Flippers is an amazing arcade in a Grandy, NC. They are holding their Spring tournament on 4/25. If you have never been to Flippers, it is worth the trip for the number of well maintained machines,
This is an IFPA tournament.
Saturday, April 25, 2015 starting at 11:00 am or noon
Located at 6615 Caratoke Hwy. in Grandy, NC
20 minutes from the Outer Banks of NC
$ 20.00 Entry Fee which will include a free
Tournament Shirt.
1st Place: Trophy & 40% of Entry Fee &
2nd Place: Trophy & 30% of Entry Fee
3rd Place: Trophy & 20% of Entry Fee
4th Place: Trophy & 10 %. of Entry Fee
It is one of the few public places where you can play Big Bang Bar, Hercules and Joust. The owner has been an operator for years and is passionate about playing and maintaining the machines. Many machines have color DMDs and all of them play well. It has the feeling of a large private collection inside a convenience store. I had a friend post on Facebook that he stopped to get gas (Flippers take so up 3/4 of a big building which contains a convenience store and gas station as well) and couldn’t believe the arcade he found when he went inside to pay for the gas.
My son and I have gone down to Flippers from Raleigh numerous times for weekend trips (we stay in Kill Devil Hills) and for pin events. Going off-season when there’s not an event at Flippers is truly surreal–the place is deserted, the games available are almost too good to be true, and by and large their condition is quite good.
There’s certainly nothing like Flippers in the Triangle or Triad regions of NC; the Asheville Pinball Museum is the only location in the state anywhere near the scale of Flippers. The games lists for both locations are on Pinside; there’s some overlap, but I’m glad they’re fairly different.
Flippers owner Dave Shields is a super fellow and a very veteran operator. Events there are very well-run. Application has been made for Flippers to be considered as a 2016 PAPA circuit site, and we certainly hope that’s successful! Trent and Joe Said have competed there in the past–Trent won a T2, in fact. I encourage other circuit players to ask Trent and Joe about their experience.
Hopefully a circuit event there can take place during a time when the weather is lousy up north and hotels are at off-season rates. Who doesn’t like a trip to the beach? Fun fact: Grandy is also the home of the “Grave Digger” monster truck.
We vacation in VA Beach and go to Flippers on rainy days - awesome place. There’s more area dedicated to pins now compared to that 2013 video above; there’s another room in the back that has SS and a few EMs as well (he had one wood rail machine the last time I was there, but it was under repair). Other games I’ve seen there that weren’t in the video: WoZ, Star Trek (Stern), Mustang, Walking Dead (finished 3rd at the launch party last November!), ST:TNG, Tron, Flintstones, Superman, Tales from the Crypt, Starship Troopers, Whirlwind, Who Dunnit, Road Show.
I’m planning on attending the Spring event, but I have to say: I’m not a huge fan of the Aurcade scoring system, or the short amount of qualifying time - especially if the turn out is anything close to last November’s tourney.
I recommend going. Flippers is a great location. The locals are friendly and David Shields is a gracious host.
In the last fall tournament, There was about a four player wait to play each game in the main tournament. I believe that it took me almost 5 hours to play each game only one time.
However, I understand that there will separate A and B banks this time, so lines will be shorter.
I’m not sure if there will be a classics tournament this time.
I’m going off the FB post, but I don’t read it that way. One 16 game bank for all levels, best 12 count, top 16 play double-elimination A bracket, next 16 play in B bracket (I’m assuming there will be an IFPA rank cut-off for the B bracket, but I wouldn’t qualify for it so I’m not worried about it ). (Chris, do you have info from some other source?) Trying to play in Main and Classics last fall… Didn’t get out of a line to sit down, eat, or go to the bathroom for 5.5 hrs, so actually kind of hoping there isn’t a Classics bank too!
I’ve been there once and really liked it. Just a ton of games spread out over several different rooms. Not everything was in great shape, but everything that was turned on was playable. Most stuff is in excellent condition. The people who were working when we were there were very kind and generous. There’s a road side farmer’s market nearby that sells boiled peanuts, which is also a huge bonus to me. There’s a list of games on their website, but it’s definitely incomplete. http://www.flippersarcade.com/
@Booberg Thanks for clarifying! @OutlaneDrainTrain Classics would spread lines out a bit, but from the perspective of a player that is a glutton for punishment, I’d have to make sure I played them too.
(Sorry to both Chris’ in this thread… should have @'d so you knew which one of you I was referring to!)
No worry at all about the Chris confusion. I called one of the guys who is organizing it to confirm the details so I could post them here. I too was unsure about how the divisions and banks would work.
