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#55 World Cup / Led Zep - The Classic Pinball Podcast

The Classic Pinball Podcast·podcast_episode·57m 32s·analyzed·Jun 22, 2021
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claude-haiku-4-5-20251001 · $0.029

TL;DR

Classic Pinball Podcast reviews restored Williams World Cup '78 with gameplay and design history.

Summary

George and Dave from The Classic Pinball Podcast discuss and play a restored Williams World Cup (1978), a System 3 solid-state machine with early electronic sounds. They cover the game's design history, notable athletes featured (Kyle Rote Jr. and Michael Platini), technical quirks (unusual software setup, no attract mode), gameplay mechanics, and restoration work. The episode includes extended gameplay footage showcasing the machine's unique features like corner kicks and spinner shots.

Key Claims

  • Williams World Cup was produced in March 1978 as a System 3 machine with approximately 6,000 units made

    high confidence · Dave stated this directly when introducing the machine

  • World Cup was the first Williams solid-state pin with electronic sounds replacing chimes, though early production had chimes

    high confidence · Dave explained the transition from chimes to electronic sounds in early production

  • Designer Edward Thomas Zawuski only made three games total, with Alien Poker being his other notable title

    high confidence · Dave researched and reported designer credits

  • The game's distributor price was $1,235 with retail estimated at $1,500-$1,700

    high confidence · Dave cited pricing from research materials

  • Kyle Rote Jr. (American flyer) was the only U.S.-born player to lead the NASL in scoring in the league's 17-year history

    high confidence · Dave read this from research materials about the flyer athlete

  • Michael Platini was banned from football until 2023 over ethics violations

    high confidence · Dave cited this information while discussing the French flyer version

  • System 3 Williams games are very limited with only five games in the series (Contact, World Cup, Hot Tip, Lucky 7, Disco Fever)

    high confidence · Dave enumerated the complete System 3 lineup

  • World Cup has no attract mode and requires complex dip switch configuration instead of software-based settings

    high confidence · Dave explained the machine's unusual technical design during restoration discussion

  • Dave has received customer requests for World Cup restorations after publishing a restored example on YouTube

    high confidence · Dave mentioned a customer contacted him wanting restoration after seeing his video

Notable Quotes

  • “This Dave told me the other day that you'd like to come on our show. Well, here was a perfect opportunity.”

    George @ ~06:30 — Friendly banter suggesting Dave Marston was a previous discussion point, though later corrected

  • “The people that designed this game, the software... There were some good drugs back in the 70s, George.”

    Dave @ ~18:45 — Humorous commentary on the unusual and complex configuration system of the World Cup, suggesting the design philosophy was unconventional

  • “How about you just make it a track mode instead of this stuff that you worked on? I just don't get it. Why would you do that?”

    Dave @ ~20:30 — Frustration with Williams' design choice to implement complex attract-mode alternatives rather than standard practices

  • “It's very much an EM design... there's no attract mode on it it's just sitting there dead”

    George @ ~28:45 — Observation about the machine's dated design despite being solid-state, highlighting the System 3 generation's technical limitations

  • “At least this one has a little more attempt at some more complex sounds, and it's passable, you know, so you wouldn't be in a rush to convert this to chimes, you know, necessarily.”

    Dave @ ~30:15 — Assessment of the sound card quality relative to Stern machines of the era, defending the electronic sound implementation

  • “This is a stingy game. It is EM-like. It is. Low scoring.”

    George @ ~45:00 — Gameplay observation about the machine's scoring difficulty and similarity to earlier EM machines

  • “I would say, George, there's a lot of fun collecting the T and A, you know?”

    Dave @ ~52:30 — Double entendre humor about the game mechanics while discussing slingshot kicker shot sequences

Entities

GeorgepersonDavepersonMaureenpersonEdward Thomas ZawuskipersonChristian MarchpersonKyle Rote Jr.personMichael PlatinipersonDavid GursickpersonWilliamscompany

Signals

  • ?

    restoration_signal: Dave rebuilt all boards, sourced replacement displays, replaced connector pins, and performed deep playfield cleaning with artwork touch-ups by Maureen to restore the World Cup machine to working condition

    high · Dave detailed extensive restoration work including board rebuilds, display replacement, connector pin replacement due to intermittent contact issues, and playfield restoration

  • ?

    product_concern: All World Cup machines examined by Dave show heavily worn playfields requiring restoration; multiple customers have requested restoration services after seeing his YouTube video

    high · Dave stated 'all these games, all these World Cups that I've seen so far, their play fields are pretty torn up' and mentioned customer requesting restoration of a machine with severely damaged playfield

  • ?

    design_innovation: Williams World Cup implemented relatively sophisticated electronic sounds compared to contemporary Stern machines, moving away from chimes with some aesthetic success despite EM-era limitations

    medium · Dave noted 'At least this one has a little more attempt at some more complex sounds' compared to Stern's 'cash register beeping and booping'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: System 3 games lack attract mode and use complex dip-switch configuration instead of software-based setup like later systems, suggesting early-stage experimentation and uncertainty in platform design

    high · Dave explained that configuration requires 'flipping some dip switches, hitting a button, turning it off and on, all these different rigmarole' rather than software setup used in later Williams systems

  • ?

