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Portland Pinbrawl 2011

Pre-registration is now closed. Thank you to all that have pre-registered. It’s not to late to be apart of Pinbrawl 2011. You can still sign up when Ground Kontrol opens Sunday morning at 10:00-10:45. The tournament will then start at 11:00. See you all there!

The tournament will be held on Sunday April 17th.  Entry is once again $20 this year.  The format is the same, head to head, best 2 of 3, double elimination.

We will be giving away a TBD pinball machine as the grand prize along with cash prizes for top finishers.

Last year's final between Opto and the eventual winner, Deathsave.

Brawlers (37 spots left):

Meilani Allen
Jason America
Drew Anderson
Brian Barbeau
Bonnie Bedford
Mindy Bert
Brandon Bras
Dennis Brenhaug
Billy Brown
Abra Cadabra
Steve Cartoon
Carlos Cash
Pat Castaldo
Raymond Chau
Adam Chesbrough
Brian Chesbrough
Sid Conner
Bobby Conover
Chris Coyle
Miles Craig
Chad Darnell
Erich Demerath
Dave Dimoff
Noah Davis
Mickala Duprey
James Edes
Emma Eichhorn
Michael Farber
Kris Fast
Matt Fentress
Harry Ford
Fred Franken
John Fujita
Maurizio Gagno
Kathy Gagno
Robert Gagno
Jeff Gagnon
Ryan Gratzer
Julie Gray
Louie Hamlett
Philip George Hammil
Hayden Harker
Ashley Harris
John Harris
Mike Hassenpflug
Eric Hill
Jason Hill
Brian Hinz
Ben Hoerth
Maka Honig
Paul Kalk
Gavin Keable
Kevin Kerr
Jared Kramer
Jeff Kraus
John Kremmer
Bill Lascher
Dottie Ledesma
Seth Longmire
Mike Mahaffey
Mark Mahoney
Jake McGhee
Eric Merchant
Jason Nagy
Edmund Nash
Aaron Nelson
Mike Norman
Andrew Nunes
James Pace
Jay Pankratz
Keith Parkins
Brian Richardson
David Rebal
Chris Rhodes
Mark Rubial
Isaac Ruiz
Matthew Siltala
Brandon Smith
Jarrod Smith
Pirate Mike Smith PDX
Jeff Spaziani
Eden Stamm
John Stein
Nathan Stellhorn
Richard Stemson
Rob Timberlake
April Vo
Zoe Vrabel
Donald Warren
Jeff Weston
J.D. Yeager

Showdown at Slabtown III Recrap

Th’ third Showdown at Slabtown is complete. So here’s a picture post.

But first, some fun facts:

The final results can be found here.
A quick recap on pinballrankings.com is here.
Drew Multiball interviewed Bowen, Neil, and Todd MacCulloch:

The tournament was awesome. Competition was way srsly tight. Pretty good CFF turnout and showing, and a good Portland turnout; solid Seattle and VRPA turnout; and some solid ballers came from other places (Neil Shatz and Bob Matthews and Keith Elwin from Caliornia, Bowen Kerins from Massachusetts). Gotta say – this tourney is really developing into Portland’s biggest and best one. The Ground Kontrol Pinbrawl is another big one… but it’s a different format. Thanks everyone for coming out and entering and trying really hard. And thanks to all the organizers and techs and scorekeepers for putting this together and keeping it running. I can’t wait for next year.

Eric Hill took most of these pictures. But I took a few, too. So I captioned them. Thus, hot pics:

Danny Backglass-Mandela gently macking on the Holy Mary Mother of God. (pic by ROM)

Slabtown (pic by Eric)

Fred and Dropshot crunching numbers (pic by rom)

Read the rest of this entry »

Showdown at Slabtown LIVES

UPDATE:

The Classics is over. Mike Mahaffey wins! Full standings will be posted later.

Check @portlandpinball on Twitter for some updates.

FINALS UPDATE: Bowen Kerins wins the Open tournament! Congrats, Bowen.

Final four: Bowen Kerins, Cayle George, Maka Honig, Keith Elwin.

Check back in the next couple of days for a more detailed recap.

That was a whole lot of pinball!

Classics winners: Left-right: Mike Mahaffey, Bob Matthews, Bowen Kerins, Keith Elwin

Open winners, Left-Right: Bowen Kerins, Cayle George, Maka Honig, Keith Elwin

So the tournament starts today! Today and tomorrow is the qualifying round.

Hours:
February 18 3:00-Midnight
February 19 12:00-Midnight

Location:
Slabtown
1033 NW 16th
Portland, OR

The scores and rankings during the qualifying round are updated live (about every 15 minutes), and can be found here.

Open Division Live Results

Classics Division Live Results

So you can keep track of the action from afar! (Note: Those are just the rankings for the qualifying round, not the final. See above for final results.)

