Pinball Expo 2022 Recap

I'm fortunate to be a pinball fan that lives in the Chicagoland area. As Chicago has been the home of pinball since the onset, there's an abundance of every facet of pinball to be experienced. Pinball Expo is the "industry show" that celebrates pinball in its backyard.

The last two years I sat out Expo. Between the pandemic happening and having a little one, it just didn't feel like something I needed to take on for those and many more reasons. Pinball people come in many flavors and walks of life, but there's certainly one demographic it heavily skews towards.I fully acknowledge that I fit a good chunk of that demo but hope my worldview largely doesn't. I digress.

Being housed at the Renaissance Schaumburg Convention Center for its second year, Pinball Expo was now a mere 12-minute drive from home. I journeyed out on Wednesday to grab my weekend pass and see the layout of what was to transpire. When I arrived, vendors were still loading in and setting up, but the registration booth was ready to go. Bizarrely, you had to go over to a row of dirty (literally, not figuratively) laptops to punch in your credit card info in visible text to then print out an order confirmation to turn around and hand to the desk. Considering you couldn't still register online, this was an odd experience. The weekend pass was $125 for the event itself or $45/day.

I scoped out the area and found that the main tournament room was prior to the convention hall itself and the seminars were upstairs above the convention hall. Come Thursday morning, when Pinball Expo opened, a line quickly queued around the tournament area doors as qualifying prepared to open. It was surprising to see how many people wanted an early start for the tournament. For $100, cash only, you could enter the tournament. They shared that the wristband for the tournament would get you a discount for the main Expo, which would have been nice to know in advance. This was quite an expensive Pinball Expo!

For the tournament, you had 15 qualifying entries and needed to play 12 unique games. Different versions of the same title (Pro vs. Premium) counted as unique games. You would use your phone or ask a scorekeeper to queue you up for a game to play via the neverdrains.com website. After the game was played, a scorekeeper would type your score into a tablet on the website. Then you would get ranked across your 12 best games and your position was determined for finals, which would start on Friday.

I played all my qualifying games ASAP, so I'd have time to enjoy the main expo hall. In the end I made A division. Then it was off to the main hall to see what was set up to play or purchase knowing I'd be bringing my little guy out on Saturday.

Not knowing what to expect with the new setup, I was pleasantly surprised. There was a good assortment of games to play. Rob Berk had brought a large amount of the games with a good selection of the rare titles. The event was larger vendor driven vs. game play on the pinball side. That said, there was actually a good amount of video games to be played. Consoles were setup with rows of TVs and the local Galloping Ghost Arcade had brought out a good amount of arcade cabinets, including the rare Beavis and Butthead.

When I woke up on Friday morning I checked and saw I had a 10:30 start time for the tournament. After grabbing some breakfast, I drove out to find things were running behind. It wasn't until 11:30 or Noon that I had my first match. I made it through 3 rounds and let up on round 4 as I gradually was realizing this format wasn't for me. My perspective on tournaments has changed over the years since having a kid. I no longer enjoy waiting for hours to play another match only to then wait hours again and never see the actual event. The prospect of possibly playing until Midnight instead of being home eating dinner with my little guy really just doesn't seem like fun anymore. I also don't have the time to learn all the rules of the very complex new games. But, that's just me and something I've now learned!

Back to the show! The major manufacturers all had booths. Stern was showcasing all of their games, including the new Bond 007 with various trims. Jersey Jack has an assortment of their games but was heavily focused on Toy Story, their latest release. They even had a crane game where you could win a plush of the alien from Toy Story. American Pinball had a showing of all of their games and Spooky Pinball had a smaller booth in the back corner of the venue where they were highlighting their games and selling playfield blanks. Even the Pinball Brothers from England brought over the new Queen game.

A big highlight of the show was the row of home brew games. Lots of creators were showing games with unique features, fun themes, and cool ideas. I'm guessing the Fast Pinball crew has greatly contributed to this up tick (they also had a booth). A big thank you to everyone who built and brought these games!

On Saturday I took my best buddy (4-year-old son) to his first Expo he'd possibly remember. He's been to two of them before but was far too small to really enjoy it. This time would be a different and exciting day! We stopped for coffee on the way, and he was rocking a Captain America mask. The barista made him a Captain America babycino with a shield.

I had previously told my son about looking out for Flippy (Expo's new mascot) so he was keen to find him. We also talked about playing the kids tournament. Goals were set, for sure. Upon arrival, we found out that the Flippy plushes were already sold out! They clearly didn't make enough for demand. We then began our explorations.

Immediately he was drawn to a custom Pokemon machine someone had put together. He played a ball and then proceeded to just want to watch the Pokemon episode showing on the apron display. What a cool looking game!

We then proceeded to play a bunch of EMs before heading over to the home brew row. Once again, the little guy was drawn to another custom Pokemon machine. He thought Frozen was pretty great as well.

Lastly, we looked through the vendors before hitting the console games section. This was very reminiscent of the ReplayFX (RIP) setup out in Pittsburgh. We were able to play a ton of old games such as Mario Kart and, more than anything else, Alex Kidd on the Sega Master System. He was fascinated by the game, and we tried the levels over and over.

We finished our adventure together by running through large empty halls and jamming on the piano that was out in one of the lobbies. All in all, it was a great adventure to share. I can't wait to see what next year brings!