There are many interesting and wondrous things happening in the pinball world that constantly cross the PinGame Journal "Pinball In The News" desk and this is the place to find out all about them! (Check out PinGame Update for more!) Read the words and click the links below to be in the know!

August 18, 2010--Stern's Avatar nears production start! Read more at Pingame Update. (Avatar translight shown is a prototype and not the final, approved version. Official photos will be available on this site when available)

August 2, 2010--Pinball Comes To PAPA. Read the details of last year's PAPA 12 by Mish Paull to get you ready as PAPA 13's start looms large in the future--August 12-15. Read more by clicking PAPA.

July 22, 2010--Stern announces production of Avatar pin. Read more at Pingame Update.

July 11, 2010--Rosa family makes it a clean sweep at the 2010 Michigan Pinball Expo

IT'S A FAMILY AFFAIR: Hot off a second place finish at the recent IFPA World Championship, Andy Rosa took first in the "A" division at the MPE. But the Rosa family wasn't finished as son Andrew grabbed the "B" division title and daughter Ahna flipped her way to the top of the "Wizards In Training" bracket. Read more about this first ever Michigan show by clicking HERE.

June 25, 2010--Michigan Pinball Expo's "Koz" interviewed by Mitch Albom

John "Koz" Kosmal, organizer of the Michigan Pinball Expo (MPE), was interviewed by international best selling author and Detroit radio personality, Mitch Albom about the MPE to be held in Rochester Michigan on July 8-12, 2010. Download a podcast of the interview by clicking HERE and get more info on the MPE at their web site by clicking HERE.

June 17, 2010--Ground Kontrol Classic Arcade of Portland wins $25,000 prize in Save The Arcades 2 contest

Ground Kontrol Arcade won the prize sponsored by Stride gum by posting the most points "donated" by supportors (including a good number of PGJ readers!) who played an on line game called Cowbots 2010. GK's Art Santana promises the money will be used for good: increasing the number of games at the arcade including adding to their already impressive lineup of pins. Take a look at the GK site by clicking HERE.

June 3, 2010--Stern Launches New Web Site Tomorrow!

The countdown clock has stopped and the brand new Stern website is LIVE! Visitors to sternpinball.com will be greeted with many new features that make this, according to Jody Dankberg of Stern, more of a public, consumer site than the old commercial, industry type. Read more at the PinGame Update page.

Stern Pinball, Inc. is conducting a limited market test exclusively in select Costco stores. The test includes a total of 48 reduced feature, lower cost, custom designed Batman™ pinball machines with less complex playfields. Participating Costco stores have three games each. Stern is conducting this test to study products best suited for various segments of its market. These games are shipped from the factory set on free play and have only one fixed coin setting of five credits per one coin. Stern plans to sell no more of this test Batman™ in this configuration in the U.S. If the test is successful, Stern will further simplify the game design for tested market segments, such redesign including a much more simplified cabinet, replacement of the current dot matrix score display, and so forth.

Stern will continue to build its full line of traditional coin op pinball games as well as collector models.

Costco Store test locations are the following: Carlsbad, CA; Rancho Cucamonga, CA; Simi Valley, CA; North Fresno, CA; Reno, NV; Tigard, OR; Issaquah, WA; St. George, UT; San Antonio, TX; Houston, TX; Overland Park, KN.

May 23, 2010--IFPA 7 Full Of Surprises! Just when it looked like the same people whould keep winning the top honors in the world of pinball competition, the IFPA 7 event happened and that all changed. Top honors went to Danelle Acciari from Italy, the first time in IFPA history the championship was won by a non-American. Second place was taken by Andy Rosa, a familiar name in IFPA circles, but never before in the finals. Check out the IFPA site for more! Congratulations Danelle!

May 13, 2010--The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (Oscars) will present a special 35th anniversary screening and disscussion of TOMMY on May 21, 2010

The event, open to the public, will include a new digital cinema presentation with the original quintaphonic soundtrack and a onstage panel dission hosted by Murry Lerner (The Amazing Journey: The Story Of The Who) with special guests director Ken Russell and editor Stuart Baird. For more information and tickets, visit the Academy website by clicking HERE.

