Lansing Pinball League

Tag: recap

  • League Night Recap for 8/14/24

    Season 21 got off to a huge start on August 14 with one of the biggest groups we’ve had in a while and possibly the most people who have ever joined at once since I became director. A total of 22 people played including a guest player. Our new players were Dana, Amy, Jessica, Donald, Erin, Orneal, Emily, and Scott, and the guest player was Lillium. I know Donald and Jessica from the Grand Rapids pinball scene. Donald and I used to frequently end up in the same group at GRPL back in the Pyramid Scheme days, and Jessica and I have played each other in GR’s Belles and Chimes. Everyone else was totally new to me and honestly I am dreading having to tell everyone I have forgotten their names already when I see them tomorrow. (I am usually pretty good at learning up to two new members’ names per night, but past that and I can’t retain them.) Of course, that’s a great problem to have and if they do all come back, we’ll know it means we did not scare them off. I did start off by telling the regulars to try not to be weird, but for some reason this instruction was not taken seriously. In addition to the new players, we also had the return of longtime, off-and-on league member Jason.

    Joseph contends with The Simpsons, which was playing a bit erratically due to issues with the lock.

    This was the first time in League history that league night has been something other than Tuesday. Our August meetings are on Wednesday due to The Avenue closing Tuesdays over the summer, a new schedule this year. We will return to Tuesday meetings in September.

    Jason plunges on Jaws in the Smackdown contest.

    Our first two banks were Ophiuchus and Lepus, named for constellations. Ophiuchus is the Serpent-Bearer, and is actually probably the most tightly-themed bank in the season. Most of the games in Ophiuchus feature a snake or serpent; the only exception is Jurassic Park, because dinosaurs would have to be good enough. Lepus, the Hare, is very loosely themed as “things that go fast” except for The Beatles, which is in there because Lepus is my favorite constellation and The Beatles is maybe my favorite game at The Avenue.

    Linda, Ethan, and Jason waiting to play in the Smackdown.

    Our Tuesday Night Smackdown – still so-called despite being on Wednesday – was Jaws. Probably unsurprisingly, it was won by Ethan, who is a big fan of the game. Joseph took first in the B division “Undercard” on Elvira’s House of Horrors.

    Ethan and Joseph celebrate their Smackdown wins.

    Will we break new attendance records at our next meeting tomorrow? I look forward to finding out! See you all soon!

  • Brian defends league title for Season XX in epic two-day battle

    Season XX ended with an unprecedented two-day league finals as Brian took two long matches to triumph over Tim. The hour grew so late that the bar began closing and the tournament director had to call time and reschedule the last match for another night.

    Season XX champion and second place Tim.

    Some had predicted that this might finally be Tim’s season, but it would be a tough battle for them, as they had already taken a loss going into finals against Brian. This meant that Season XIX champ Brian would only have to win one match to prevail, but Tim would have to win two. Tim had previously defeated Josh 2-1 to come out on top of the second-chance bracket, giving Josh third place.

    Josh, expressing his delight with the third place trophy.

    The first match between Brian and Tim went to three games, eventually giving the victory to Tim and putting them into a second match. As the last game of the match ended it was around 1:50 am and the bar was shutting down, so tournament director Heather (yes, that is me) declared that the last match would have to take place at a time agreed to by both of the other parties.

    B division champion Devon and second place Donny.

    That ended up being two days later on Thursday. The two competitors met in the comparative quiet bar around 7 pm to resume, and after a brief warmup period they resumed the battle. It went to three games again, meaning that they had to play the full six games in order to settle things. Brian came out on top this time, retaining his title as the league champion and giving Tim second place.

    Biff shows his B division third place trophy.

