I'm Mike Dus [music] and this is Pinball Shenanigans. [music] All right, we're taking the 6-h hour plus trek to Ottawa for the provincial championships. And finally, we're getting past this plow that has kind of [ __ ] blocked us for a little while. Me and the wife in this car.
Hello. Hello.
And if we can catch up here. Oh, you little bugger trying to chop us. Anyway, way up there. If you can see the orange car, you probably can. That is Julie and Shiny Boy. We're just following each other all the way. How long we've been driving now? A few hours.
Yeah.
Oh boy.
Almost. Oh boy.
Almost.
And we're going to go stop at Costco for a hot dog lunch. It's going to be yummy.
Fancy seeing you here.
How about that?
Good idea at the Costco lunch. Yeah. Where's Julie? You ready for some Costco lunch? We're halfway there.
I'm I'm actually not hungry. No, I'm not actually either yet,
but uh we're gonna take some wieners to go.
$150.
Yeah, it's
Shaunie's favorite lunch.
Yeah. And they got fountain diet coke now.
Who likes that?
What about the shenanigans about your purse? What happened? [laughter] Come all the way to Ottawa purseless. Almost was going to turn back at Woodstock to go grab that. But
so basically what happened was I had my knapsack with, you know, stuff in it and then I had my purse sitting there and I put the knapsack in the car and I had it I didn't have it in the kitchen.
Yeah.
So I checked, oh, am I missing anything? You know, you got like got a pillow and I got this bag and I got food bag and and I left the purse.
Left the purse.
Look at he's got his meat.
Got his meat and wine. He's set for tonight. It's like these.
Here's our Costco score. One
I brought high boots and I brought these
three wieners. I don't know what they
Doritos.
27 packs of gum.
I brought my
How many pounds of uh protein?
It's like enough for 6 months.
There you go. Jamie's got some slippers. Shiny's got some boots. We scored large.
I didn't even need my foot.
Ah, see, you're going to survive just fine. There it is. There's our sign. Ottawa. All right, this is home sweet home for a couple days. Check this out. This is a pretty cool Airbnb. It's got the craziest floors. Got TVs galore. Got brand new pretty much everything. Kitchen, island, office. And then there are bathroom here, bedroom here, and bedroom here. Our bedroom has an on suite.
Oh, yeah. We've got on suite. All the bathrooms are occupied right now cuz we just got here. So, everybody had to pee. All right. I'm here at the Ottawa Pinball Arcade. And uh we're here for the Ontario Provincial Championships, which is happening tomorrow. In the meanwhile, today, which is uh Friday, we are doing a little warm-up tournament. So, [music] uh take you for a tour. Mr. Tolas is running the show. What's up? So, this is the space here. I'll uh just kind of waltz around
all the uh edges and then I'll kind of show you the whole thing. Oh, we got live action here between Donna and Shaunie Boy. I just finished playing all my games. This was like a max match play. Here's a view of the whole space. Check it out. It's pretty sweet, actually. They've had this space for about eight years and then they're going to expand. This is Mike Loftess of Pinball Medics and I was talking to him and he said that the new space that they have is uh going to be like seven times as big and they're going to have in the neighborhood of like a 100 pinball machines. This is my first time ever here and uh it's a good warm up for tomorrow and practice. get a feel for uh how these machines play, their level, their pitch, their kickouts, flipper alignments and bounces. They've got uh some super bands on the flippers. So, some some getting familiar and getting used to some of these games so that uh tomorrow we can you know choose the games that we want to play cuz uh for the provincial championships it is uh heads up it's actually for now it's going to be me versus Eric who is probably the one that had to drive the longest to get here from Windsor which is about 8 hours and change. was only 6 hours from London only. End change, but so it's a best of seven. Sneak around back here. Show you the back action. Best of seven.
What's up, boys and girls?
What? All of Maple is back here.
The whole of Maple Pinballiz.
Patient zero. I didn't know that's you. No, you taking over that role. You're taking over that role. Actually, that all stems back to uh Mr. uh shall I say his name? Um Bob Matthews. So, this is going to be all streamed tomorrow. Oh, check it out. There's all everybody.
All the security action. But yeah, this is the the pinballers will be on Twitch tomorrow with the live stream. Anyway, so each player picks a game that is old, a game that is mid era and a game that is new, and then you just go back and forth between each other's games. Like I said, best of seven. Winner advances and it is a 24 player bracket.