April 12, 2010--Stern, in conjunction with the IFPA, announces four (count them ...four) simultaneous Iron Man launch parties around the US!

Hot on the heels of the official Iron Man press release distributed last week came an announcement from Josh Sharpe of the IFPA that they will be hosting four Iron Man launch parties.

March, 2010-- Cartoon Network's [Adult Swim] features pinball for an entire episode of Aqua Team Hunger Force. The clip embedded below will give you an idea, but the whole episode involved pinball including Shake's eventual date with the game Death Mountain Hoedown.

The episode began with a message to Stern:
ATTENTION! Stern Pinball, Inc. the following episode of ATHF was inspired by our Family Guy pinball machine and features a design that we believe is the future of pinball. Please take notes and produce this machine accordingly. Thank you kindly, [adult swim]
(Thanks to Pins & Vids co-producer Al Warner for sending the video!)

January 14, 2010--Stern's Big Buck Hunter Pro pinball officially released.

Slated to be on the production line late this month, Stern has sent out the official press release for this game. Based on the popular arcade game of the same name, besides the Stern crew of Lonnie Ropp, John Borg and Lyman Sheats, it features contributions from Raw Thrills/Play Mechincs' Eugene Jarvis, Geroge Petro, Mark Ritchie, Scott Pikulski and Ken Hale as well as John Youssi who created the art package for both games. You can read a very preliminary overview of the game by clicking HERE, read the full Stern press release by clicking HERE and look for an indepth discussion of the game, including a "behind the scenes" glimpse at the design process, in a near-future PinGame Journal!

This morning on the NPR broadcast Weekend Edition, Liane Hansen conducted an interview with David Silverman about his collection of over 800 games and his goal to create the National Pinball Museum. What a great showcase for pinball ... you da man, David! Take a look and a listen to the interview by clicking HERE and check out David's museum web site by clickingHERE and help out by giving a buck or more to the cause by clicking "sponsorship."

January 2, 2010-- The Pinball Hall of Fame moves to a new location.

It's been a long time coming, but Tim Arnold has moved his Pinball Hall of Fame into a stand-alone building that is owned, not rented. The Las Vegas Pinball Collectors Club has purchased a building that can hold about twice the games and is about half the distance to the Strip as the old place. There are photos at the PHoF web site which you can see by clicking HERE. Look for more on this promising upgrade in the January, 2010 (#138) issue of the Pingame Journal!

January 3, 2010-- The famous ever-changing opening sequence of this evening's episode of "The Simpsons" features pinball.

The episode "Thursdays with Abie" (which featured an appearence by Detroit area local celeb Mitch Albom, author of "Tuesdays With Morrie") contained a pinball opening that consisted mostly of a giant pinball machine named Couch Gag Chaos featuring the Simpsons family being bumped and shot around the playfield, all finally draining, as all pinballs do. You can see the opening along with the entire episode at the Fox site by clicking HERE and click on "Thrusdays With Abie" (Season 21, Episode 9). The Simpsons have been the subject of two pinball machines, check out the Stern Pinball site to see the most recent, Simpsons Pinball Party by clicking HERE.

December 23, 2009-- John Popadiuk's iPhone pingame app becomes available from the iTunes store.

This game is jam packed with features including the ability to customize the playfield giving the player the ability to play the resulting game. Get all the details by clicking HERE.

December 23, 2009-- Stern Pinball announces finance deal.

Stern Pinball, Inc. announced today that it has closed a financing and partnership agreement with a group of investors led by David J. Peterson, a founder and Managing Director of Hagerty Peterson & Company, LLC. Under the agreement, the new investors will provide capital and services to Stern Pinball, Inc. with the goal of expanding the Company’s business. Mr. Peterson and his colleague, Daniel P. Wallace, will join the Company’s Board of Directors. Gary Stern will continue in his role as Chairman and CEO of the Company.

“We’re very excited about this new partnership with Dave and his colleagues,” said Stern. “They have an impressive history of building successful businesses and are bringing fresh insights to the Company that we believe will be very helpful.”

