Coin Slot Magazine - #047 - 1978 - December [International Arcade Museum]
room full of pinballs isn't worth starting if its future is to be a
clothes rack and bed for your cat.
Nobody's going to get rich, but an intelligently assembled col
In fact, somebody starting their
collection now, collecting games five years old or older should see
their collection appreciate in value, as there will be more and more
lection shouldn't cost too much.
newcomers bidding up prices in the years to come.
The cosmetics of a game effect its collectability monetarily
even more than the play.
It will probably always remain this way,
although the idealist would like to see a basket case Bank-A-Ball
bring more than, say, a cherry King Tut.
A deteriorating pinball
is heartbreaking, but it's better to hold your sweetheart tight on
the deck of the Titanic than it is to divorce her on a luxury cruise.
Don't throw away a large investment on a game with broken back-
glass, peeling paint, and broken cabinet - but if it plays well and the
price is reasonable, snap it up and play it and love it and do what
you can to reverse the effects of time.
Individual tastes vary as per what is a well-playing game. How
ever, it is safe to say that any Gottlieb single player made between
roughly 1950 and the present runs a good chance of becoming
anybody's favorite. These games are not cramped by the mass or
limitation of the multi-player format (see Nov. column). Most of
the games from 1950 to roughly 1970 were the work of one man,
Wayne Neyens. Neyens has since moved upwards in the Gottlieb
company to an Engineering Vice President post, and is only indir
ectly involved with the design of modern games.
His work of the
50's and 60's is deceptively simple in concept, yet complex in
execution* The Gottlieb game has always been gimmick-free. In
spite of this fact, their innovations now stud modern pinballs:
flippers, return lanes, banks of drop targets, end of ball bonus,
spinners.
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The Williams game of the 50's can be unusual or even downright
Take for example the placement of "special when lit" targets. The
Gottlieb targets are usually available at the very least through an
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