So basically,
you have to win about what five matches total. and you will be the the Ontario provincial champion. What's up, buddy?
Dinosaur.
Yo, good, good.
Um, that is basically the tour right there. So, pretty cool space. Lot of games in here. got a mix of uh you know we got Jersey Jack, we got some like old school T3 White Star, we got some WPC, some system uh 11 Funhouse Demo Man, and then a mix of uh arcade stuff as well. So
yo, it's
the first time two players from Hamilton City Pinball League have qualified for provincial.
Oh, very good.
Peter Tap.
Peter Chaplain.
And Peter Chaplain
and yourself.
Nice, man. That's awesome.
Two Hamiltoners.
Two Hamilton players qualified for the provincials for the first time. So that's pretty sweet.
How's it going, Shauny boy? Are you saying
Well, they're flipping the standings upside down.
Yeah. Let's see.
If the standings are flipped upside down, Shauny Boy will be in first place instead of
uh you know, he's not having his best uh performance today, and neither am I. I'm I'm done. This was uh I think 42 players for the warm-up tournament and uh top like 12 make it to the playoffs and uh I am nowhere near. So anyway, that's the action for tonight. Tulus is going to run like a little two strike uh just for fun. Actually, not for fun. What does the winner of the two strike tournament get? $5 cash.
Free to get in.
Hey,
infinite return.
Infinite return. That's right. So, free money. All right. I hear there's some shenanigans going over on the uh the royal flush here.
Let's go. Uh let's go see what's going on over here.
So, what's going on with the royal flush here? What's happening with this? The uh flippers are not at an acceptable level of strength for this arcade. So,
you're adding modern stern flippers to an old electromechanical machine.
All the coils are uh converted to DC current.
Oh my god. This is uh this is some serious This is This is like super high tapping.
I've never seen anything like this before. This thing is going to
Every single game has had that done.
Is it really? I noticed
also that your pop bumpers are like so very active. It's like they're like also turbocharged it seems like. Or you just have them.
What did you do?
We did a few things. We First thing we do is we always put in a a Williams 20 volt coil in it.
Oh yeah.
Fires like crazy.
Yeah. Well, that'll do it.
We There's a few tricks we do with capacitors here and there. Uh increase some of the power in key areas.
Your Yeah, your games are very lively. Uh that is for sure.
That's the key.
And uh you know, for that reason, I've had a few like 30se secondond games today.
It can do that. The funny thing is, you know, people think, "Oh, wow. It's so powerful, right?" Like putting strong flippers on an EM, it's going to be too easy,
right?
Not so much.
No. No. Maybe the opposite.
Exactly. Come back just as fast as it goes.
Dangerous.
Very much so. Cool.
Exciting.
Yeah, man. Royal flush on steroids. I can't wait to give it a try.
You get to play tomorrow.
Yeah. Yeah.
Well, if you guys get it cabinet switches, too.
Oh, okay. Well, if you guys get her going tonight, I'll have to give her a try.
Oh, we'll have a test run for you.
All right. Nice. Yeah. Yeah. We'll have We'll have to document that for sure.
Absolutely. Almost before.
Yeah.
The original Max. Where's the original Max?
Oh, yeah. Let's see
over here.
They're available for any purist who wants to buy.
Ah, okay. So, this is the old with these things here,
right? So, if anybody wants these, contact Mike Loftess of Pinball Medics. And this is what's going in here. Are these like the uh pinball uh life uh full flipper assemblies?
This is uh well, it's partially
partially. Yeah, it's it's been modified like we buy everything is from Jinball Light. Yeah,
we kind of pieced it together in our own way. Each brand is a little different. Like a solid state game, we'd be putting a capacitor on it like an 11630 parallel wound coil typically. Okay.
But with the Got Leaves,
um, and the old Williams, too. Anything that runs on a lower like what is it? 25 volt all of these. Hey, Rob.
Yeah. This and the Williams.
Well, that is something else. I'm looking forward to giving that a go.
A few ways.
Yeah. Oh, you you've definitely really honed in uh your what you do here with uh all all your adjustments and modifications.
Rob was a a certified electrician, electrical contractor for his like whole professional career, shall we say?
Ah, okay.
But he also ran a performance shop where he built race cars.
Oh, yeah. This guy.
Yeah. This guy right here.