Transcript

groq_whisper · $0.173

0:00
There's a football fella, you all know his name And the papers tell us he's in the Hall of Fame Wherever he goes, he'll be all the rage Cause he's the new sensation of the age Dressed in red, white and blue He's World Cup Willie We all love him too World Cup Willie He's tough as a lion And never will give up That's why Willie Is favorite for the club Willie He's everybody's favorite for the club Well, we're all football crazy And it's plain to see That we're all so happy like one big family Now we've found someone who makes the rafters ring Welcome to a brand new soccer game Dressed in red, white and blue That's World Cup Willie We all love him too World Cup Willie He's tough as iron And never will give up That's why Willie is favorite for the crowd It's Willie, Willie He's everybody's favorite for the crowd All the fans are waiting How they'll spur him on And those sixteen nations Will soon know Willie's song Wherever he goes He'll be all the rage Cos he's the new sensation of the age That's why I'm blue That's World Cup Willie We all love him too World Cup Willie He's tough as a lion And never will give up That's why Willie is favourite for the car Everybody! Willie! Willie He's everybody's favorite for the time Willie He's everybody's favorite for the time
2:48
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Classic Pinball Podcast. My name is George and I'm joined today by my co-host Dave. Hello Dave. Hello George. Dave, I don't think it came across as to how close we came to death in our last podcast. if folks recall i was almost paralyzed by the fact that we had an suv coming at us directly on a two-lane road the only quote-unquote bumpers and they were bumpers because they were guardrails was a small breakdown lane on both sides with guardrails dave navigated expertly but I have to say the reason in the gaps of speaking or talking about the near accident, I didn't know what to say. You? I was just kind of in disbelief. I was like, this guy is coming right at us and is getting closer and closer, and he's not even stepping on the gas to pass his truck. He's in a no-passing zone. Oh, that's right. There was that big dump truck. Big truck he's trying to pass, but he's just going alongside it. If you're going to pass, pass. Don't go in our lane. Crazy. I don't get it.

  • All World Cup machines Dave has seen have heavily worn playfields requiring restoration work

    medium confidence · Dave noted this pattern across multiple machines he's encountered

    • World Cup
    game
    The Classic Pinball Podcastorganization
    System 3product
    Hot Tipgame
    Disco Fevergame
    Lucky 7game
    Contactgame
    Space Missiongame
    Alien Pokergame
    NASLorganization
    IPDBorganization

    historical_signal: World Cup licensed soccer theme with regional variants featuring different athletes (Kyle Rote Jr. for U.S., Michael Platini for France), reflecting early international licensing practices

    high · Dave discussed four-page flyers with different regional athletes and mentioned 3,600 Canadian units plus U.S./export versions with different pricing

  • ?

    gameplay_signal: World Cup features challenging ball control (no ball hold capability), stingy scoring with low six-digit cap, and unusual 18-goal maximum, creating EM-like difficulty despite solid-state technology

    high · George noted 'This is a stingy game. It is EM-like' and Dave explained 'you really can't get ball control easily because you can't really hold the ball' with ball falling into ejector kickers

  • ?

    content_signal: Dave's YouTube restoration videos of vintage pinball machines generate sufficient community interest to drive direct restoration requests from viewers

    medium · Dave stated 'After I put this one out there on YouTube as a finished product, I did get another customer say, hey, I have one of those too'

  • $

    market_signal: Demand exists for professional restoration of System 3 machines despite their technical limitations, with pricing potentially variable based on customer budget and scope

    medium · Dave received customer requests for restoration and plans restoration scope based on 'If they have a big budget, then we'll see about Maureen working her magic on the artwork'

  • ?

    design_philosophy: Williams marketing materials for World Cup minimally documented unique mechanical features like the kicker-in-slingshot mechanism, suggesting unclear design intent or marketing strategy

    medium · Dave stated the brochure 'don't even really point at it' regarding the ejector kickers and 'They don't even say anything about it' despite being a notable mechanical feature

  • ?

    manufacturing_signal: Williams produced approximately 6,000 World Cup machines (plus 3,600 in Canada separately) in early 1978, indicating moderate commercial success for a System 3 title

    high · Dave confirmed 'about 6,000 units produced' with separate Canadian production and export variants

  • ?

    operational_signal: World Cup machines demonstrate reasonable long-term reliability if not abused, with primary wear being cosmetic (playfield paint/graphics) rather than mechanical failure

    medium · Dave stated 'It's not very complicated. Yeah, exactly. As long as you don't abuse it, I think the reliability factor is probably pretty big on this game' as a home game recommendation