Thanks Chris for posting. If we made separate divisions a and b then only a would get ifpa points so we decided to make the bank bigger to 16 games then all would be a part of ifpa points . The aurcade system is a little different than most pinball tournaments but has worked well at flippers. There is a strategy to making sure you play the games you think you can maximize your points after posting your first score. Having live scoring from aurcade helps out in knowing where you think you can get better and take points away from a competitor to move up in standings. The great part of having 2 divisions is that in playoffs a lot of competitors will get to participate since in past tournaments we only took final rankings then went to playoff then now going from 16 to 32 in playoffs
We will not have a classics on top of main tournament. It was hard to put up scores on classics and get main tournament in the allotted time. It was great to see all participating but think it was too much for time . The best part of the tournament is going back and posting a better score on a game you think you can do better on.
Agreed on the strategy of the Aurcade system, which isn’t really all that different from standard 100/90/85-1 scoring. The one problem was not enough qualifying time (should be improved with only 12 games needed).
Full disclosure: I didn’t play well last November @ Flippers, but under PAPA scoring I finish 7th (Google Docs link: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1qmu9ukpce-P2PiqmTxG-V9gITQrX6an86702JD4anpg), whereas under Aurcade I finished 18th and out of the finals (I know, “PLAY BETTER!”). But, when you play 7 top 16 games (including 4 top 10), a 17th, a 25th, and a 26th, that really should be enough to make a top 16 final.
The main problem I have with Aurcade vs. PAPA scoring is that, if you look at many arcade game tournaments, the top scores are very close to each other… the top 10 players, let’s say, are within a few thousand points in games with scores of 1M. But if you look at pinball tournament scores, generally you have one or two blow-up scores, a few really good scores, and then all the also-played’s. In PAPA those also-played’s are still worth 75-80 points, whereas in Aurcade they’re worth…
Well, to give an example, Chris Newsom blew up ST:TNG for ~4B points last November in qualifying. I put up ~700M which in PAPA scoring would have been good for 81 points, but in Aurcade was 17. It also happened to be my “worst” qualifying game (lowest Aurcade points), but I’m not going to go back and attack that table again, because the odds of me getting a better game vs the amount of qualifying time (waiting in line and actually playing) it would take to play that game wasn’t worth it.
I’m curious if anyone can chime in on when PAPA decided to go away from Total Points as a system of ranking in tournaments, and why.
Love that google doc very interesting on the difference. Each tournament there are a few monster scores that mess up the aurcade system but as you know unless you think you can also have a monster score on that game it is best to leave that one alone get a decent score then move on to a game you know you can do better at and not waste time going after the small points on a game that has a monster score. Newsom and Cedolia have put up some monster scores in tournaments we might have to retire Star Trek next gen because the first tournament at flippers he had a 9 billion score on it and completely took all those points away. We did get David to agree to start a extra hour early at 11 instead of noon. Maybe in future events we can get to a point where qualifying is all day Saturday and the playoffs will be on Sunday .
Just an off-topic interjection, but y’all should see what Newsom has done with the new Star Trek code at our local pin bar. Just insane! Don’t see myself or anybody else (that plays at Lyman’s) catching the 38 medals, 42 warps, or the 800 mil GC anytime soon.
also in November I did not even bother with the other tournament because I knew that it would be close to get all my games in and then add all the games in classic tournament in time , that is how I went back and beat my scores on a few that I tanked at to . You were so close to getting into the final round of 16 by 3 points. Looking at the ac/dc all it could have taken is a score of around 28 million that was close. Drew had golden eye in monster score area but a few got close to half that score.
hope to see you in april at flippers and hopefully it will go smoothly but you never know but I do not think it will be close to TPF status as we have been hearing about this past weekend.
Exactly – this is one of the reasons I prefer the PAPA scoring to the Aurcade scoring. For example, if I’m third and an opponent is fourth on a game, then someone comes and blows it up, we’ll slide down together but effectively still have the same margin between us (third/fourth vs fourth/fifth). In Aurcade, that same blown-up score can affect our position, because now my third place can be meaningless.
Example: I’ve got 200 million on Creature, an opponent has 100 million. Top score is 250 million. In Aurcade scoring, I’ve got 80 and the opponent has 40. Now Elwin comes along and hangs a billion on it (I know, it’s unlikely to be that low). My margin (80-40) now becomes 20-10, and an opponent gained 30 points on me without either of us doing anything.
Something similar to Aurcade was used at the “old Pinburgh” for two years (1998-99) before being switched out for the current ranked scoring format. The move away from Aurcade-style scoring happened because it put a huge emphasis on single blowaway games instead of focusing on strong, solid “runs” or consistent play. In Aurcade, someone can post a #1 score on one game and not even play the other game, and do better than another player with two consistent games.
). (Chris, do you have info from some other source?) Trying to play in Main and Classics last fall… Didn’t get out of a line to sit down, eat, or go to the bathroom for 5.5 hrs, so actually kind of hoping there isn’t a Classics bank too! 