Tickle the Ringmaster? Sample vs Production differences on Cirqus Voltaire!

Pinball Shenanigans·video·14m 5s·analyzed·Feb 11, 2026

Analysis

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TL;DR

Cirqus Voltaire playfield differences documented: thicker ringmaster, text changes, dropped opto sensor.

Summary

Mike Doss of Pinball Shenanigans documents sample vs. production playfield differences on his 1997 Cirqus Voltaire, a rare sample unit (197th of ~200 made). He explains the four stages of pinball development (prototype, whitewood, sample, production) and details specific changes: ringmaster head thickened to prevent ball drops, insert text and colors modified, opto sensor dropped from menagerie zone, decals added to samples, and most notably, the original goal of 'Tickle The Ringmaster' changed to 'Defeat The Ringmasters' due to designer peer feedback.

Key Claims

Approximately 200 sample games of Cirqus Voltaire were made
high confidence · Mike Doss citing Pinside post on sample playfield development
The sample playfield had a skinny ringmaster head that sometimes caused the ball to drop into the cabinet, solved in production by thickening the head
high confidence · Mike Doss demonstrating the physical difference on his machine
The original game design goal was to 'Tickle The Ringmaster' but peers convinced designer John Popadiuk to change it to 'Defeat The Ringmasters'
high confidence · Mike Doss explaining designer intent and peer feedback
An opto sensor was routed into the menagerie zone on sample playfields but dropped from production, possibly to save money
high confidence · Mike Doss showing the playfield routing and cutout evidence
Sample playfields used decals (ringmaster images, 'Multiball' text) while production playfields had these elements printed directly
high confidence · Mike Doss comparing sample and production playfield photographs

Notable Quotes

“Sample games were set up to prepare the assembly production line for the game run and to get some games out in the market. Sample games were usually sent to test sites or locations like mine that had an agreement. And in return, we would have to inform them of any ball hang-ups, mechanical issues, and bookkeeping records from the game for the first few months.”
Coyote (Pinside user) @ ~2:30 — Defines the business and operational purpose of sample playfields in the Bally-Williams era
“The problem with that head is that once the ringmaster lowered into the playfield, sometimes—somehow—it would cause the ball to land inside the cabinet. So they made the ringmaster with a thicker head.”
Mike Doss@ 5:29 — Identifies the core mechanical issue that drove the ringmaster redesign
“I find it the most interesting one. So, designer John Popadiuk wanted the ringmaster character to be friendly. And, uh, initially the goal of the game was to tickle the ringmaster.”
Mike Doss@ 11:43 — Reveals the original friendly design intent and 'tickle' mechanic concept
“You know, that's just kind of weird tickling all these ringmasters. I think we should, um, beat on them.”
[name withheld pending review]@ 12:07 — Illustrates peer feedback that drove the gameplay theme shift away from 'tickle'
“And you can see that these inserts—um—are not only white, but they also say—it's kind of hard to see here—but 'Acrobats Ready' and 'Juggler Ready.' Mine just says 'Juggler' and 'Acrobats.'”
Mike Doss@ 6:19 — Demonstrates insert text clarification changes between sample and production

Entities

Mike DosspersonCirqus Voltairegame John Popadiukperson BallycompanyCoyotepersonPinsideorganizationInternet Pinball Serial Number DatabaseorganizationMike Hanleyperson

Signals

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restoration_signal: Detailed video documentation of sample playfield differences on Circus Voltaire, including physical modifications (ringmaster head), insert text variations, and dropped features (opto sensor). Demonstrates collector research methodology using serial number databases and community forums.
high · Mike Doss systematically comparing sample and production playfields with photographic evidence and playfield routing documentation
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design_philosophy: Original Circus Voltaire design goal was 'Tickle The Ringmaster' to maintain friendly character tone per designer John Papaduke, but peer feedback drove change to 'Defeat The Ringmasters' for more conventional gameplay language. Reflects creative direction negotiation in game design process.
high · Mike Doss citing John Papaduke's intent and explaining peer feedback that redirected the theme
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design_innovation: Ringmaster head design evolution from thin to thick profile to prevent ball drop-through, demonstrating iterative mechanical refinement between sample and production stages
high · Mike Doss showing physical comparison of sample vs. production ringmaster heads and explaining the functional issue
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manufacturing_signal: Transition from decal-based graphics (sample) to direct printing (production) for ringmaster images and 'Multiball' text; opto sensor feature dropped from production possibly to reduce costs
high · Mike Doss comparing decal application on sample playfield to printed graphics on production playfield; noting the opto sensor routing was cut
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historical_signal: Detailed documentation of Bally-Williams four-stage playfield development process (prototype, whitewood, sample, production) and the operational role of sample games as test/location units with feedback loops for quality control

