Night Rider

March 23, 2005

I saw this recently at Lori’s Diner in S.F. where “someone” still operates EM machines to play. I never cared for the artwork but like I said before…so I loved the fast snappy action on this game and knowing that there were 2 versions, an Electro-Mechanical and a Solid-State, I kept an eye out for the EM. I found it 2 weeks ago on E-Bay and snagged it! Only problem, it was in Reno….another Road Trip! Since I had my friend, world-famous pinballogist, Jeff Neuman, check it out for me because he lives there, I called him and we made plans to get together, pick up the machine and I would get a glimpse of his “Sweethearts” and his baseball themed pin whose name escapes me. Well Jeffery called it right and so did the seller,Chris Butler at Pinball Connection in Reno cuz this is one sweet machine! It required some glue and nails to the head, bulb and socket work, but had fresh rubbers, extra spunk and when I put it into service last week, it was an immediate hit. It’s got a lot going on, 2 spinners, 2 target banks, bonus, double bonus, extra ball and specials. The kick-out saucer at the top sequences thru various point values and occasionally lites the Double Bonus. That’s when you want to nail it! If you get your DB on and you manage to keep it alive and rack up some bonus, you can really score big. This is a fast and furious game and is hard to beat.

Produced by Bally, 1977. 4 players. 9.8 out of 10 on the Play-O-Meter

High Score 172,320 by Scott on October 13, 2004

Adding comments is temporarily down