History YMMV / Pinball

* CrowningMomentOfAwesome:
** Creator/RogerSharpe's courtroom demonstration of pinball skills, as recounted on the [[{{Pinball}} main trope page]]. Made all the more amusing by his later admission that [[AccidentalHero his success was due to luck.]]
** Atari Games' 1979 ''Pinball/{{Hercules}}'' measured 93 inches long, 39 inches wide and 83 inches high. It used a pool table cue ball for the pinball. Sometimes this would be an 8-ball.
** ''The Pinball Circus'', [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2DXk2Xn1W04 a pinball machine built to fit in a videogame arcade cabinet.]] Only two of these machines were ever built.
** Performing any of the advanced techniques in a pinball machine. Admit it, you cheered upon your first live catch.
** Triggering a WizardMode, which is rarely ever easy, and often makes everything on the table activate and/or be worth a large number of points each.
* CrowningMusicOfAwesome: So many, we put them on [[AwesomeMusic/{{Pinball}} their own page.]]

** Plunger lanes that lead to pop bumpers are a major cause of annoyance for a lot of players, especially if the pop bumpers do not have a fixed exit and can fly out in any direction. The reason is that there is a good chance that when you begin the ball, it goes to the bumpers and rockets into the drain, without any way of saving it. Even with a ball saver (a mechanic to return the ball to you with no penalty when the game begins), the ball could bounce around in the bumpers for so long that the ball saver runs out while the ball is still there. Machines where this has been an issue include ''Pinball/BramStokersDracula'' and ''Pinball/TheWalkingDead''.
* UnpleasableFanbase: Obviously not every pinhead will be satisfied with the newest games or the decisions that pinball companies make. However, the Pinside Forums house some of the worst offenders of this trope, to the point that most pinball industry figures [[WhyTheFandomCantHaveNiceThings have sworn off posting exclusive news or mingling with online members here altogether]].

* ItsHardSoItSucks: Pinball requires careful aiming and even (gently) [[ViolationOfCommonSense rocking the machine]] just to survive for longer than 30 or so seconds per ball, and unlike in video games, real-world physics can complicate matters. As such, it's easy for newbies to dismiss pinball as cashgrabs designed to suck out customers' money.

** Outlanes, particularly for beginners; it can seem unintuitive for the ball to slide into an outline, resulting in a drain that seems quite non-preventable. While experts argue that nudging the table can easily prevent an outlane drain, nudging requires knowing exactly when the ball is about to slam into the outlane as well as being delicate with the table; a nudge too weak is the same thing as doing nothing while a nudge too strong is a [[NoFairCheating TILT]]. However, some tables have "kickbacks" that will eject the ball from an outlane (usually the left one), or other means of catching balls that are about to head into either outlane (such as the Shooting Star in ''Pinball/TalesOfTheArabianNights''); either way, anti-outlane measures often have limited activations so don't count on them saving you every time.

* Every pinball machine that provides unlimited balls but only allows you to play until time runs out--''Pinball/JamesBond007'', ''Pinball/FlipperFootball'', and ''Pinball/SafeCracker''--have all bombed in sales and were unpopular with people passing by putting coins in to play. (A fourth one, ''Goin' Nuts'', was scrapped before it could even be sold.) For all of these cases, the reason is the same: Newcomers get destroyed until they run out of time, whereas people dedicated to playing them well could learn to exploit time bonuses and play for way longer than it would remain interesting. ''Safe Cracker'' has since been VindicatedByHistory when individuals bought used machines for personal use and they didn't have to worry about paying per game, however.
* Plunger lanes that lead to pop bumpers are a major cause of annoyance for a lot of players, especially if the pop bumpers do not have a fixed exit and can fly out in any direction. The reason is that there is a good chance that when you begin the ball, it goes to the bumpers and rockets into the drain, without any way of saving it. Even with a ball saver (a mechanic to return the ball to you with no penalty when the game begins), the ball could bounce around in the bumpers for so long that the ball saver runs out while the ball is still there. Machines where this has been an issue include ''Pinball/BramStokersDracula'' and ''Pinball/TheWalkingDead''.

* UnpleasableFanbase: Obviously not every pinhead will obviously be satisfied with the newest games or the decisions that pinball companies make. However, the Pinside Forums house some of the worst offenders of this trope, to the point that most pinball industry figures [[WhyTheFandomCantHaveNiceThings have sworn off posting exclusive news or mingling with online members here altogether]].

** {{Video Mode}}s are seen by some as interrupting the flow of a pinball game and being fairly out-of-place; after all, why play ''pinball'' and end up playing a ''video game''? Creator/PatLawlor, among other pinball creators, is known for refusing to put video modes in his tables as a result.