Transcript

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0:03

Okay, so here is my Bali Circus Voltater from 1997. When I first brought this into the basement and started to shop it up, I was recording and posting videos on it and someone pointed out that, hey, you have a sample playfield. I didn't really know what that meant at the time, but I have since um done a bunch of research and I'm going to talk about the differences between well, first what a sample playfield is and the differences specifically between the sample playfield and the production playfield on this Circus Voltater machine. And there's a bunch of differences and uh don't know that it's really been documented before in a video form. So, I thought it would make for an interesting video. [music] I'm Mike Dus and this is Pinball Shenanigans. [music]

1:11

So, there's basically four stages of development when it comes to pinball playfields. You got your prototypes, then you got your whitewoods, then you have sample playfields, and then you have production playfields. On pin side here, someone by the name of Coyote posted what he knew about sample playfields. And here it says, "In the Bali Williams days, hardware game production was three steps. Prototype, sample, production. Prototypes were made by hand and kept close to the development team used for developing art, sounds, and software, and finalizing rules. Prototypes came right after the Whitewoods. Sample games were made once things leveled out. Sample games were set up to prepare the assembly production line for the game run and to get some games out in the market. Sample games were usually sent to test sites or locations like mine that had an agreement. And in return, we would have to inform them of any ball hang-ups, mechanical issues, and bookkeeping records from the game for the first few months. My location, we could then purchase the game at a discount or if we didn't want it, send it back. Changes were made to the art, mechanical bits, and software changes as the game then went into production. Some games had big changes between sample and production. And he puts, for example, Circus Volater and Twilight Zone, while others had very little, like Road Show. So, in the case of Circus Volater, there were approximately 200 sample games made. This is my serial number here. Manufacturing date 9121 1997. And you can see the serial number 5336210 0. And then this 197 pretty much means that it was the 197th playfield made of the samples. This is an interesting website that I go to from time to time. It's the internet pinball serial number database. And so the other day I was checking out the serial numbers for Circus Voltater and I found that my machine had already been entered probably by the previous owner. It starts with the lowest numbered um serial number. Uh these here I believe are going to be the prototypes and then you can see that there's this blue parentheses here that ends right there. All the serial numbers in this zone here are samples. And you can see here's mine right here, one zero 1 97. And that is the only one that is located in Canada that has been uploaded to the uh database. And then from here on down are your production playfields. Actually, I'm not really sure what this means here. But uh yeah, they made 274 circus voltaars including the samples. Of course, they're not all entered in the database, but found that to be somewhat interesting. Okay, just for fun, let's click on my serial number. And what I just discovered is that this was submitted while it was in my possession, but not by me cuz I am not FunHouse. So maybe someone saw my video and uh posted it for me just to have it documented. So I guess uh thank you Funhouse for submitting my serial number. Okay. So now that we know what a sample playfield is, I'm going to talk about the differences between this sample and the production playfield. Probably the biggest one is that most samples and prototypes had a skinnier version of the ring master. And the problem with that head is that once the ring master lowered into the playfield, sometimes somehow it would cause the ball to land inside the cabinet. So they made the ring master with a thicker head. This is what the original skinny ring master looked like. Might be hard to tell, but have a look at that. And we'll go back over to the machine. And here again is the fathead ring master. You can see his neck is just kind of filled with all those riffles and uh that prevented the ball from dropping into the cabinet. Another minor difference is that this juggler insert is orange on the sample playfield as well as the Acrobats insert there. On the production playfield, you can see that these inserts um are not only white, but they also say, it's kind of hard to see here, but Acrobats ready and juggler ready. Mine just says juggler and acrobats. I guess they wanted to just let you know that hey after you've hit one, two, three shots up the left orbit now your juggler multiballs ready to start locking