    • 4:31
    Other people might have panicked and just whipped the wheel back and forth or honked up. I just felt really calm about it. I'm just going to slowly just kind of turn the wheel a little bit to the breakdown lane and just kind of do a little zen thing. so but as you said in the in the last podcast had you been like a lot of drivers looking down at your phone not having anybody else in the car as an extra set of eyes that would have been disastrous maureen's giving me the eye right now saying uh-huh yeah and i wanted to make sure that we we address that because i quite frankly i didn't know what to say i was just dumbfounded by the whole escapade. The lesson there is don't text and drive, folks. You can do that when you stop. There you go. Let's get into today's episode. Dave has taken in a Williams World Cup, not World Cup soccer, World Cup. Dave, why don't you get us going? This was produced by Williams in March of 1978. It's a Williams System 3, about 6,000 units produced, and it was the first Williams solid-state pin that had electronic sounds replacing the chimes. And early production examples did have chimes, in fact, but they switched over.
    5:58
    The, let's see, the design was by Edward Thomas Zawuski. I don't know, something like that. Yeah, who was that? You know what? The only other notable game he made was Alien Poker. I never saw the name until I looked it up. He only made three games. Okay.
    6:16
    So he made this one, which is a decent game, and Alien Poker, I think that was his crowning achievement for the three games he did, he designed. The art, on the other hand, is done by Christian March. He did a whole bunch. His notables are Bow and Arrow, Hocus Pocus, and then you have Williams OXO, Space Mission, and Grand Prix. and the uh other thing about this game is there's a four-page flyer i don't know if you know about that george you know the flyers i did for these games i looked it up i don't know what you're gonna say but i looked it up okay so the american flyer had a soccer forward american soccer forward named kyle rote jr now do you know even know who that is yes he's a north american did you know who it was i had no idea i did and the reason why is his dad played for the new york giants oh interesting okay okay because i'm not a sports guy at all uh it looks like a very clean cut gentleman and something you know very much you know look like a good spokesman for the for the game he played between 73 and 75 he uh and is a member of the national soccer hall of fame but that's actually kind of boring because that's not what he's noted for no that's what he's well that's what he's noted for no it's not he's not okay well you tell me he was he was the only american i believe to hold the scoring record for the north american soccer league if i remember correctly okay i have it here you can continue i'll take a look all right well i want to say In contrast to his squeaky clean record and, you know, he was, you know, he's Dudley Do-Right, let's say. The French language version of the flyer features Michael Platini. So good old Michael here, Michael Francois Platini. He's regarded as one of the greatest French soccer players of all time. He even was made president of the Union of European Football Associations in 2015. Sadly, though, George, he has been banned from the sport until 2023 over ethics violations. Here I'm reading right now. He spent the 1972 season on the bench before coming a starter in 1973. That season, he became the first American ever to lead the league in scoring and the only U.S.-born player to do so in the NASL's National North American Soccer League 17-year history and was also named Rookie of the Year. That's pretty impressive when you think about the international, even if that's a word, international realities. No, that's not a word. Well, I like it, George, but we'll go with it. You got what I meant. That's fine. Mr. Bally, Dallow, whatever. Right. All the international players that play in soccer leagues, for him to have that achievement, it's a big deal. Well, in contrast, Mr. Francois, he won the first major trophy of his playing career, leading his team to victory in the 78th French Cup, and scored the only goal of the game in 78. You'd think he would have adoring fans, but no. Bowling fans followed him from match to match, which brought out the prankster in him. Platini would have his revenge, though. On away trips, he would set off firecrackers in public spaces and then pretend to be dead, drawing a crowd. While in Argentina for the World Cup, he would squeeze tubes of toothpaste into his teammates' beds.
    9:35
    So that's Mr. Michael Franco. He sounds like a real dude. Yeah, he's a lot of fun. Bring him to a party.
    9:43
    So, yeah, the booing fans has made him just, okay, okay, mother effer, I'm going to. There you go. So he's lots of fun there. What else with this here? The game price to distributors back in that time was $1,235.
    10:03
    And in Canada they made 3,600 of these. And let's see. USA Canada, and exported was $2,829. So I'm guessing the retail price, if you were to go buy a game, would probably be somewhere between $1,500 and $1,700, if you were able to secure one from a distributor. Yeah, probably. They probably had $200 or $300, $400 to that. Yeah, I would think so. Yep.
    10:29
    And as for the gameplay itself, it's a lot like... Oh, no, no, no. Wait. Oh, you missed something. Okay, you go ahead, George. You go. What do you got? Okay, David. Here's your claim to fame right now.
    10:42
    This Dave told me the other day that you'd like to come on our show. Well, here was a perfect opportunity.
    10:50
    Did you miss what most of the pictures on that IPDB site came from? Oh, boy. No, but I know what you're going to say, George. What am I going to say? Go ahead, guess. You're going to say Dave Marston had pictures on there. Is that what you're trying to say? Oh, you know what? I screwed up. Uh-oh. Nope. Wrong guy. Oh, well, okay, well. Okay, well, wait a second. I do have a retraction. Okay, wrong guy. Oh, man, I really, oh, wow, I gaffed that. Oh, boy.
    11:22
    Who's David Gursick? George, George, George. Who's David Gursick? David Gursick. He sounds like he's someone in RGP years ago. He's got a ton of pictures on there. Yeah, he was kind of a tech. Okay, my bad. Okay, David, sorry, we probably won't even include this.
    11:41
    Whoops. Oops. Okay, go. Let's see. It kind of plays like Space Mission. It's a unique game because you really can't get ball control easily because you can't really hold the ball. You try to hold the ball, and the ball falls into these little ejector shooter things on either side of the flipper. so you kind of have to be very active with your flips or or that kind of thing with with this game and even shooting the center spinner is kind of tough to do so it's really you have to really be on the ball so to speak with this game you can't hold it so you can't hold see that i missed that see jordan's looking right now at the flyer here oh so there's the kicker right in the uh Whatchamacallit? Into the left and right flipper feeders, sort of. But there is no feed. No, these things. Help me. Well, like Space Mission, they're called... Oh, what do you call them? I don't know. Is there a name for them? No, I don't know. There's got to be a name for them. I'm sure Williams calls them something.