    Meanwhile, back on Tuesday night, the B division also had some hot competition, but as there were only eight players it did not run nearly so late. Biff and Devon went to three games, leading to Devon moving on to finals and Biff taking home the third place trophy. Devon then played two matches against Donny which also went to the full six games, 2-1 for Devon in each match. During their last game, the tournament director checked in to see the status of the match and Devon declared that it was as good as over since he had probably just lost to Donny on Ghostbusters. Instead he rallied, winning Ghostbusters and a very hard-fought B division title.

    The Tuesday Night Smackdown side tournament was also held, despite the usual low participation for finals night. The arena was Foo Fighters and the winner was Ethan, who wrote another IOU on behalf of Heather for a button. Heather, however, declared that this time it was not marked with the phrase “official signature” and was therefore invalid.

    Tonight is Super-Ball XX, the split flipper tournament colloquially known as the Zen Tournament. The format will be the same as for league finals but the tournament director has expressed the hope that it will not need to take two sessions.

  • League Night Recap for 4/9/24

    We started our final bank rotation on 4/9 and mercifully, this time people voted for the wild card games to be stuff upstairs rather than in the alcove. The talk before league started centered on the previous day’s total solar eclipse. Joseph and I had gone to Cedar Point to watch it. Ethan wanted us to know that he was definitely not envious of this because while he had seen it in Muncie, it lasted 20 more seconds for him.

    The usual suspects.

    Danny wasn’t present during roll call and I felt sure he would probably show up in time, so I commented, “That’s all right, when he comes I’ll just put him in a group with Derik and Dan.” Danny did come midway through the first game and I flipped a coin to determine what bank he’d be in. Then I asked which of the three groups he wanted to be in. He said he really didn’t care, so, being the imp that I am, I sent him over to the closest group which indeed had Derik and Dan (and Curtis) in it. When I walked up, Derik was player 3 and in the middle of a multiball on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I was hoping to still put in a fourth player and saw that Derik had both balls trapped so I said “Hey Derik” and just then he started flipping again and I said “Nevermind, I was going to ask you something while you were trapped. ” He tried to trap again and lost one of the balls in the process, which I apologized profusely for, but he was nonchalant about it. I fed quarters into the game while he trapped his remaining ball so we could hit the start button and put Danny in.

    Tim poses after winning on Jaws! Unfortunately there are no prizes at the moment as my button maker is out of commission.

    Our Smackdown game was finally on Jaws! Not too many people played, so we ended up with a two-person group (Mark and Cyndi) on Scared Stiff in the B division. Tim apparently brought a big enough boat to Jaws, and Mark won on Scared Stiff.

    Our next meeting (in a couple of hours) is our last qualifying meeting of the season. This will determine who makes A division and what seeds everyone gets for finals. See you shortly!

  • League Night Recap for 3/19/24

    Our last league night was three weeks ago now, a longer gap than usual due to the bar unexpectedly closing Monday and Tuesday last week. Between that, the mountain of grading I’m buried under (students are going to riot soon if I don’t get some old grades back), and the fact that I’m still shaken up from seeing the total eclipse yesterday, my memories of last league night are pretty fuzzy. It was our last night with banks 5 and 6, meaning that tonight we’ll embark on the final bank rotation between 7 and 8.

    A typical league night crowd: Derik, Curtis, Brian, Ted, Devon, and Adam.

    One notable event I do remember is that we were joined by former league player Jake VanKempen, playing as a guest player. Jake goes back to the early days of the league, or as we like to call them, the Theio’s days (IYKYK). Jake was a little miffed to learn that the new league rules mean that anyone playing after the midseason has to play as a guest player, meaning their scores do not count. He said that if he was going to come all the way out to play for no points I should at least put him in “a good group, like one with Dan.” He also mentioned a couple of other names but I honestly don’t remember who they were. As it happens, when I drew for him (he was running late) I did draw him into a group with Dan N., AKA half of Double Dan-ger. The other half ended up in another group for a change.

    Devon watches with admiration as Curtis tears up Godzilla.