* CrackIsCheaper: Both the machines themselves and to compete. To buy a brand new Star Trek Standard Edition from Stern would cost as much as buying a {{PlayStation 4}} and ''110'' games. PAPA tournaments allow players as many attempts for the high scores on the machines as long as they are willing to keep paying the fees, which leads to arms races where players throw large amounts of money into the competition to one-up their rivals. Averted with IFPA tournaments, however, where each player gets a finite amount of tries for a fixed fee. You can try DigitalPinballTables, including pinball simulator ''VideoGame/ThePinballArcade'', but playing on a simulation isn't the same as the real thing.

** {{Video Mode}}s are seen by some as interrupting the flow of a pinball game and being fairly out-of-place; after all, why play ''pinball'' and end up playing a ''video game''? Creator/PatLawlor, among other pinball creators, is known for refusing to put video modes in tables as a result.

* CrackIsCheaper: Both the machines themselves and to compete. To buy a brand new Star Trek Standard Edition from Stern would cost as much as buying a {{PlayStation 4}} and ''110'' games. PAPA tournaments allow players as many attempts for the high scores on the machines as long as they are willing to keep paying the fees, which leads to arms races where players throw large amounts of money into the competition to one-up their rivals. Averted with IFPA tournaments, however, where each player gets a finite amount of tries for a fixed fee.

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. he proved pinball wasn't about luck ''[[{{Irony}} through sheer luck]]'' (pinball tables were [[BannedInChina banned in some jurisdictions]] on accusations of being gambling machines). Even other kinds of plunger-based skill shots can still fall under this trope depending on how well-maintained the plunger is. Perhaps because of this, some tables use flipper-based skill shots instead, where the player has to hit the ball into a designated target with the flippers immediately after launch.

** Outlanes, particularly for beginners; it can seem unintuitive for the ball to slide into an outline, resulting in a drain that seems quite non-preventable. While experts argue that nudging the table can easily prevent an outlane drain, nudging requires knowing exactly when the ball is about to slam into the outlane as well as being delicate with the table; a nudge too weak is the same thing as doing nothing while a nudge too strong is a [[NoFairCheating TILT]]. However, some tables have "kickbacks" that will eject the ball from an outlate (usually the left one), or other means of catching balls that are about to head into either outlane (such as the Shooting Star in ''Pinball/TalesOfTheArabianNights'').

** Outlanes, particularly for beginners; it can seem unintuitive for the ball to slide into an outline, resulting in a drain that seems quite non-preventable. While experts argue that nudging the table can easily prevent an outlane drain, nudging requires knowing exactly when the ball is about to slam into the outlane as well as being delicate with the table; a nudge too weak is the same thing as doing nothing while a nudge too strong is a [[NoFairCheating TILT]].

** {{Video Mode}}s are seen by some as interrupting the flow of a pinball game; after all, why play ''pinball'' and end up playing a ''video game''? Creator/PatLawlor, among other pinball creators, is known for refusing to put video modes in tables as a result.

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. he proved pinball wasn't about luck ''[[{{Irony}} through sheer luck]]'' (pinball tables were [[BannedInChina banned in some jurisdictions]] on accusations of being gambling machines). Perhaps because of this, some tables use flipper-based skill shots instead, where the player has to hit the ball into a designated target with the flippers immediately after launch.

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. he proved pinball wasn't about luck ''[[{{Irony}} through sheer luck]]'' (pinball tables were [[BannedInChina banned in some jurisdictions]] on accusations of being gambling machines).

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. he proved pinball wasn't about luck ''[[{{Irony}} by through luck]]'' (pinball tables were [[BannedInChina banned in some jurisdictions]] on accusations of being gambling machines).

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. he proved pinball wasn't about luck ''[[{{Irony}} by being lucky]]'' (pinball tables were [[BannedInChina banned in some jurisdictions]] on accusations of being gambling machines).

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. he proved pinball wasn't about luck ''[[{{Irony}} by being lucky]]''. (as pinball tables were [[BannedInChina banned in some jurisdictions]] on accusations of being gambling machines).

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. ''[[{{Irony}} the same sort of thing he was trying to disprove]]'' (as pinball tables were [[BannedInChina banned in some jurisdictions]] on accusations of being gambling machines).

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. ''the same sort of thing he was trying to disprove'' (as pinball tables were [[BannedInChina banned in some jurisdictions]] on accusations of being gambling machines).
** {{Video Mode}}s are seen by some as interrupting the flow of a pinball game; after all, why come to a ''pinball'' table to play a ''video game''? Creator/PatLawlor, among other pinball creators, is known for refusing to put video modes in tables as a result.

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. ''the same sort of thing he was trying to disprove'' (as pinball tables were banned on accusations of being gambling machines).

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots]] in practice; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. ''the same sort of thing he was trying to disprove'' (as pinball tables were banned on accusations of being gambling machines).

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being effectively [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots}}; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck, i.e. ''the same sort of thing he was trying to disprove'' (as pinball tables were banned on accusations of being gambling machines).

** {{Skill Shot}}s involving flashing lanes at the back of the table are often dismissed for being effectively [[LuckBasedMission Luck Shots}}; even Creator/RogerSharpe admitted that his pinball-saving skill shot was a stroke of luck.