    12:50
    Whatever they call them. Anyway, I missed that. In the brochure, they don't even really point at it, which is kind of a shame.
    12:58
    Okay. I'm sure they call them... In the flyer, they gotta call them something. I'm sure they're gonna say... They don't even point at it. Unless I missed it.
    13:11
    No. They don't even say anything about it? No. They don't say anything about it. That's bizarre. No. What was the other game we did that had those on there?
    13:23
    Didn't we play a game recently that had it in there? On the show? Yeah. No, I don't think so. Wow, okay, I'm really... I mean, this is like old school. It's like Space Mission would have this. You know, Williams liked that. I thought we played a game with this in it. Okay. No, I... We will shortly when we go down to the basement.
    13:44
    So in the... Basically, it's a kicker in a slingshot, but the slingshot doesn't work. There's no sling activity. No. It's just that kicker. Right. Whatever that thing is. The kicker there. Basically, all it does is that kicker on either side of each flipper will try to kick to the saucer on the left or the right side, depending, you know, which one you're kicking from, and get in there, and then it'll kick out. It's a lot of like, it's almost like, it's like soccer, kind of, because you've got a kicker kicking it over here, then the guy gets the ball kicks it back to you There a lot of that soccer feel to the game which makes sense Why didn they have that with the holes I keep gaffing that game too The game with the four holes where the ball skips from one hole to the next hole Oh, yeah. That's old school. Whatever game that was. That would have been pretty cool on this game. Yeah. This game doesn't have a lot of stuff in it. It doesn't, but shooting the spinner is very nice, although it is only 100 points when lit. So, you know. And this is only a six-digit game, too, right? Six-digit game. And it's a pretty low-scoring game. I mean, you want to keep spelling star. Every time you do that, you get a multiplier. You get two, three, five times. That's the other strange thing about this game. You have only three lanes at the top of the game. Well, four lanes. Well, actually, there's two. Well, you're right. There are three lanes. Right, but normally you would have a lane for every letter. In this case, the S and T are one lane. The middle lane is the goal lane, I guess you would call it. and then you have AR as the other lane. But you have to go to each lane. It has to be hit twice. So the first time you go through the ST, you get the S. Oh, so you don't get two times multiplier if you spell star? You do, but you have to go through the ST lane once for S, go through it again for T. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, I didn't. I'm thinking you get ST. No, this is not Fonzie 8-Ball where you can kind of double up or Playboy or anything. Okay, my mistake. Okay, I'm learning. I don't know if I've ever played this game. You'll see that... And they made quite a bit. They made over 6,000 of these. The people that designed this game, the software... There were some good drugs back in the 70s, George. Because how this thing, to get into changing the software and parameters in this game, is something special. In fact... Okay, I'll bite. What do you mean? Like special ed. Special. Like what? it's difficult. It's not like any other game from Williams in the system, four, five, six, four, six. So this game just kind of stands on its own? Is that what you're saying? Yeah, it's so early on that they just kind of didn't know what they were doing. And it's like reading through the manual to figure out, I'm pretty technically inclined. And even for me, it's kind of like, what?
    16:37
    So to set up for extra balls, or even to set up your high score or date or your scoring thresholds, thresholds. You've got to set some switches and then hit a button and then you have to do that. It's not all through, the other games from Williams all did it through software. You actually would hit a button, hit the credit button, the thing would roll up on the score when it's there, hit a button again, it would enter it and you're good to go. It's all software. This one is a combination of that, flipping some dip switches, hitting a button, turning it off and on, all these different rigmarole that just, I don't know. I'm just going to leave it as stock.
    17:16
    Well, I guess that's what I was going to say. If an operator got this, it sounds like however it came out of the box, it might be the way it stays. I'm pretty sure it's the way it's going to stay. Yeah, that's the way it's going to be. And no attract mode. So you turn this game on and it looks dead, except for the high score data flashing, but there's no track mode. Also, when you play a game on it and say, and you turn, let's see, turn it back on. You play a game on it and then the game ends, all the lights that were lit just stay lit until for the rest of the arcade open that day. No one plays it. Those lights are just sitting there burning on. They don't go off to like either track mode or off to whatever. But this wasn't their first electronic game, was it? No, they had Hot Tip and a couple other ones. Not much. Hot Tip's the one with the fisherman, right? No, I think Hot Tip is a horse racing one. You get a Hot Tip on a horse race. What's the one I'm thinking of? With the guy with the fishing reel?
    18:16
    I thought that was called Hot Tip. No. Hot something. Hot tamale? Hot line? Hot line. That's it. That sounds like. Sorry. Okay, no. So all we have here for System 3, we only have five. We have Contact in 78. I don't know what that is. We have World Cup in early 78. and Hot Tip is 77, September of 77, followed by Lucky 7, followed by World Cup, and then you have Contact and Disco Fever.
    18:45
    But System 3s are always, they're just very limited. Those are some really woofing games. They're woof, woof. Woof, woof, woof. Yeah. Yeah, not Gottlieb's finest. But I do, we'll say World Cup. No, not Gottlieb. Williams. Sorry, Williams. Where am I? Williams. Sorry, George. Harry. Sorry, Harry. You'd figure, you know, these guys they didn't have the technology to do or whatever or the wherewithal to make an attract mode like the other other games around it like you know belly uh funzi eight ball did and even night rider did and that was early for belly they were 77 i believe they were doing um you know attract modes you know meager but they were done um instead these guys did some other complex crap which I don't know why they would.
    19:29