    Now that banks 5 and 6 are both finished, we can take a look at the standings at the end of the night. Tim won Argo Navis (Bank 5) with solid to great games on everything. Derik took honors in Bank 5 (Cetus) with a mediocre game on Medieval Madness but great games on everything else, including a huge 942 million on Godzilla. That was not, however, the biggest score on Godzilla; that distinction goes to Curtis, who did around 1.3 billion.

    A rare photo of me for the league report, taken by Joseph. I am starting the Smackdown game on Indiana Jones.

    We were still unable to use Jaws due to its placement in Bank 5 (Argo Navis), so our Smackdown game was the random selection of Indiana Jones. For the second time in a row, Joseph won the Smackdown and I got second. The B division was on Star Trek and in that arena Dan prevailed. Unfortuantely I had no buttons to give out because my button press is out of commission. It’s not pressing correctly and I can’t figure out why, but I hope to get that fixed eventually and give everyone the back buttons they are owed.

    The champs: Smackdown winner Single Dan-ger and undercard winner Joseph.

    Tonight will start our final rotation, including the wild card games that the league voted to include in Bank 8. See you all very soon!

  • League Night Recap for 3/5/24 (plus March Hare Madness!)

    Derik does some quick work on Deadpool to get it running for league.

    We passed the halfway mark of the season with our last meeting, at which we played banks 5 and 6, Argo Navis (the ship Argo) and Cetus (the sea monster). These were very appropriate banks for our first night with our shiny new Jaws LE game. Jaws was conveniently slotted into Argo Navis to replace the game that left to make room for it, Guns and Roses. This did mean we had to break our tradition of using the newest game for Tuesday Night Smackdown. Instead, Metallica got drawn for that honor.

    It looked like we might have to replace Deadpool as it was suddenly not registering the scoop right before league was going to start. But Derik went and got his equipment and did some quick soldering, allowing us to start with the bank intact and just a few minutes late.

    Mark plays The Mandalorian in Bank 6.

    For some reason, it was a night with light attendance, and the number of people in attendance meant that some people were in two-player groups. I ended up playing with Ted and we both felt like we had solid nights. I had one embarrassingly bad game, but otherwise always felt like I was playing at least mediocre, and consistently mediocre is often enough to do pretty well. Everyone finished pretty early, and we started the Smackdown well before our average start time of 10 pm. So far, Derik is the champion of bank 5; appropriately, his Jaws score was huge. Tim has the lead in Bank 6 with big scores on just about everything in the bank.

    Joseph plays in the Smackdown.

    In the Smackdown, Tim won B division, which is well known to be the Best division, and Joseph was the overall champion on Metallica.

    The following Tuesday was the Stephen T. Kendrick Memorial March Hare Madness Charity Pinball Tournament, named in honor of a very special rabbit. We had 15 people attend, which is around average for this particular tournament. In recent years it has been a Critical Hit tournament, using the original Critical Hit Matchplay Edition deck. This continues to be a popular format – well, except among who keep getting bad card draws. A standout moment was when Ethan played the most powerful card in the deck, one that forces another player to trade games with you after Ball 2. Danny was then compelled to give up two high scoring balls on Tales of the Arabian Nights to play Ball 3 starting from about a million points. Ethan was so delighted by this that he came over to tell me before returning to his game. A while later he reappeared and, while laughing so hard he was wheezing, eventually managed to get out that Danny had come back and won anyway.

    B division winner Tim and Smackdown champ Joseph showing off their buttons.

    Things ran fairly late as always, and a few people ended up dropping out before the end, including Derik who would have made finals but decided to leave without playing. That bumped me up into finals. Unfortunately, Brian started the round by making everyone discard a random card, and that cost me the card I had been saving, one that forces someone to stop playing immediately. I was left with only a card I drew at the beginning, which makes everyone in the group play an entire game with the display covered. The game I deployed it on was Willy Wonka, so we had the ridiculous situation of having to cover just about the entire backbox of the game with newspaper. I don’t think it could have really helped me at that point, but as I said at the time, “I just want to watch the world burn.”