balls. So again here you can see just says juggler doesn't say juggler ready. And same with acrobats and I do prefer the yellow inserts actually. Here's a couple other changes that were made that are sort of related to each other. This here says crank and this is the marvel for the spinner. And this here says crank me up behind the spinner. And then you've got these four inserts here. So they ended up changing crank marble to spin and they added sp i n letters to these inserts. Here you can see the production playfield says spin and it says spin on the inserts as well. So when I was playing the other day, you got the sideshow insert here. This is for your sort of mystery mode. and I couldn't quite figure out how to light it when it was already used up. And I accidentally discovered that hitting these targets is what reit. Uh you can see there's no text in front of these inserts on the sample playfield. So you can see here on the production playfield they added the text BHO in front of the targets, although it's pretty hard to see. Okay, this is one of the bigger changes that was um dropped from production. So, in the sample playfields, they initially were going to put in an Eddie sensor switch right here in this managerie zone so that when you hit the ball, it would register a hit just like the ring master. There's a Eddie sensor right here. So, as soon as the ball crosses it, you hit the ring master. They were going to have one of those right here. So, they had the playfield routed out. There's an insert here and um they ended up dropping that from production possibly to save money, but I have the insert under the playfield and just because it was there I decided to add a flasher and light it up so you have this effect. So on the sample playfield with the flasher added, you can see the managerie insert lights up. Here is what that insert looks like from underneath the playfield. You can see the cutout for it. And uh that's where the Eddie sensor was going to go, but that was cut from production. And you can see that in uh this playfield here. So, this appears to be a photo of a new playfield. And this is the zone right here that uh the insert would have been, but that was cut from production. When I first started shopping up this machine and noticed these decals right here, I was wondering what is going on with these. But now we know what's going on. These were added onto the sample playfield. They're heavy duty decals. This is a ring master here, a ring master here, and a ring master here. And on the production playfields, that's printed right on, of course. And also, they added the word multiball to each of these inserts. And on this photo here, you can see the printed ring masters and the words multiball printed right onto the uh production playfield. There is one more decal that was added and that is this defeated all ring masters decal. You can kind of maybe see the edge on that. But uh this change would have required you know physical and software changes because underneath this decal the insert says visit ring three and um they just thought it would make more sense to have it say defeat all ring masters once you defeat these three guys. I think it's four total actually. So, it just I guess made more sense because you got ring one here, ring two, ring three, and then visit ring three. It's just one of those changes that was made to make more sense of everything. And I'll show you what that insert looks like. You can actually see it from underneath the playfield somewhat, but I have a photo somewhere. Someone did up this whole map chart here on Pinsside that talks about the differences between the prototype machine sample and production playfields. And on this particular photo, you can see here just barely visit ring three. And we have one last change. I find it the most interesting one. So, designer John Papaduk wanted the ring master character to be friendly. And uh initially the goal of the game was to tickle the ring master. And uh you'll notice when playing this game occasionally you shoot the ball at him and he giggles. So, I think John Papa's peers said, "You know, that's just kind of weird tickling all these ring masters. I think we should um beat on them." And that text tickle the was changed to defeat the ring masters and that's reflected here as well. So, I think uh defeating ring masters sounds much better than tickling them. And here you can see that change on the production playfield. Much better. All right. Well, I hope you enjoyed the video. Now you [music] know what a sample playfield is. Hopefully I described it sufficiently and you especially know the differences specifically on this Circus Volater pinball machine. So, hope you enjoyed. Thanks for watching. Oh, and just a quick little Easter egg. John Papa's good buddy, Mike Hanley, got his name into the uh Backplexi here. Hanley Cable Company. There's a little Easter egg for you. Okay, before I go, I'm going to show you one more little Easter egg. If I can get this to work,