    So when it flashes high score to date, it'll flash like the player one light that says one next to the player one display. It'll flash it. It'll show the last score there and keep flashing. The high score date comes on. It shows the high score to date. Let's say it's 350,000 points in the player one display. Then it'll go and cycle to player two will be flashing. The player two light will flash next to the player two display. and then that'll flag up between whatever the player 2 was of the last game and then the high score date would show up in the player 2 display and player 3 and player 4. They just keep doing that over and over again. So that was like some complex stuff they did. No one would give a crap about that. How about you just make it a track mode instead of this stuff that you worked on? I just don't get it. Why would you do that? Experiment? They sold 6,000 of them, so it couldn't have been too bad. No, George, I still say it's drugs. No, probably. Most likely. Maybe a combo. Any other notable features before we go down into the workshop? I will say, after I put this one out there on YouTube as a finished product, I did get another customer say, hey, I have one of those too. I want you to restore it up. And all these games, all these World Cups that I've seen so far, their play fields are pretty torn up. And this one wasn't too bad, but the one the guy wants to bring me next, it's pretty torn up. So that means paint and playfield protector? Yeah. I'm guessing you can't buy the old stock. I don't think they make a playfield protector for this.
    21:08
    Do they make a playfield for this? No. Not of demand. So what are you going to do? As I said in that racking base thing from the 60s, no one wants a Charlie in the box, George. Yeah, no kidding. And nobody wants a pull toy with square wheels. Exactly. There you go.
    21:28
    So what are you going to do? Just paint it and clear it? No, no, no. I think we're just going to, on this next one, I don't know. I've got to see what the customer wants. But I think we're just going to get it playing well, player's game, reliable, and we'll see where we are. If they have a big budget, then we'll see about Maureen working her magic on the artwork and doing that. But I'm pretty sure we're just going to do a real deep clean and make it a little bit of touch-up and not go too crazy on the next one. Maureen actually did a nice touch-up on this one as well.
    21:59
    Here we are again, down in Dave's basement. Down in the basement, yeah. Dave, nice looking game. Why don't you tell us a little bit about what you may or may not have done to this game to get it working.
    22:17
    Well, rebuilt all the boards in it. what else had to source a new display for it or a used display for player 4 that was totally out and had to grab a new master display rebuilt from somebody on ebay because the one that was in it was kind of not so nice so put that in there and they just basically took apart the whole play field and cleaned it, magic eraser it, Maureen did her touch up stuff on it, tweaked the spinner, put rubber on it, a couple LEDs here and there, and shined up the metal in the back there, shined that up, buffed a couple things. And the biggest problem with this game I had was just the displays were still kind of wonky, and when you shook some wires back there, they'd go off and on, they'd do this weird stuff and then but i couldn't find the connector pin was they were fine i finally found the source but i found there was some connector pins i was missing that weren't that i didn't see right away they were a little bit sketchy but even looking at them they still looked good i said well i'm just gonna replace them anyway i did that and now it's totally fine so things can look good uh but when you replace them with brand new then they're good so that's we did that so fix those little uh those little buggers i have to be honest with you when you showed me this game when it was a part the last time i was here i thought it was an em it's very it yeah it is very much an em design i mean look at this there's no um a track mode on it it's just sitting there dead and uh they did make a couple of these games with chimes first maybe 100 or so games where it was a chime game. But the sound card, actually, in the game is not that bad compared to the Sterns of this generation. The Stern sound card was crapola. It was like a cash register beeping and booping. At least this one has a little more attempt at some more complex sounds, and it's passable, you know, so you wouldn't be in a rush to convert this to chimes, you know, necessarily.
    24:26
    But it's, you know, nice backlash on the game. It's kind of a cool game to have, like a very family-friendly game. None of the Bally grapefruit sections, as you know Bally does with their girls.
    24:44
    First off, looking at the back glass, Kyle Rote Jr. kind of looks like the main player in the center of the back glass. second thing that's missing and i and it's called world cup there's no american flag now i don't know if the united states i'm not a soccer guy but i would think that you would have a u.s flag somewhere on here yeah i think because probably because soccer was considered uh more of a european thing back then we were doing stuff in in america with soccer but not nearly as much as today but back then definitely european thing because they would call it football and we would call our football you know right but it doesn't say football or soccer on here i'm wondering you think they exported a lot of these games they did yep that would make more sense let's uh let's give the play field a once over before we turn it on i'll start and you can then take over up top you've got three lanes i think we talked about that earlier left hand side you have a lane that will take you back up to the top. On the right-hand side, tell the folks about that feature, because that's definitely different. Well, it's called the corner kick, and you get it around there. You get 1,000 if it's not lit to 3,000 when they are lit.
    26:14
    Well, describe it. It looks like an upside-down J. Can you hit that with the left flipper? you looks like it'd be a really real real tight shot relying on the bumper to get it in there relying on the bumper to get in there yep and you can't get in the other way you can't go in through the bottom side of the of the upside down j because there's a hole at the bottom of that inverted j there's a hole there is also a post with a rubber on it there that actually slows the ball down when it's coming down it slows it down so it drops into the hole take a look online folks it's definitely a unique game and uh right in the middle you have your spinner i'm guessing the spinner is juiced you guessed correctly george and we talked about the slingshots with the kicker in it i don't know how else to describe it somebody else might know the proper name but it looks like a fun game why don't we uh turn it on and uh play a game so you can again not doing very well dave last two times you've done this you've taken me no cheating george if i go upstairs and the last time you did it it was really bad you had that killer game i did that's true let's see if we can uh put that magic back in the bottle here let's see what happens here it almost sounds like a horse race doesn't it yeah what do they call it it's not a uh A classic? Yeah, it's kind of like... It's a classical song.
    27:43
    I don't know what song it is. Oh, I know. Is it William's Overture? William Tell Overture? Yeah, that's the guy. Might be. All right, there you go. You want one or two, George? You want to play for me? You need to show me. I'll lead you off here.