    Joseph, to his surprise, ended up winning March Hare Madness, with Tim in second, and Brian in third. I ended up with fourth. And that’s another March Hare Madness in the books. We made $256 for the Rabbit and Small Animal Rescue, thanks in considerable part to a $100 donation from Pinball Pete’s, as well as all the players.

  • League Night Recap for 2/6/24

    Last league night was our third of the season, so it started a rotation between banks 3 and 4 (“Corvus” and “Perseus”). The night’s winner on Corvus – so far, as this is only with half the league having played it – was Tim, which included a stunning 108M game on The Munsters. The winner so far on Perseus was dark horse Biff. A lot of league members don’t even know Biff as he often arrives to play his games after others have finished for the night.

    Ethan gets ready to go on a Space Gem quest on The Avengers.

    I was going to play my second game of the night when I heard a timid voice say, “Is it too late to join the Lansing Pinball League?” I turned to see who this newcomer was, and it was actually longtime league member Mike! Mike took last season off and had missed the first two nights of this season, so I was very happy to see him again.

    I was in a group with Ethan, Devon, and Adam, and there was a good deal of jollity going on. There was a lot of trash talking going on, mostly between Ethan and Devon, but Adam got in a great line too. At one point he responded to someone griping about his achievements with the classic line, delivered with sassy confidence, “It’s called luck. Deal with it.” (I can’t quite remember now what he was responding to, but it might have been Devon observing that he’d beaten Adam on every game except one.)

    Linda and Mark play in the Smackdown while Curtis watches.

    I mentioned to Devon that although I enjoy the atmosphere of women’s tournaments in a lot of ways, one thing I do miss is the trash talking. In my experience, you just don’t get it at women’s tournaments. One of the things I immediately loved when I first set foot in the Lansing Pinball League was watching players collegially insult each other. It was one of the things that let me know I was going to love pinball league. Devon apparently made a mental note that it was OK to trash talk me. Later in the evening I was playing really bad on Elvira’s House of Horrors, and afterward Devon approached me as though he wanted to talk to me about something confidential. In a very serious voice he said, “Is everything all right?” I thought I must be giving off some vibes of someone going through a personal crisis, and my mind began racing as I tried to figure out what might be causing me to look that way. But before I could respond, he followed up with, “Because you’re playing terrible.” I nearly doubled over laughing.

    Ethan remembers what shirt he’s wearing.

    Our Tuesday Night Smackdown side tournament game was on Jurassic Park, with the B division playing off on Ghostbusters. Danny won the Jurassic Park game (no surprises there) and Ethan won Ghostbusters, prompting someone to remind him that he was wearing a Ghostbusters shirt under his hoodie, which he had completely forgotten about.

    Ethan and Danny with their amazing Smackdown trophies.

    That’s all for this week’s recap, but we’re meeting tonight to finish up the bank rotation, so I’m hoping to see everyone soon.

  • League Night Recap for 1/9/24

    We began our 20th season with Ethan wishing everyone he saw “Happy new year!” I reminded everyone that we were now starting season “Double X.” My joke was that we were not quite bad enough yet to be “Triple X.” Joseph’s joke was that next season would be “Double Sever.” Two new players joined this season. One of them, Jack, had previously played in the Fear and Trembling Charity Pingolf Tournament, but is new to league. He recently moved to Lansing from the Cincinnati area. Devon brought along the other new player, his friend Rob.

    The banks this season are roughly the same as last, with a few adjustments made due to the game lineup changing. The bank theme is still “Constellations, or, The Starry Skies Above,” although my attempt to mildly theme each night’s bank has already been mocked by fate. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles went down before the night started (at least no one had played it yet) and I chose a game from our designated bank for pulling substitutes from. I wanted to avoid something in the alcove as we were already playing several games down there, so I switched in The Simpsons Pinball Party. That means TMNT has been moved to Bank 7, “Canis Minor.”

