Pinball is an indoor game in which a player maneuvers steel balls on a surface called a playfield inside a glass-covered cabinet. The cabinet is often called a pinball machine. The player scores points by guiding the balls so they strike an assortment of targets placed throughout the playfield. The machine keeps track of the points electronically on a scoreboard, part of a decorated backglass that stands at the rear end of the playfield.
The basic pinball game begins when a player uses a plunger or another type of control to shoot a steel ball onto the playfield. The player can control the ball’s direction with the use of flippers and by guiding the balls into holes and against raised knobs called bumpers that repel the balls on contact. The playfield has a slight downhill slope toward the player. If the player loses control of the ball, it will drain (roll down) into a trough at the bottom of the playfield. If players earn a high score, of if they achieve specific targets, they can be rewarded with extra balls to continue the game, or even with free games. A skillful player can keep a single ball in play for many minutes.
Pinball is a popular commercial game found in such public places as family entertainment centers, restaurants, and various types of arcades. Commercial games are coin operated, with a player depositing coins into the machine to receive a certain number of balls. Many people own one or more machines and play them for recreation in their homes. Elaborate modern machines can cost several thousand dollars and weigh several hundred pounds. Tens of thousands of players throughout the world belong to the Professional & Amateur Pinball Association (PAPA) and the International Flipper Pinball Association (IFPA). Both associations organize leagues and tournaments for competitive play.
Most historians trace the origins of pinball to a French table game called bagatelle, popular by the 1700’s. In that game, players shot balls with a stick or cue from the player’s end of the table. In 1869, the British inventor Montague Redgrave settled in the United States and soon started manufacturing bagatelle tables. In 1871, Redgrave was granted a U.S. patent for his “Improvement in Bagatelles,” which replaced the cue or stick with a coiled spring and a plunger.
Coin-operated pinball machines first were mass-marketed in the early 1930’s. During the 1930’s, electricity was added to pinball machines, creating a new technology that made pinball a faster and more complex game. Player-controlled flippers were introduced in 1947, in a game called Humpty Dumpty.
Commercial pinball was hurt in the late 1970’s and 1980’s by competition from video games that displaced pinball machines in arcades and other public places. Pinball regained much of its popularity by the early 1990’s with the development of more complicated mechanical operations and elaborate sound systems. Manufacturers based pinball machines on themes linked to both older and currently popular music performers, motion pictures, and television shows, such as the Rolling Stones, Star Wars, and “The Twilight Zone,” respectively. After a sharp decline in pinball machine sales in the 1990’s, further technological advances helped the industry recover in the early 2000’s. Pinball machines today may include animation and multi-level playfields.