    27:57
    All right, we'll lead you off here. I know zero. All right. Like I said, I don't think I've ever played this game. Okay, but if I get in the center lane up top, it's going to score a goal. and so when you score, every time you score a goal, you're going to get bonus points. Your bonus is going to increase, so you want that. I find it kind of tough. It stings you on bonus points, so let's see if we can... And also by spelling star, you get a multiplier. So down the center lane, so that gave you goal number one.
    28:24
    So now again, A in star. Yes. Okay, kind of drippy. scores goal when lit. Is this a three or five ball game? Three ball game. Is that why that's lit all the time? No it goes off It goes off as soon as I get in there Okay so Dave got it in that slingshot kicker on the left side
    28:53
    Yeah, this is really stingy. Okay, you got it. But that doesn't get you a goal. Even though you got it in that hole, you got to get those four... Well, I think it wasn't lit when I got in there, I think.
    29:03
    Oh, okay. See? Oh. I need to get... See, it's hard to really aim the thing. Yeah, how do you get over the... I got that. You've got to be really precise. I got that shot. You just got the corner kick shot. So Dave's up to two. That's it. Wow, this is really... This is a hard game. What do you have the threshold set on on this? Okay, so Dave just got another goal. He went in that corner kick. That seems to be...
    29:32
    There's a goal. Another one. Oh, you're doing well. You got around there. You've played this a few times. A couple.
    29:42
    Unlike the last game. Yeah, last game, not so much. That was something special. And the lane that goes up the left-hand side is progressive. Is that because every time you get it into a goal, it increases from one to, I think, 4,000? Is that right? I think every time you get the ball advancing, get the rollovers, I think that lights up the score goal when lit. That's what happens. Yeah, well, we can find out when I play. There we go. Okay, so Dave just... Not bad. 50, 60... Oh, he's gone. 76,000. Okay, let's see if I can do something with this.
    30:20
    Full pull. Let's see. And it does go down the middle, and I get a goal. And I just got it into the corner kick, and... That shot's easier than you think it is. Well, I just got it off the left flipper.
    30:36
    Oh, that was horrible. A whopping 5,000 points. 5,000, almost 6,000. But we'll, you know, there we go. Okay, so A and R and star.
    30:49
    So down and back up again. Okay, so now you're up. Oh, up she goes. I don't understand why those gold lights light.
    31:02
    Okay, now they're lit. I think you keep your bonus points. They're lit for me right now. Yeah, you're still lit. And I have the T?
    31:11
    You have the T, yes. Okay. Wow. Rubber. Call me the rubber band man. Holy crow. Well, it's been a shot for George. Oh, it's 10 points at least, though, but it's something. Okay, let's get it. I need the A. That was bad. Wow.
    31:39
    17,000 points. A whopping 17,000. This is a stingy game. It is EM-like. It is. Low scoring. Let's see. Get a goal.
    31:52
    Folks, I have a feeling this is going to be a good play today. Oh, that backhand. Maybe the tee. So you need the tee. But the goal is good. The goal is good. So you keep your bonus in ball-to-ball. But you don't get your multiplier back. You've got to keep earning that. at least you get the goals, is 18 goals, is 18 the maximum?
    32:14
    18 is the maximum, yes. Which is kind of weird, too. Don't you think? It is kind of weird, 18. It seems awfully low. Yeah.
    32:24
    David keeps getting it in the goal on the right-hand side, though. That saucer. Again. Bang. He keeps getting it in that slingshot kicker.
    32:37
    It likes going to slingshot kickers. There you go. Seems like a lot of play in the bottom half of the game.
    32:47
    I got up the right lane there at the top. There you go. And another goal. 13 goals. Yeah, looking good. Oh, I don't see. That was dumb.
    32:57
    Out the left lane. So I don't even stand a chance. I'm at 17,000. Oh, a free game at 160. I just got a free game, George. It was just one crack. Yeah, terrific. 179 to 17 you just need 10 times your score that's all you need let's see if I can that doesn't help this is a goal you got a left hand saucer there I'll use the A right now there's an A next to your right flipper you can get and that gives you a multiplier there you go, this is a multiplier I'm taking the good points taking it easy here, dude. I'm going for catch-up mode. Oh, there you go. 100-point spinner there.
    33:47
    George is zending out here waiting for the ball to come to him. Yeah. Nice. That was a better shot. 26,000 points now.
    34:00
    Oh. Wow, that's... And he wound up with... 47,000 points. Okay. Let's go. One more time. All right. Here we go. I think this is going to be quick.
    34:18
    Simple game. Simple but fun. I can see this at the beach house somewhere or, you know. Well, and it's mostly a set it and forget it. But I'm guessing if you do what you usually do, it's a good home game because you're probably not going to have a lot of problems with it. It's not very complicated. Yeah, exactly. As long as you don't abuse it, I think the reliability factor is probably pretty big on this game.
    34:51
    7,000 points for me. Right, if you don't, you've got to be very precise with this game. Okay. Okay, come on, come on.
    35:03
    Okay, that's good. Okay, so all I need is one letter, and that's it. So that just gave me, oh, you can get letters down below. Oh, I didn't realize that. Oh, yeah. Oh, I'm missing a lot of things here. Okay. So you can collect the T and the A.
    35:20
    Just leave that alone. You can collect the T and the A with those kickers in the. I would say, George, there's a lot of fun collecting the T and A, you know? You need to play with that. You need to play with that left flipper a little bit. In fact, Bally's Playboy did a lot of TNA. Yeah, well, you can collect the TNA letters with those slingshot kickers.
    35:43
    You need to do a little work with that left flipper. It's got a little hop there. Yeah, it should build as best it can. Otherwise, you have to upgrade it to modern WPC flippers, which is a whole other animal. Oh, there we go. Okay, back up top and another goal. I'm doing much better this time. I don't know how I'm scoring, but I'm doing better.
    36:03
    Those kicker things are instrumental in trying to get... I might not be able to catch the ball, but you know what?
    36:12
    That's a big side. You can gain a lot of points on that. 95,000 points, George. He's kicking my butt over here.
    36:21
    Okay. You've just got a goal. Center up top. And playing catcher. Oh, horrible. Okay. Dave gave me a chance here. Let's see how we can do. So I give it a full pull. I got the R. Now I need the T, which is on the left-hand side. And if I can get it where it is right now, I get the T and I get the multiplier. Right? Right. And it goes down the right side. You get a two-time multiplier for that.