    Hey!!

    When we arrived, we discovered that our usual practice of standing behind the upstairs bar to make announcements and sort groups had been rudely denied. The Avenue had put up a rope across the bar entrance! Surely this wasn’t targeted toward us… was it?

    The first two weeks we are rotating players between Banks 1 and 2, known (to me) as “Ophiuchus (the Snake Bearer)” and “Lepus (the Hare).” I got sorted into Lepus along with new player Jack and Ethan, from an adjacent group, began telling Jack how good I was at The Beatles and how he shouldn’t feel bad because I was about to blow it up. I nervously told Ethan that he was jinxing me by saying that, but in fact I did have quite a good Beatles game. It was the best one of the half of the league that played it that night, but I’m sure I will be dethroned when the other half of the league plays tonight.

    Linda and Joseph watching the Smackdown games.

    The winner for the night on bank Ophiuchus was Danny (surprise?) followed by Joseph and then Dan. The Lepus winner was a tie between me (thanks Beatles) and Derik, with Ethan coming in third.

    Smackdown champ Danny and undercard winner Ethan.

    We also played a Tuesday Night Smackdown on James Bond. Danny kicked off the Smackdown season with a win, and Ethan won the B division on Medieval Madness.

    That wraps up the league report for the first night of our 20th season. The weather may keep some people away tonight but I am hoping to see most of you in a few hours!

    Joseph requested a photo of him creeping on Ethan after losing the Smackdown undercard to him.

  • Brian Triumphs over Danny in Season 19 Finals

    Brian K. is the new Lansing Pinball League champion after dethroning two-season champ Danny in a late-night final bout on December 5. This is Brian’s first time as LPL champion. The tournament went only one round in finals, with Danny fighting from the second-chance bracket. While a two-round final match is more dramatic, it would have been very inconvenient in this case, as it was nearing closing for The Avenue and the staff were already going around shutting off the pinball games. Third place went to Josh.

    Looks like someone made Dan play Turtles. I know that couldn’t have been his pick.

    In the B division bracket, dark horse Biff defeated Grant for the top trophy. Ann-Marie got third. Many league players don’t even know who Biff is, because he makes liberal use of the rule that allows players to start the night late as long as they are present by 10 pm. He often comes in around 9:30 and runs through his games on his own. His final match with Grant was very exciting and after it was over, Biff declared that it was the most fun he had ever had playing pinball.

    Dan and Tim with their Smackdown buttons.

    There was also a very small Tuesday Night Smackdown tournament on The Simpsons Pinball Party, which was not being used in finals due to recent issues with it (though Derik tells me they are now fixed). Tim won the Smackdown and Dan won the Undercard.

    The B division finalists: first place Biff, second place Grant, and third place Ann-Marie.

    There was no chance of a Double Dan-ger finish again this season, as both Dans were in the A bracket this time. Instead, the Double Dan-ger was all mine, since I got knocked from the winner bracket to the second-chance bracket by Dan N., and then knocked out of the tournament by Danny.

    Linda, Grant, Cyndi, Ann-Marie, and Ethan, hanging out after B division finals.

    We also gave out the Best Game, Worst Game, and Most Improved awards for the season. Pat won Best Game for a blowup on Ghostbusters that was way above the night’s mean. After some comparison of candidates based on Joseph’s statistical analysis, the Most Improved award was presented to Dan N. Joseph noted that Brian K. had also been a strong contender for Most Improved, meaning that somehow, as good as he was, he managed to get even better.

    Brian walks away as he wins Game of Thrones against Danny in finals.

    The league’s post-season tournament, Super-Ball XIX, also called the Zen Tournament, is tonight, and the next season will start on January 9.

    Josh and his third place plaque.

    First place Brian and second place Danny.

