish Tales	Simpsons Pinball Party, The
Flash	Sinbad
Flash	Six Million Dollar Man, The
Flash Gordon	Six Million Dollar Man, The
Flight 2000	Sky Jump
Frankenstein, Mary Shelley’s	Sorcerer
Freefall	Sorcerer’s Apprentice
Frontier	Sorcerer’s Apprentice
Funhouse	Space Mission
Funland	Space Shuttle
Galaxy Ranger	Space Shuttle
Game of Thrones	Spider-Man
Game Show, The Bally	Spinal Tap (Conversion)
Genie	Star Gazer
Genie	Star Trek (Bally)
Getaway, The: High Speed 2	Star Trek (DE)
Getaway, The: High Speed 2	Star Trek (Stern)*
Ghost Busters	Star Trek: The Mirror Universe
Gladiators	Star Trek: The Next Generation
Godzilla	Star Trek: The Next Generation
Godzilla	Star Wars (DE)
Godzilla (Sega)	Stardust
Godzilla (Stern)	Stargate
Godzilla (Stern)	Stargate*
Godzilla (Stern)	Strange Science
Godzilla (Stern)	Street Fighter II
Gold Strike	Super Star
Gorgar	Sure Shot*
Gorgar	Sweet Hearts
Gorgar	Swords of Fury
Gorgar	Tales from the Crypt
Grand Slam	Tales from the Crypt*
Gulfstream*	Tales of the Arabian Nights
Guns ‘N Roses (JJP)	Tales of the Arabian Nights: The Forgotten Tales
Guns ‘N Roses (JJP)	Target Alpha
Guns ‘N Roses (JJP)	Team One
Guns ‘N Roses (JJP)	Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (DE)*
Guns ‘N Roses (JJP)	Terminator 2: Judgement Day
Guns ‘N Roses (JJP)	Theatre of Magic
Halloween	Theatre of Magic
Halloween	Theatre of Magic*
Harley Davidson (Stern)	Title Fight
Heads Up!	Total Nuclear Annihilation
Heads Up!	Transformers
Heist	Tri Zone
High Roller Casino	Trident
High Speed	Tron: Legacy
High Speed	Tron: Legacy
Hot Wheels	Tron: Legacy
Hot Wheels	Twister
Hot Wheels	Ultraman
Hot Wheels	Ultraman
Hot Wheels	Viper
Hot Wheels	Weird Al’s Museum of Natural Hilarity
Houdini	Weird Al’s Museum of Natural Hilarity
Hurricane	Whirlwind
Independence Day*	Wild Fyre
Indiana Jones: The Pinball Adventure	Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory
Indiana Jones: The Pinball Adventure	Wing Ding
Iron Man	Wizard
Iron Man	Wizard of Oz, The
Jack in the Box	World Challenge Soccer
Jackbot	World Cup Soccer
Jacks Open	World Cup Soccer
Johnny Mnemonic	World Cup Soccer
Joust	WWF Royal Rumble
Judge Dredd	Xenon
Junk Yard	Zissou

In addition, there were seventeen more machines which made up the History of Pinball exhibition.

Airway	Major League
Airway	Master Play Boy
Ballyround	Official
Big Broadcast Special	Play Boy
Favorite	Relay Deluxe
Fisticuffs	Spit Fire
Fleet Jr.	Wings
Joy	World’s Series
Kings

Throughout the show, visitors could purchase raffle tickets to win a brand new Willy Wonka pinball machine by Jersey Jack Pinball. The draw would take place during the closing awards ceremony on Sunday afternoon.

Meanwhile, the final rounds of the Texas Wizards Tournament were taking place on Saturday night.

160 players were confirmed to compete, with a further 125 on a waiting list in case anyone dropped out.

The final was contested by Steven Bowden, Raymond Davidson, Chris Frame and Preston Moncla and was played over three machines – Aztec, Flash Gordon and Dialed In! – with a 4-2-1-0 scoring system.

Despite coming last on Aztec, Raymond Davidson went on to win the second and third games to give him 8 points and first place.

Steven Bowden took third and two seconds to end up second overall with 5 points. Preston Moncla and Chris Frame tied on 4 points each, so played a tie-breaker which Preston won to take third place.

Sunday

The Main Hall opened at 10am but it was a truncated day at the TPF as the closing ceremony took place in the Seminars Room at 2:30pm, hosted by show co-organiser, Ed VanderVeen.

To help relax after three days of action stress balls were distributed to the audience, although the method of distribution might have induced even more stress.

It is a tradition of the TPF that Best-in-Show awards are presented in a range of categories to those who brought games. In each category there were two runners-up and a winner, as chosen by Rich Wiski, Scott Martin, Keith Holbrook and Bill Morrison.

There was also an overall winner of the Grand Champion award. All category and Grand Champion winners received a plaque and a cash award, presented by Bill Morrison.

The category winners were:

• Best Pre-’60s: Airway, History of Pinball Exhibition
• Best ’60s: Ding, Colin Dowling
• Best ’70s Electromechanical: Wizard, Ken Head
• Best ’70s Solid-State: Sharpshooter, Jeff Bolich
• Best ’80s: Freefall, Bill Stahly
• Best ’90s: Lethal Weapon 3, James Alexander
• Best ’00s: Dale, Jr., Jason Turcyn
• Best Modern: Alien, Bobby Niefer/Lord of the Game Room
• Best Original: Spit Fire, Damon White
• Best Restoration: Batman, Jessica Richardson
• Best Custom Pinball: Billy Madison, Stupid Pinball
• Best Classic Video: Target Zero, Lonny Payne
• Best Custom/Innovative Video: Mortal Kombat 11 Extreme, Rodney Black
• Grand Champion: High Speed 2: The Getaway, Cary Hardy

The final event of the closing ceremony was the raffle draw for the new Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory pinball.

The winning ticket was drawn by the show’s special guest, Sylvester McCoy.

The game was won by Gary Walters.

With the raffle draw completed, the show officially closed and breakdown of the machines, stands and, yes, even the TARDIS could begin.

We hope you’ve enjoyed our coverage of the Texas Pinball Festival 2022. Will be back with more information from this year’s show, so check back to this page for all the latest updates.

In the meantime, here’s out exclusive Pinball News Thirty Minute Tour video of the main show hall at the Texas Pinball Festival 2022, shot on the Sunday morning.