    36:55
    Okay, that's better. 129. That's good. You're on pace for my high score I just got. replacing me in my last game.
    37:04
    Let's see if we can bring it back. Oh, just nothing. Yeah, there's a lot. A lot of rubber. There's a lot of rubber. Those rubbers around the spinner are kind of unique. What are those?
    37:24
    Yeah, those are like modern, more modern, or System 11 kind of rubbers. Yeah, it's like a wrap around the whole post. I don't know, what do you call it? Yeah, William's Space Shuttle, I think, had the same ones. Yeah, I've never seen that. That's William's thing. I would expect to see that, like you said, on a modern game, but not a 1978 game. Yeah, beefy rubber. Well, it would keep it from getting trashed. Oh, yeah. Where, you know, Dally used to put the post in front of it. Oh, the little bit of rubber. The thing would come right out of the wood socket there. Oh, not so good. Okay, give me a pull. I'm done.
    38:04
    I beat Dave. Okay, rubber match. Rubber match it is. Hold on. I'll go down here. You know we always have to play three, folks.
    38:16
    I'm still getting points. There we go. Okay. I did pretty good. Oh, I could have scored a free game. Yeah, you had it. Doesn't matter. We'll make more. Alright, Rubberman, here it is. Here we go. All the marbles. I'll go for it. Oh, you're going to go for it? Okay, go. Okay, I'll go. You pulled. I did pull. You're there.
    38:37
    I don't know why. Not that it matters. Yeah, you gotta... I liked my idea, and now you're employing my technique. Exactly. Or I'm employing your technique. There you go. Go right over there. That's the way to do it.
    38:54
    You might not be able to create a little ball, but you can get points every time by putting it in that kicker, and then it goes right up in there.
    39:02
    I don't think I've seen either one of us score a goal by going up all four rollovers on one side. That's a tough shot.
    39:12
    There's easier ways to get points. Oh, there we go. That's good. Multiplier. You can hold the TNA, so that's an easy way to get it.
    39:26
    Okay. Up top again. Better. Goal. Another goal. Keep moving. You got the spinner lit. And you got 3,000 on that outline. So you got a lot of stuff lit.
    39:38
    Okay, there you go. You just got the A. I'm doing what George did here. It's all you got is T, right? You got his T. Another T. I just got World Cup just flipped out. That means I maxed things out here. See the World Cup? If I do it one more time, there's going to be a special one. Oh, that star in the... Right there. It says you have World Cup. Oh, Dave just had a good ball. 89. Okay, you've played this a few times. Let's see if I can not embarrass myself like I did the last time.
    40:07
    Okay, I already got the A, but that's okay. I don't have the T, and I just rolled it into the T. I got another goal. No, no goal there. But I'll keep doing that because it collects.
    40:22
    Okay. How many points do you get when it goes into that... Oh, no! Saucer? Yeah. Not enough. 500. Not enough, yeah. 500 points for you. I think we all know where this is going to end up, unfortunately.
    40:46
    See, most people, and I'm not most people, would have shut the game off if they got 5,000 points on the first ball. I always believe, you know what, you can always get there. That's it. Just take one and it'll happen. Maybe not today. Up top. There we go. You need it in the R. You got two times, so... Okay. There we go. Whoa. No.
    41:25
    Okay, you need that egg. Two. There you go. Another goal. Dave's up to 10. 10 with the two-by. Okay, so Dave's up to 100 and... Oh, man. That's a free game. 143. 160 is a free game. I think I'm done.
    41:44
    Okay, I just got a goal. I've got my second goal. Aren't I doing well? And out the left-hand lane. Wow, there you go. Done. 12,000. Ball three.
    41:54
    Well, you certainly don't need seven digits on this game. No, you definitely don't. That'd be overkill.
    42:01
    Oh, out you go. Yeah, those outlanes are very brutal. I don't know if I'm going to make it. Will I make it? I just made it. You got a free game. 164. Five, almost. Let's see if I can make a recovery here. I don't think so. That's a lot to make up.
    42:18
    Okay, got the A. Got the A, come on, let's get the T, we got the T, I got a goal, I got it in the kicker again, and I got it up the lane, and I need to get a letter, and I got an S, and I spelled star and I got two times.
    42:47
    And I got nothing. Three times, nothing. 164 to 49. Dave wins. Winner, winner, chicken dinner. Okay.
    43:04
    I here with Dave in Northborough Massachusetts and we out repairing a Stern Led Zeppelin Premium Dave has already repaired one item, which was what, Dave? That was the latch for the lockdown bar. It was just, the screws were just ripped right out of it. And it's a brand new game, so I don't know how that happened. So this game's, what, two months old, the customer said? Yeah, yeah. And now Dave's got, what is this thing called? The Electric Circus? No, the Electric Magic, which is the spinner mech that comes out of the center of the play field.
    43:54
    Stern, I guess, has an upgrade where you need to remove the brackets and the actual spinner and put in the new kit in order to get the spinner to go up and down rather than tilted like it is now. So as anybody who's played pinball before knows, if the spinner is not sitting the right way, the ball will just go underneath it and not spin at all.
    44:24
    So Dave is now taking this whole mechanism apart in order to get the brackets out and put everything back together again.
    44:33
    And there's also another problem with node board 9 inside the cabinet. Something with the shaker motor, maybe? Shaker motor? Well, actually, it's complaining about it could be a shaker motor, but I think it's node 9 sensing an overcurrent, and Stern said it could be a shaker motor, but we unplugged the shaker motor and we're still getting an overcurrent on node 9, So it could be a Note 9 board. It could be something else. I don't know.
    45:05
    I don't know what boy that's starting to come up with that. So, nice looking game. But a shame that you got to repair it after two months.
    45:23
    We're not in Valley World. as Dave was singing earlier pinball breakdown no no it's more like let something break down the spinner's insane having a spinner breakdown it's not working today it can drive you insane yeah that's quite the box the electric magic is not very magical right now it's not happy no it is not happy but cool game but Stern trying to teach a retail customer how to repair this yeah fail massive fail I mean even I who don't know anything about Stern games I followed along but even it's beyond my pay grade I can unplug things and plug things in but this is one for the ages here just take electric magic apart and put it all back together again it'll work I mean, it's a pretty simple neck overall. There's not much to it. It's a motor with a cam that basically just raises it up and down. It's not much to it. Except for that one. It fell. Oops.
    47:05