Oh, okay.
So,
he's got some experience making things go fast. 10 years ago when we retired
and he started doing pinball full time. Like those two skills were basically
Oh yeah. Okay.
Like seeing it as this.
Okay. So everything's like hot rodded then. Basically
that's our whole cosmetics. We don't really care. You're not going to see, you know, you'll see warm wood. No problem. Take a look at Dolly Parton. She's warm.
Oh, I played it. Yeah.
Plays like a champ.
Yes. Plays. As long as it plays, that's all that matters, right?
These games are here to be used and enjoyed.
Yeah. We have a couple of pretty ones. The ground shaker.
I saw it. Look. Is that a new playfield or a hard top?
Okay. That is a new playfield.
Oh yeah.
But not just that.
That's a blackjack. That's a valley blackjack.
Oh, really?
Originally.
Okay. See
started as that. We had a CPR playfield. So Rob's like, I want to build a nitro ground shaker.
Yeah.
So we took a blackjack. He rewired it from scratch.
Oh, really?
Oh, yeah. No choice. What are you going to do?
You couldn't use the old blackjack wire harness.
Well, he modified it. You had to modify it.
Just stop it and take what's missing.
Okay.
But when we redo these games,
every single connector is redone regardless on an original game. Every pin repinning everything.
Rep everything before we even start the the reconditioning process. Every pin.
Just start with that.
Takes the right out.
Yep. Oh yeah.
No more%.
So it allows you to track hands. you know, you're not going to be chasing it, you know, in the middle of a tournament or in a customer's home after you've sold it with the warranty.
It's it's good to do, especially on a location game, right? In in a home environment, you may not have you may be able to get away without repinning every connector, but on location, the office
here, I work here. My office is in the back. A bad pin, well, I'll go find it. I'll change that pin. Yeah, but in my customer's house, I got to drive to their house and troubleshoot it in the dark without all my stuff. No, thank you. I'd rather just do all the whole thing, eh?
Add it to the price. Yep.
But that's what it is. If you want to
just bulletproofing. Yep. Bulletproofing it.
Well, that's it. And it'll still break. I mean, it's like a car. They're not zero maintenance.
Exactly. Yeah.
But take a 40-year-old car. If you don't do ground up, well, you can't expect reliability.
Yep. So this
you'll be chasing gremlins forever.
Always.
So this is the only way we can give you a reasonable expectation of reliability.
Yeah.
And we'll warranty it cuz we can warranty it for a certain amount of time. But pinball is pinball, right? You know,
I mean
it works until it doesn't.
Exactly. But once they've been rebuilt like that,
the most is maybe a wire is going to break, but I'm never going to go in and have to get into some crazy troubleshooting. Ford connector. No, the connectors are all good. did the foundational work.
That's it. So, it's there's never going to be any voodoo or any mystery. If, god forbid, I have to do a a warranty call on it, I'm going to be in and out of there in 5 minutes.
Yeah. Yeah. Right.
Well, that's great. Cool.
This is what happens when we don't complete a job.
Let go in the middle of a tournament.
Yeah.
Embarrassing.
I was called on this game and I was going to play it, but then I saw the hood was up, so they moved me to a different game. Sorry, Lance.
No worries. resting my butt on your uh flipping fingers there.
Anyway, that's uh that's how uh they roll here at Pinball Medics. Literally like super hightapping the flippers and pop bumpers and uh yeah, they these things play like lightning.
Okay, big money at stake here. Down to the final four in the two strikes bonus side tournament. me, Maddie, Shony, Lauren on Nitro ground shaker. We got uh zero strikes, one one and one. I want that $5. You know, at a final table of a poker game where they bring out the stacks and bundles of cash. Well, same thing just happened here. Look what Tias brought out. No, you son of a
cash is on the glass. All right, I just got whacked in third place. It is between Shnie and Maddie on Dolly. It is a two ball game for all the marbles. 500 of them. 500 pennies that is. And uh I'm here to record and document the action. Carter, are you excited?
I'm very excited.
Yes. He's he's got the front row seat here for the action. Final game of the night and then uh we're shutting down till tomorrow. Batty's got 33,000 after ball one. John's uh got 1,240 1,440 1,540. Your points weren't going up. I think the score uh display was broken. Okay, this is Maddiey's last ball here. You got to talk quietly cuz there is $5 on the line here. Right there. Oh my god. Nice try, man. That almost came back. This is it. Do or die on Dolly. Working nine to five. Can Shiny pull it off? Oh, Maddie is the victor. Yeah, there you go. Good job, boys. Nice job.