Discuss stuff in the comments!

Anyway, don’t forget to try hard, every body! Good luck, and have fun.

Some notes:

-All the machines in the Classics bank are set to 5 ball.
-Some of the machines have very sensitive tilts and are set to “difficult” – so be careful.

Memories of Bygone Days

And by “bygone” I mean “two weeks ago.” And by “memories” I mean “pictures.” And by “of” I mean “like, totally.” So, when you put it like that, “Pictures, like Totally Two Weeks Ago.”

Our local tournament organizers have been busy these past few months coming up with sweet tournament ideas. The most recent one was the C-Bar Charbroiled Schoolyard Rumble. You can read about it in that post. But the gist is: Once upon a time there were four team captains. And one Saturday night those team captains got together and drank a bunch of beer. And then they each drafted their teams from a pool of players. 7 players a team. And on Sunday we all got together and rumbled like asshole school children!

The format was designed just for this tournament. In the first round, each player played four person games against the other teams’ players. After a game was over, you got shacked up with three different players from the opposing teams. Plus you were awarded points based on how you placed (4,2,1,0). And so on for, uh, 7 games in total? At the end of those games, each teams’ points were totaled.

Then the 2nd round began. In this round Team 3 played Team 4. Regular games were played, except at the same time it wasn’t very regular because the players rotated after each ball. So, the pressure was on! When you stepped up to play you knew you could only contribute one ball at a time. This made for an interesting atmosphere, with teams huddling together to come up with their plans, and everyone playing spectator – standing back and focusing intently on whom ever was up at the plate.

Anyway, Eric Hill took some rad pictures throughout the day-long event. Here they are.

Ugh, it's fricking Rhodes...

Aaron 'Dropshot' Nelson glances back mid-game to make sure people are filling out the score thingies correctly. This guy is ACES at running tourneys, man.

Noah 'Mad Eyes' 'Opto' Davis (two nicknames!), wearing a headband.

Okay, listen up, people! Probably Dropshot's favorite thing to say.

Nearly the same picture, but this time with more beard.

Who ever said pinball wasn't a spectator sport? Oh... like everyone except these people. Okay...

Scoring and drinking. Usually, you know, it's like totally the other way around in this scene (drinking, and then SCOOOORING!!). but mmhmm, yeah...

Video 'Dennis' Mode shreds Judge Dredd

Dropshot doth the same.

And then over on the other side of the room: more pinball.

Mindy crushes skulls in the final, on Black Knight 2K

Opposing force Jay 'Kickback' America tells us all to cut the crap as he steps up to jah plate

A heavenly halo slams into Kevin's dome as he battles the Black Knight. But would it be enough?

Spectating during the finals

Dropshot, ball 3, player 2, comes from behind and wins the tournament for his team

Don't forget, mad cash for the winning team

Not to rub it in or anything... (Rhodes and Mindy)

The winning team! YAYYYY. Matt, Soundcard, Dropshot, Emma, Rhodes, Mindy, ROM

Sigh, fun times.. And you can find some bracket stuff here.

For upcoming tournaments, check that section of the message board, or the Events page on the Portland Pinball Map.

Ricochet C-Bar Bounties + Cascadia Cup Registration Reminder

Two hot items for you to munch on, swallow, and then belch out.

First off: a reminder that the First Annual Cascadia Cup* is happening on November 7. Registration is now completely full. Thank you for those that have signed up. It’s gonna be fun!

If you didn’t know, Cascadia is the bio-region commonly known as the Pacific Northwest. It’s a lush enviro, all green-like and pretty, super casual and phased, and some people here want the United States to just get the hell out of it forever.

So this tournament is a celebration of the super rad Cascadia pinball scene. It’s an all day tournament, and you’re guaranteed to play 9 rounds! Basically, you get matched up with three others and play a game of pinball, then you get matched up with a different 3 others again and play a game of pinball and you get to do this 9 times. Then the top 12 advance to the final rounds. Dropshot’s testimony: “Those that attended last year’s event, the Slabtown Smackdown, will likely testify that this may be the most laid back tournament in the history of tournaments.”

You need to sign up ahead of time for this tournament. We are making t-shirts and stuff, and the prize packages will be SWEET. Pre-registration ends TOMORROW, Oct. 1. So sign the eff up. We currently have 29 registrants, and we’re gunning for 36 so that we have a nice clean bracket. AKA space is limited! More information can be found on the Cascadia Cup page.

Item number dos: Casual flow knows no bounds! Much to everyone’s happiness, local operator Ricochet Pinball has taken over the C-Bar. They’ve added seven machines to the place. And in celebration, they set up an amazing bounty hunt on the machines there (well, on five of them).