“We were impressed by the commitment of the Company’s customers, suppliers and employees to pinball, which we share,” said Peterson. “It will take some time, but we think we can help the Company better serve that community and expand.”

August 19, 2009-- Popular Mechanics magazine features pinball history on their web site.

The story is about the era when pinball was illegal and the efforts to remove the stigma of gambling and prove the game requires skill and not chance only. Take a look by clicking HERE.

Bowen talks about pinball in general and what it's like to compete at the top level. Take a listen by clicking HERE.

July 8, 2009-- Pinball Pioneer Steve Kordek is featured in a Chicago Tribune article on pinball with an associated story on Stern Pinball Inc.

Freelance writer, Lisa Pevtzow interviewed pinball people around the globe to create this feature on pinball which hit its stride in Chicago and look in on 98 year old classic designer Steve Kordek. She also talked extensively with Gary Stern of Stern Pinball, Inc and presents an updated view of the company and its head. (Link currently broken--we're working on it!) Click Chicago Tribune-Kordek to read both stories.

March 15, 2009 ESPN "Sports Center" puts pinball front and center

The text message from Trent Augenstein read, "I'm going to be on Sports Center tonight, briefly." He was. However, the spot focused on ex NBA player Todd MacCulloch who switched to pinball for his professional sports excitement as he won his first ever individual trophy in any sport at the 2009 Texas Pinball Fest tournament. Todd finished second to Trent's first place effort but as Todd's first, it was a special moment.

This announcement is exciting news for all Pinball 2000 owners as well as a good sign along the road to the future of pinball. The PGJ is excited to present a mini-interview with Nucore co-creator, Chuck Hess, revealing some details of their operation. Look for more detail in near-future issues of the magazine. First the announcement:

“The Big Guys Pinball team is pleased to announce that a licensing agreement for Nucore has been finalized. WMS Gaming Inc. approved a licensing agreement between Big Guys Pinball, Illinois Pinball Corporation and The Pinball Factory. This agreement will allow Big Guys Pinball to market and sell Nucore worldwide. Nucore will be exclusively distributed by Pinball Life of Huntley, Illinois. Big Guys Pinball will be releasing Nucore pricing and component details in early March so visit them by clicking HERE for more details.

PGJ's Mini Interview with Nucore's Chuck Hess

PGJ—Chuck, we have talked a lot in the past about how you were going to navigate the dangerous licensing waters as you brought out this product. Your announcement reveals that you are covering pretty much all the bases. Was this a requirement you had to meet before Nucore went officially public?

CH—No, we weren’t forced to get licensing from both Wayne and Gene but it is just the best way to make sure we would have zero legal problems. Legal problems would be costly for us and could have stopped Nucore sales because of possible drawn-out battles.

PGJ—Now that is out of the way, do you have some big factory somewhere to produce all the systems to have Pinball Life distribute?

DH--We are a two-man operation doing pretty much everything. We are making custom hardware. One board will come with the Nucore base package and it will provide a key function that we couldn’t emulate safely in software. It will also provide for future expansion boards allowing the addition of a real cabinet knocker or a mod to greatly enhance Bill Ung’s saucer mod, for just two examples. These custom boards will be mass-produced, but we have designed, built and tested the prototypes. Don is really the genius behind that.

PGJ—What was your reasoning in adding a distribution level to the venture? Are you both going to hand it over to them, rake in the profits and spend your time on the beach in the Cayman Islands?

DH--What we gain by using distribution is control over the marketing and sales of our product while losing the minutiae of handling orders. We picked Pinball Life due to their stellar reputation, worldwide distribution and neutrality between all parties. I really do believe in specialization of labor and Pinball Life will serve us well. Once we start selling Nucore, Don and I will be doing all of the support along with help from our testers and other Nucore users. It will hardly be like sitting on a beach sipping mojitos with purple umbrellas. We have a lot of work ahead.

FOX Business News. On April 29, 2008 FOX Business News visited the Stern Pinball factory to see the latest game Indiana Jones on the assembly line and talk to designer John Borg. The video will be included on a future PGJ Media Clips DVD. Also, the same day, myFOX Chicago aired a live report at Stern interviewing Gary Stern.