SURPRISE New Pinball Machine Reveal by Barrels of Fun Pinball
By knapparcade
We interrupt my regular article with this BREAKING PINBALL NEWS! Barrels of Fun Pinball has just revealed a new game out of nowhere. The new game, Winchester Mystery House. Designed by the incredible pinball player Karl DeAngelo it is limited to 525 units. Watch now and enter the most haunted house pinball machine ever built, inspired by the true legend of the Winchester Mystery House and created in collaboration with Winchester Mystery House, LLC and Barrels of Fun, the creators of Labyrinth and Dune Pinball, comes a new kind of fear under glass, Winchester Mystery House Pinball. Game Attractions: Winchester Mystery House Holographic Ghost Box Spirits are unleashed within this spellbinding Pepper’s Ghost effect bringing the mansion to life with ghosts that interact with the ball! Revolving Hallway Turntable Hidden corridors and staircases to nowhere are uncovered in this labyrinth of shots that includes 3 unique entrances and 8 different positions, creating a variety of ball paths! Collapsing Winchester Tower When the 1906 Earthquake destroys the Winchester Tower, a hidden ball path within the house is revealed! Staircase to Nowhere Magnetic Ball Catch A seemingly dead end that plummets the ball further into the depths of the house! Door to Nowhere Staircase Ramp Expels the house’s ghostly inhabitants Right Staircase Ramp Diverts the ball to 3 unique exits Seance Room Inline Target Bank Breakthrough the wall to uncover the mysterious Seance Room Seance Table & Crystal Ball Take your seat around the illuminated Crystal Ball with this 3-ball physical lock Spirit Board Apron Communicate with the ghosts of Winchester through hidden illuminated lettering and backlit Ouija planchette; also featuring a “Return” left outlane kickback 5 High-Fidelity Custom Sculpts Winchester Witch’s Cap, Roofline, Tower, Stained Glass Window Frame, and Crystal Ball 2 Magnets Spider Web Magnet Catch within the Holographic Ghost Box Staircase to Nowhere Game Features: • 3 Full-Size Flippers, • 1 Mini Flipper, • 6 Balls • 4 Metal Ramps, • 5 Chrome Wire Habitrails, • 1 Subway, • 2 Scoops, • 2 Vertical Upkicks, • 2 Magnets, • 1 Spinner, • 1 Diverter, • 1 Kickback, • 2 Drop Target Banks, • 1 Inline Drop Target Bank, • 1 Captive Ball, • 2 Up-Posts, • 1 Physical 3 Ball Lock. The MSRP of Winchester Mystery House is $11,600. It can be ordered from a distributor or directly from Barrels of Fun at: Barrels of Fun Order Page
Back to my regularly scheduled article: It's the start of a new week...and it's going to be a good one. Well, at least in terms of talking about pinball and arcade stuff. First off, this week is the annual Chicago Pinball Expo in Schaumburg, Illinois. We always get cool news out of that show. Unfortunately, I will not personally be attending Expo this year. BUT I have a good reason for not going. This past weekend, Rob and I went on our 7th Annual Fall Arcade Road Trip to the Ann Arbor Pinball Museum, also known as Vintage Flipper World (VFW) in Brighton, Michigan. For those of you who aren't familiar with it, the VFW has what is likely the largest single collection of pinball machines on the floor at one time of any arcade in the World...around 530 games! The VFW is right up there with Rob Burke's Past Times Arcade in Girard, Ohio as the most amazing arcade that I have ever personally been to. The VFW is tricky to get to though because it is only open to the public for two main shows per year, once in the Spring and once in the Fall. They also hold two other big events annually, a Tournament and a Charity event. I've been talking about going to the VFW show for years and finally pulled the trigger and flew out with Rob on Friday morning. I'll share lots more pictures and video from that show over the coming weeks. Below is a walkthrough video that I took while I was there. It took me a whopping 17 minutes to walk the entire floor of the arcade and see everything. Check it out.
Back to Pinball Expo. Pinball Brothers' brand new Predator Pinball machine will make its U.S. show debut at the event. The games have been shipped over from the Euro Pinball Corp. factory and Italy and have made an appearance at several arcades this week en route to Expo, including the Electric Bat Arcade in Tempe, Arizona.
American Pinball's new sister company Orbit Games (I guess that's how the structure works there, it's kind of confusing) is also bringing a new game to Expo. Orbit Games' WHIRL-O-BALL will make its public debut at the event. The company describes it as a "Classic Alley Game with modern gameplay & tons of features." It looks a lot like Skee-Ball with a twist to me. Orbit stated recently that the game will begin to appear at select locations this fall with new orders shipping in early 2026. www.orbitgames.fun
Barrels of Fun Pinball will be at Expo with its own room and its first two games, Labyrinth and Dune AND its just announced new game Winchester Mystery House! Specifically, they will have four Winchesters at the show for the public to play.
I have written about Expo's amazing Homebrew Pinball section a couple of times over the past week or so, featuring Mud Flap Pinball's Big Trouble in Little China and Ernie Silverberg's Monster Inc. games. I have a few more really cool ones to highlight. The first is a wild 3D printed homebrew game called ATOM. Check out how cool this thing looks:
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Two extremely innovative French pinball homebrewers, Tadeg and Nicolas, are bringing their new creation "THE INVADERS" to Expo. If you haven't seen this machine yet, you have to check out the video below. The mechs in it are unbelievable.Your browser doesn't support HTML5 video. Download the video instead.
Game of the Day 1984 Williams Still Crazy vertical pinball machine. This is 1 of only 12 Prototype machines ever built and 1 of only 3 examples of this game still known to exist today! Picture a full game, based on the backbox of Williams’ Banzai Run. The object is to flip balls from the bottom level all the way to the top using a series of buttons on the control panel. Video in comments below. Designed by Eric Erickson and Dan Langlois with code by Ed Suchocki. As seen at the Ann Arbor Pinball Museum.