The bounties are thus: Whomever holds the GC on a machine on the deadline of Oct. 15 wins $100! Uh yeah… that’s huge, people. That’s $500 in total prizes. There’s already some tight competition on them. But some of the machines are still just waiting to be slayed. So have at those machines!

The machines in the bounty hunt are:

Twilight Zone
Rollergames
Judge Dredd
Road Kings
Jack*Bot

Discuss the bounties here. Thanks, Ricochet!

*it’s sort of the 2nd annual… I dunno. whatever!

Cascadia Pinball Cup Registration

Registration for Cascadia Pinball Cup. is now limited to 48. Please contact Aaron/Dropshot to register. Thank you to those that have signed up, so far there are 46 players this year. Looking forward to seeing everyone in November.

We had 7 people pre-order a t-shirt, we plan to make a few extras to sell the day of. If anyone knows they are going to probably buy one please let me know.

Registered Players (48): All full

Quest for the Beta Test – Pre-Avatar Pinball Tourney

ROM from Casual Flow Headquarters here, bringing you news about an upcoming Slow-Flow tournament being run by local operator, Quarterworld.

Stern’s next machine, Avatar, is coming out soon. Avatar is already known among some circles (namely, the circle made up of me and my cat) as one of the most pixelated pinball games ever made. Take a look at this screenshot for an example:

It’s like freaking Monet met up with Buzz Aldrin and they had a baby together. And then they smashed the baby onto the playfield and then cranked up the pixels. Amirite?!

But wait, there’s more! Now’s your chance to finally see the pinball machine in person.

Quarterworld is being rad enough to let some top ballers get an early taste of the machine. To be granted access, all you have to do is hold a GC or #1 score on one of the two machine at the Langano Lounge by the tournament’s end.

Check out Qdub’s post about the tournament.

And here are some additional details:

Casual Span: Aug. 20 – Sept. 12.
Casual Loc: Langano Lounge. 1435 Southeast Hawthorne Boulevard.
Casual Crush: The Simpsons Pinball Party, Indiana Jones (Stern)
Casual Flow Rating: 5/5 (due to length of the tournament)

There is the potential for four people to win this tournament. So don’t fret! You have a chance. And if you win, it would be cool if you could use the message board to give us fans and early review!

Showdown at Slabtown II – Casual Flowblock

At the stroke of midnight – two hours ago – dropshot called out, with his grotesque horsevoice, the final games of the qualifying round. And not too surprisingly, some mad rank exchanges took place right at that final toll. Danny Backglass, on a heroic 900,000+ game of Aztec, leaped from 12th place in the Classics (not a qualifying placement) to 4th. And in the Open division, Opto did something or other on Whirlwind to skyrocket his placement from so-so to good! A moment after these games were registered, all the machines were swiftly turned off – the mad shuffle complete, the qualifying round OVER!

There’s a lot to go over right now. And I do not think I will be able to cover it all, late as it is. But I will try to note the things that pop into my head. First off, Eden Stamm arrived today from Canada and succeeded in posting a slew of big scores in the Open division, thus securing his 1st place qualifying position. He was solid all the way through. And in the Classics division, Cayle George ended the night on top.

There was a very strong turnout in both tournaments. It was busy all day, but the final few hours were especially crammed with contenders jockeying for qualifying positions. Mega thanks go out to Sara, Nhu, and Katrina for managing the scoring in the final hours. It looked really hectic, and you all really took care of business. Also thanks to Emma for her superlong day shift. Plus thx to Isaac, Noah, DannyB, Jake, Dennis, and EVERYONE who helped out and/or took a scoring shift (I am missing many in that list).

Here are the leaderboards:

Open leaderboard (top 16 qualifies)

Classics leaderboard (top 8 qualifies)

And the individual machine scores:

Open:
Simpsons
Demolition Man
Whirlwind
Terminator 2
Frontier
Seawitch

Classics:
Royal Flush
Aces and Kings
Aztec
Solar City

Okay, I am super tired. Here are a bunch of pictures I took today! Click each image for full size. The pictures cover some afternoon action, mini-games (NES Gun Flippers, Reverse-Flippers, and Tommy mode), Classics set-up, and more.

And here’s a video I took with my camera of some Classics action! That’s Eric Hill, one of the event organizers, in the foreground playing Aztec.

So! The Classics finale matches start tomorrow, Sunday, at noon! If you’re in the top 8, ya gotta be there on time. This is IT!

And during the classics matches, there will be the side-battle for the PBR longboard. This battle will be with the 17th-20th place finishers in the Open Division (but it also depends on how they qualified in the Classics…?? I don’t get it, really – JUST BE THERE OKAY!), and will be starting at noon.

Then, around 2:30pm, the Open division final matches will begin. If you qualified in the top 16, be there earlier than 2:30pm. Don’t be lame (looking at you OOO).