    Oops. That's okay. All right. It's called technician breakdown. Yeah, technician breakdown. But I like the one thing I do, and I was saying to Dave before we started recording, The one thing I really do like about this game are the lights that are in the cabinet sides, inside the rails. That's pretty, very innovative. I like that. I wish it was on some of my games.
    47:32
    But as we know, pulling the play field in and out of the game, those lights would last about two seconds. I will say the spinner is a unique thing on these games. usually have a wire that comes off of the spinner and it goes down to a switch below either a cherry switch or a leaf switch on an older game on this one here it's very unique the spinner is oblong and when it goes around it interrupts a opto so every time it interrupts the opto is a spin so no actually physical touching of the spinner to right no moving parts other than the moving parts The spinner itself, just on a bracket, right? That's it. And that should theoretically give us increased reliability, but here we are.
    48:19
    As I was saying to Dave, if this happened to one customer, I'm sure it has happened to multiple customers because the bracket for this spinner is totally different than the one that's in the game.
    48:33
    Gives it a little bit more clearance. But this is not a fast fix for somebody who's a retail customer, the way I see it.
    48:50
    What else do we like about this game? No, we haven't played it. I don't know. That's not going to happen anytime soon. I played ball on it. Yeah, you played one ball.
    49:01
    Pretty cool. Balls and magic sprinters is kind of a neat concept. Yeah. The mech looks a lot more sophisticated when you see it coming out of the play field, but now that I'm looking at it underneath, there's not really a lot to it. It's basically, it's the Ironmonger. It's Iron Man, Ironmonger, with a spinner instead of hitting a bash toy, you're hitting a spinner. That's what you got.
    49:21
    Okay, I'm sort of familiar with that game, but I understand what it does. Yeah, it's basically a lift. It's like a stage lift. If you were in a concert and somebody came out of the stage or, you know, a drum kit or a person or, you know, a guitar player. It could be anybody. That's all it is. Cycle.
    49:42
    Makes sense for the theme of the game. I'm sure we'll see this thing recycled into something else at some other point in time. Oh, this is a recycle. Well, right, you said with the Iron Monger.
    49:55
    So what, does Iron Monger have some kind of thing on his head or it's not in the middle of the play field? It's not in the middle of the play field. It's a big bash toy that you... Right, but the top of the bash toy must be flat. It's like a flat thing like this one. Yeah, same thing. Oh, okay. A little flat top. Okay. I'm thinking like an actual, you know, person.
    50:14
    No. Right. It's supposed to be like a robot. Right. Kind of situation. Somebody did a little picking over here already. Oh, wow.
    50:25
    Okay, interesting. Yeah, actually there too. I see it all over the place. Huh. interesting this is a first for me i learned about optos dave's talked about optos forever i finally have gotten to see one live so that's pretty neat too and again we're doing more stern stuff only because dave is out on the road repairing and you're going to hear this from time to time not often but from time to time yeah we kind of you know sprinkled in like seasoning yeah a little expand our horizons I mean the sound sounded really good the light show looks great in this there's positives we'll leave it at that I don't want to offend anybody who owns one of these I can see how it's if you're a Led Zeppelin fan I get it all it makes sense it's a cool game this one is the side art on this game isn't my favorite though I would like the side art from one of the other games, but that's me. And I'm not buying one anyway, so what the hell does anybody care?
    51:37
    Again, my opinion. Coming up in future broadcasts, we're going to have a beautiful Valley Rolling Stones coming up. Oh, yeah, to keep on the rock and roll theme. I saw that today. That was nice. And we're still looking at Silver Ball Mania. that'll come around at some point because you want to get rid of that by the end of summer or by the end of july that's gonna be end of july but it has to be done by the second by the third week of july latest somebody's having a party or people over no i'm going on vacation oh there you go so and then what else oh you had a t2 t2 that's going to be done uh even sooner right around the same time frame. I'm going to try to get that out. Get that done. Okay.
    52:21
    And here's a pinball happen. I'm going to be working on a Dr. Dude soon. Oh, fun. I think what I'm going to do is I'm going to take some paper and roll with the dude and I'm going to put Dave on in the background. Dr. Dave. Get the customer notices.
    52:43
    Okay, folks. We're back. Dave is absolutely annihilating this game on this poor customer who is watching Dave take the high score he's now up to 195,000 but this is the only second game you played Dave?
    53:01
    with the majority of 195,000 now 198 coming on this third ball he's already had several multi balls he's down to his last ball the customer is praying that he drains and doesn't run the score up anymore the customer is going to hit on the power switch I think the customer might not be too happy right now there's a factory reset there you go He's not going to be happy seeing D.O.C. on the back glass every time he turns the game on.
    53:54
    Oh, come on. Finally. I've got to shoot again. No. Come on. Stop. must be Scott wow very good Dave very good I don't know why you got that shoot again I'm just doing it the funny part is if you didn't give him any guidance yeah thank you as we always play we never read the rule sheet Awesome. Nice job. Thanks. Awesome.
    54:42
    Thank God we're pikers. 218 to single digits. So I just say, George, grand champion on there? Yes. Yes, you are the GC.
    54:51
    And that's not general contractor. So tell your friend that I said come get me. You know what the funny thing is? Yeah.
    55:01
    I'm going to shut this off. Can I call him Doc Alps? You're going to see Doc up there, and I'm going to tell him that's me just playing with him. Yeah, yeah. Oh, there you go. Take it. Go ahead.
    55:13
    There you go. Nice job. Thanks. Dave. Who? Dave. D-A-V-E. Yeah, Dave. Right. So anyone out there that wants to explore getting their games worked on, getting their games restored, or buying a restored game from me, you can check out my website at pinballdoctor.com. That's pinballdoctor, all spelled out. Or you can reach me at dave at pinballdoctor.com. Or you can reach me at drdavespinball at gmail. And that's d-r-d-a-v-e-s, pinball, at gmail.
    55:57
    Thank you. Coming around my breakdown Tell me you're safe Are you back? I got something I think you ought to know Are you back? I want to tell you that I love you so I want to hold you in my arms I'm never gonna let you go If I like you too It's a new day to break down It's always the same Having a number break down Love you too
    57:24
    Thank you.