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What constitutes a classic now?

Wayne J

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Saw this posted for the banks at the Texas Pinball Festival.

Is TWD now a classic?

Where is the cutoff now?

LCD - Modern,
DMD and Alphanumeric - Classic
Everything else - Vintage
 

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Silly people made that list

Flash Gordon, Laser Cue, Attila the Hun and Black Pyramid are not Alpha Numeric

I would just do EM, SS (most people do not see a difference between SS and AN) DMD and LCD
I didn't say that FG etc were alphanumeric.
I was suggesting what the 3 categories could be.

How many comps have 4 different categories of banks?
 
In one of my first comps, 1998 a new, modern, classic and vintage was used. Ages are at the time. New was AFM (2 yr old) HS2 (6 years old) Space station (10 years old) and worlds fair (24 years old)
Lets remember how time has marched on, as now
A 24 year old game now is Monopoly/Austin powers/High roller.
A 10 year old game is Walking dead/Mustang/Kiss
No one would think anything of putting a Monopoly or older bally wms game along side a Jaws in a modern bank, should this be the case?
I feel it should be on how old the game is rather than which score displays it uses as that keeps the timeline rolling but it also means some games, eg pulp fiction or beatles are not assigned to the wrong bank.
Upto 15 years modern (maybe squeeze to 20 at a push)
15/20 years to 40 years classic
40 year+ vintage
Maybe pre 1972 (small flippers) on a separate bank?
 
It seems that the lines are drawn on a tournament by tournament basis depending on the machines available, if the format dictates you need to split them into two or three (or indeed, four) categories.

But in my mind nothing released in the 90s or beyond is a “classic” and you could have endless arguments about where you draw the line in the 80s. I guess we see where things stand in 10 years’ time, by which point we might be splitting our machines based on whether they incorporate VR or not 😂
 
--Redacted for the Lols.--

Definitely don't agree with that, I think it should be based on date ranges and not what type of display it has.

Would Blues Brothers go in a classic line up, its 2024 build but has alphanumeric and pretty much old Bally/Stern style boardset. (Disregarding the fact its actually just a rethemed Stars)

What about the Fathom and Fun House remakes? Classic games originally but would the remakes running modern hardware be expected to be in a "Classic" comp?
 
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Oh no, not this again 😂

To me it's about the skills required to play a game, along with the feel of the flippers.

Even though there's barely any years between the later Bally Solid states and early Sys11s I would argue a sys11 feels more like a modern stern in flipper skills than it does to the later Bally solid states

Ramps feeding flippers is another thing.

I had many debates at our previous comps when people argued Pool Sharks is a classic not a modern 🥲

Same reason Pulp Fiction and The Beatles are moderns. They may have influence from much earlier games but the flipper feel, ball save, multiball etc is more akin to moderns.

The classifications should mean a player has to show a variety of skills by playing different eras. So to me it is related to skills which differ with different flipper mechs and technology, such as ball saves among other things.

No idea what TPF are smoking 🤣 it's a great lineup regardless
 
We lose track of time in this hobby. Games you played new are suddenly 40 years old!

The dot matrix era was nearly as long the the flippered EM one!

pre flipper 1933-1947 14 years
flipper EM 1947 to 1977 30 years
early solid state 1977 to 1986 13 years
alphanumeric 1986 to 1991 5 years
dot matrix 1991 to 2015 24 years
LCD screen 2013 to now 11 year and counting

Traditionally classic means pre alphanumeric but tournament organisers can only use the games made available . In our Electric Circus league we had to stretch to use alphanumeric for classics where few would argue a game like Funhouse certainly has more in common with dot matrix games.

A few alphanumeric games have a classic vibe ie single level no toys playfields. Bally Harley Davidson and Gottlieb street level games (Deadly Weapon , Vegas ) spring to mind . Meanwhile no one would blink if you used earlier games that have ramps like Comet Space Shuttle Sorcerer etc.

Hopefully at Pinfest enough pre 1985 games will be offered. As a last resort I'd rather see Whoa Nelly that plays like an EM than a bells and whistles system 11 like Space Station

In the story of pinball , High Speed was the game changer and games before that should count as classics.
 
Don't forget in most of our heads the 1980's was 20 years ago.


So true, the other day I was talking about the film 'There will be blood' as if it was a modern film until someone pointed out it was 18 years old. 🤣

90's games are probably classics now I guess but it's hard to think of Walking Dead and Game of Thrones as old games.
 
If nothing changes from accepting at least early dmd's into classics then in 15 years time we will be considering 50 year old games as modern. How can that be right?
 
If nothing changes from accepting at least early dmd's into classics then in 15 years time we will be considering 50 year old games as modern. How can that be right?

I suppose we wait and see?

But don't you agree there's a difference between classing a game as a classic in general and classing the same game a classic for competitive reasons?

I think Road Show is a true classic but it's not a classic in a comp.
 
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