The Ricochet mini-games! In the fourth picture above, you can see Jeri Ellsworth, one half (with Trish) of the inventive minds behind the fun set-ups, using the NES laser Gun to play Star Trek. As far as I know, Dave (10th picture) has the current high score on that machine – around 34 million. And Danny B (7th picture) has the current high score on the reverse-flippered Time Machines (around 4.2 million). I’m not sure who has the high on Tommy Bad Cats – but I’ve heard it’s around 25 million.

Alright, I’ll have another round-up tomorrow once it’s all over. I hope you found this post informative, and I hope I didn’t anything crucial out. See you tomorrow!!

Showdown at Slabtown 2010 Friday Wrap-up

Day 1 of qualifying at the Showdown comes to a close, and what do we have? We have this:

Open Leaderboard

Basically:
Robert Gagno – 1st
Cayle George – 2nd
Danny Backglass – 3rd
Romulanx – 4th

and etc.

Open division machine scores:

Simpsons
Demolition Man
Whirlwind
Terminator 2
Frontier
Seawitch

And the Classics Division Leaderboard

Royal Flush
Aces and Kings
Aztec
Solar City

Nice turn-out tonight. It felt busy. We’re showing 40 entries so far. Even stronger than last year at this point. A lot of the weekly regulars have shown up (though not all! what up), as well as some fresh faces, plus there’s a solid contingent from Seattle, and from British Columbia. And more of them to arrive tomorrow. Action starts tomorrow at noon. And there’s, no doubt, gonna be a lot of shifts in the leaderboard.

Ricochet has set up some rad side-games. Get this! They have a Data East Star Trek machine with flippers that you activate using an NES Gun! There are sensors at the bottom of the playfield, and you shoot the gun at the left or right sensors, accordingly. Its really difficult! But I was definitely improving with each try. Whosoever has the high score by the end of the tournament wins half the coin box. 25 cents to play.

Plus, they set up Bad Cats Tommy Style – with the bottom foot of the playfield covered up in black tape, so you can’t see the flippers!

And – third side-game machine – Time Machine is set with reverse flippers. The right button triggers the left flipper, the left button triggers the right. Super challenging. Top score on any of these machine by the end of the tourney wins half the respective cashbox. They are really fun, unusual, and creative side-games to be running during the tournament. Fun ways to step away from the qualifying machines and just get wild!

Sorry, I did not take pictures of anything tonight. I’ll take and post some pics tomorrow. And I’ll also post another status report after the qualifying rounds ends, midnight tomorrow. Good luck tomorrow, everyone. Let’s see some sick scores!

Second Annual Showdown at Slabtown

Hey hey, next weekend is the second annual Showdown at Slabtown!! It’s a three day tournament, with big cash payouts to those who qualify for the final day’s matches.

Check out the Showdown page for more details, plus some stuff about the rules.

And read the message board thread for some hot discussions!

This style of tournament, though different from Portland’s weekly tournaments and from the Ground Kontrol Pinbrawl, has a strong focus on an individual’s skill and strategy. While you are trying to beat other people’s scores, you’re also allowed the time and space to do your best without having to worry about being eliminated after just a couple bad games. Two days of casual flow qualifying on Friday and Saturday! Hang out, watch the players, watch your placement go up and down, and have fun!

But then on Sunday, things change! Once it’s down to 16, you’ll be matched up against the other players, playing three 4-player games, and then advancing (or not) from there.

A lot of people will be entering this tournament. It’s a good way to check out the scene, get sorta serious about your game, TRY HARD, and maybe win some money!

Here’s an overview:

Slabtown
1033 NW 16th
Portland, OR

Open Tournament will be held on 6 machines and qualifying will be held from:
Friday, July 30 3:00-Midnight
Saturday, July 31 12:00-Midnight

Finals will be held on: Sunday, August 1 following Classics finals

Classics Tournament will be held on 4 machines and qualifying will be held from:
Friday, July 30 3:00-Midnight
Saturday, July 31 12:00-Midnight

Finals will be held on:
Sunday, August 1 at 12:00pm

1 ticket=1 game
1 ticket- $3
4 tickets- $10

Open tournament machines:
Seawitch
Frontier
Whirlwind
Demolition Man
The Simpson’s Pinball Party
Terminator: II

Classic tournament machines:
Aces and Kings
Royal Flush
Solar City
Aztec

Machines are provided by Quality Entertainment, Ricochet Pinball, and some individuals. Thank you to all y’all, and to the organizers, and Slabtown! It should be a lot of fun. There are two big pinball tournaments in Portland each year, and this is one of them!

In the meantime, read our excellent (live)blogging coverage from last year’s Showdown:
Showdown at Slabtown – Updates
Top 16 announced
Showdown at Slabtown wrap-up

And like last year, we’ll try to keep this blog up to date with the latest qualifying scores (daily round-up).

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