Well, where do I start?
First of all, it was great to be there representing AussiePinball.com and hopefully we end up with an influx of new members. All the colour brochures went and we were well into the black and white ones by close on Sunday. On Sunday it was a bit quieter than on Saturday so had more chance to outline the benefits of joining up to a number of interested pinball owners. We also managed to sell a few T-shirts along the way.
Thanks to all who assisted in any way - T-shirts, banner, brochures, and manning the stall. Special mention to those who backed it up on the Sunday and helped out for a second day! I think it was a very positive move for the forum to be a sponsor of the Expo and having good forums can only help the industry grow as we assist and inspire people or point them in the right direction to get what they need.
Pinball machines: it was great to have close to 100 machines on the floor for people to play. Apparently there were over 1000 through the door on Saturday but I didn't hear the humbers for Sunday. In the end I didn't actually play that many games but the strongest memories for me were NBA Fastbreak (I think this one has made it on to the wishlist), Bride of Pinbot (that was an easy game - managed Grand Champion on my second go on it on the Sunday), and of course Coconut Island (although that machine didn't like me). It was sad to see Nick and Christian have to leave early but the guys put in a huge effort just to get there with a working game so hats off to them. I am not sure what plans Christian has for his source code but it provides so many possibilities for what is in the end quite a simple design on the hardware side of things.
The people: it was marvellous to be able to catch up with so many people from the forums and the wider pinball community. I met people from Perth, Adelaide, Brisbane, and of course, Sydney (and Wollongong). Thanks to everyone for their friendliness, hospitality and generosity. It was fun to be chatting with like-minded people on the subject of pinball.
The dinner: good turnout, good food, interesting company, unbelievably difficult pinball trivia (but the general questions were easy), a nice little speech from Tony M (illawarra_steelers), and some interesting video footage from Michael S. The only disappointment was not hearing from Alan Tate (sp?) - I really wanted to hear about his vision for a pinball museum from the man himself, but it wasn't to be.
The auction: pretty fair prices for what was on offer. There wasn't a huge roll-up compared to the Saturday, and the buyers where not the typical "I MUST own a pinball" crowd you see down in Melbourne, so nothing got too inflated.
The stalls: Of course, Gavin was there with examples of his awe-inspiring restoration work, and his neon signs. I reckon he might have a few years of work ahead of him after the Expo, he attracted that much interest. Michael Shalhoub was of course there with his books and also spare parts and pinball manuals. Pinball Mania (Jason Douglas) supplied some pinball machines for the floor as well but I can't remember them having a stall. Capital Pinball (from Canberra, where else) brought along an Attack from Mars, a Medieval Madness and a Cactus Canyon - all of which Jose was letting people play until the AFM was sold. AMD was there with 24 and the new NBA game (and apparently they racked up some orders as well). Three Ball Wizard were there promoting their T-shirts. There was an Arcade+ stall (Sydney based company selling cocktails and uprights) and a Kartatak display (Sydney based racing kart company). And of course there was us alongside Coconut Island.
The pinball competition: run by Z Ball, this was won by someone from Dubbo (I guess there really is nothing else out there to do except practise pinball). Matt might have more details as he watched this one.
A big thanks must go to Rian for organising it along with Michael and the others who helped. It takes a lot of courage to put on an event like this, especially when your money is on the line. Overall it was a great way to bring more exposure to the game of pinball. The amount of media coverage the event got was quite impressive.
Suggestions for next time:-
1. Without trying to sound too negative, the quality of some of the machines on the floor was not great. At one stage on the Saturday it felt like 1 in 3 pinballs were down. Admittedly they were getting hammered, but some machines were obviously better than others (NBA Fastbreak never missed a beat, by the way). It is not a real good introduction to pinball to rock up to a machine only to find it doesn't work. And all the machines were supposed to be on freeplay but some still needed manual addition of credits.
2. Even though the Expo was advertised as finishing up at 5pm on the Sunday, from the auction onwards (12pm) there where no more pinball machines to play. There were a few disappointed punters who came in expecting to be able to play machines but were not able to do so (and if you read the website it sounds like you could). If there needs to be an auction next time (and maybe there doesn't need to be one) then it would be better programmed for later in the day (say 2-5pm).