  • League Night Recap for 11/21/23

    Our last league night, the final qualifying night of the season, was just two days before Thanksgiving. Despite encroaching on the holiday, there was a good turnout, since everyone was making use of their last chance to improve or retain their seed for the final playoffs.

    See? We don’t need that photo booth.

    The final two banks, Perseus and Coma Berenices, both contained one of the league’s newest games, Foo Fighters and Venom. Coma Berenices also contained the games that had been elected by the League as wild cards. As a result of the final bank not being part of my original bank organization, we had several games all in use in the alcove, which I try hard to avoid when I set the banks at the beginning of the season. Normally we would not have five games all being played in the alcove. We had two guest players, Jamison and his son Owen, who were checking out the league, and I had to reassure them that it isn’t usually like playing inside a sardine can. Owen is normally off being a student at GVSU and was on break for Thanksgiving, but Jamison lives relatively close by and I told him he should come back when we start a new league season.

    Tim ponders what to get from the spider wheel.

    Danny C. ended up placing first for both of the banks and, unsurprisingly, will also be the top seed in playoffs, with a pretty big points margin. Brian K. in second and Tim in third are clustered a little closer together.

    The Avenue’s famously eclectic vending machine often stocks bags of stick-on googly eyes. Someone had been going to work with them, resulting in Pete’s pink elephant and the Foo Bot each having one giant googly eye.

    Now that’s some side eye.

    Our Tuesday Night Smackdown game for the night was Scared Stiff and the champ on that was Danny. Devon won the B division game on Foo Fighters.

    Tonight is our final playoffs and that will determine who is the Season 19 champion. Will it be Danny again? Will Tim finally get his win? Or will it be relative newcomer Brian K.? We’ll find out sometime tonight… or early tomorrow morning.

  • On November 7, we started our final bank rotation, which will complete tonight. One of the games we were supposed to play, James Bond, had an issue so it was replaced with The Beatles (the runner-up from the vote for the wild card slots in Bank 8). Early on, it was discovered that The Beatles had a drop target issue that was causing people to get a mode selected for them at the start of the ball, and not the same mode every time, so I made the call to also pull The Beatles and it got randomly replaced by Jurassic Park. At one point there was a moment when I thought we would have to also pull Elvira’s House of Horrors again, but it seemed to straighten itself out adequately after a ball search so fortunately it stayed in.

    We also had some trouble with our Smackdown game, which was supposed to be Getaway, causing Joseph to write “You’re welcome, Tim” on the rule sheet. Ethan “broke” it during an attempt to qualify, so I chose a random replacement, which was The Avengers. I scribbled out “You’re welcome” and wrote “Sorry.” During finals, however, Tim ended up blowing the game up and taking first, so Joseph pointed at his original message and said “See? See??”

    Devon plays in the Smackdown finals while Jim gets ready for the B division behind him.

    Jim was back, and greeted me with “Guess who was here on Halloween?” Unfortunately, it turns out that Jim missed the memo that we were going to meet twice in a row and then skip Halloween, so he missed a league meeting and then showed up confused on Halloween. I was also at the bar on Halloween, though I apparently showed up late enough that I didn’t run into Jim or any other league folks, and it was jammed. We would not have wanted to try to have league that night.

    Jim watches Cyndi play in the B division finals on KISS.

    We ended up with a group that included both of the Dans again (who were the A and B division camps last season). Everyone started calling the group “Double Dan-ger” as a result, which I think is going to end up sticking as a name for Dan N. and Danny.

    Double Dan-ger had a great night: the winner for the first half of Bank 7 (“Perseus”) (which can, of course, change as the other half of the league plays it tonight) was Dan and second place was Danny. Over in Bank 8 (“Coma Berenices”), the top scorer for the night was Brian K., followed by Pat. After the dust settles tonight, we’ll know the final seeds for the season, and who will get to make the cut for A division. Given the number of people qualified to play finals, it looks like we will have a 10-person A division.