Awards ceremony is about to begin. Here we go. Here we go. Get all got to get all the money out. Get on camera.
Okay, here we go.
Okay, in second place
pinball shenanigans that goes up.
the mayor of North Bay, Matt. A little like this little city.
Yeah, those city
in North Bay. You need security with this kind of cat. You be careful. Yeah, we'll we'll help you. We'll escort you out. Nice job, buddy.
They wanted a chop. They said no. We're going for hall. First round's on that.
All right. [music]
Come on, Jon Snow. [music]
All right, the provincials are about to get started. It is Saturday at noon
and uh It is time.
Thank you, Mike and Ottawa Pinball Arcade for hosting. [applause] And Rob, you come out here too, Rob.
These guys have worked so hard. Thank you so much. [applause]
Doing a random draw for a translate right now.
How many translates do I get to I mean, do we get to choose from? [laughter]
All right, you press it. Generate. The winner
he did it.
He did it. He did it [laughter]
gets this plaque.
All prize money is going to be e transferred by the way within 5 days. Okay. It takes
what we're playing for
$4,200. You can only do so much e transfers.
The hardware
uh in a 24-hour period business days. There's this. Someone will win. By the way, we'll have a new winner for the first time. Yeah. a very a first time winner.
For the first time ever, we have a Canadian National Pinball Championships. We are the second biggest country uh with the most players, second most players, and there are 19 countries that have country championships. Now, we have our own in Canada. And I can tell you this year it's in Sherwood Park where Yankton is, Sherwood Park at Arcadium, February 19th through 22nd. Next year it's at Maple. So, we're excited about that.
Thank you, Jeff and [applause] Thompson.
And that goes to the top six players. If any of those six players can't do go, it'll go to the next two uh like whoever came in seventh and eighth.
All right, the action is live on Twitch here on the pinballers. We got Duncan commentating here. [music] We got the rig. We got this set up and the stream is right up there. So, good action. And uh just so I don't get YouTube strike, I will uh exit that room there cuz it's got loud tunes. Anyway, we're [music] into round two. I made it past uh round one against Eric 4 to one and then uh now it is me versus this guy right here. All right, I just uh finished my match with Tiolis. Check this out. I won on Metallica. He won on Led Zeppelin. I won on Evil Convvil. He won on Meteor. I won on Funhouse. He won on Aball. Then it went to Sudden Death Tie Break on Rush and I got the check mark. So, moving on. And it's now final eight. And my constellation prize is uh playing against Mr. Carter Castleman. And uh we have played Funhouse already.
I got that one. And we have played Led Zeppelin and he blew it up. And we're just waiting on Metallica. But, uh, top eight. That's my best provincials yet, I think. So, pretty happy with that. I think, uh, $172 for my troubles and a chance to qualify for the Canadian Nationals. So, hey boys. Yeah. Put on a show for me. Thank you. Okay. Okay. Well, I lost my match to Carter 4 to one and then uh so that put me in a 5 through eight situation and we just played John Flinton, Matt Faulner, myself and Eric played a three-game set and um this was to determine five through eight and that was important because uh fifth and sixth get invited to the Canadian Nationals and I started off with a two on Dolly Parton and then uh I was uh in first place on Nitro Ground Shaker and we were playing a four-player game and I just uh tilted a little too much and tilted through. So I got DQed and I got a zero. So that was amazing. And then I got a measly one point on Walking Dead which gave me three which put me in third out of these four guys which lands me in seventh overall. So, I am going to be an alternate for the Canadians. And uh since me and Shiny Boy are already going, there's a good chance that I will make it to the nationals. So, that's pretty cool. Seventh overall in the provincials, I think my best finish by far. And I think 172 bucks. So, cannot complain about that. [music] And uh it looks like I believe Carter and Phil Burnbomb are playing right now to determine who will be the Ontario champion. Uh I'm not sure if I'll be sticking around for that. So we'll keep you posted one way or another, but anyway, Ottawa Pinball Arcade was great and it was a fun weekend of competition. My run here is done and uh we'll see you kids on the next one.
[music]
behave.
Come on, Jon Snow. [music]