Sun 4/24 @ noon
The tenseness of the moment is undeniable: Sweaty palms and tired fingers, not to mention mental fatigue, are common. Flippers are pounded, and a silver ball ricochets off bumpers while multiplier points are audibly accumulated. This all happens in a flash, over and over and over.
Welcome to the world of competitive pinball, where wizards are crowned while others are literally and figuratively left on tilt.
The above scenario is common at the Superelectric Pinball Parlor, which, since opening in December, attracts everyone from baby boomers to millennials partaking in its more than 20 games that date back decades. The Gordon Square venue also hosts monthly Pinball Tournaments. The next such affair begins at noon Sun 4/24.
Prior to opening its new Detroit Avenue location, the Superelectric journey began as a screen-printing company and evolved into its current pinball refabbing and sales business. In fact, it was the W.78th Studios-hosted Third Fridays event, where the space was open for all to enjoy its games for free, that led to the creation of the new amusement hall at Gordon Square.
CoolCleveland talked to Superelectric Pinball Parlor co-owner David Spasic about the new venue and its popular tournaments.
Let’s start with the monthly pinball battles.
It’s the last Sunday of the month. We do a pinball battle and that’s open to everybody. They’re pretty popular. This will be our sixth. We get about 40 to 50 people. The cost is $10 to enter the tournament and the money goes to the winners. There are eight qualifying rounds to play. Players are put in groups of three or four, and you compete against each other in each round. A random pairing on random games every round.
Are you surprised by the large turnout?
We’re definitely happy to get those numbers every month, but the leagues in the area tend to have 80 to 100 people. So there’s a pretty big following as far as competitive pinball in Cleveland. And we’ve been drawing more and more people into tournament play as they’ve been discovering our space. Our tournaments have a top-qualifying group, and we also have a novice bracket. So players that haven’t competed before or aren’t ranked really high can battle it out for the novice champion, which gets trophies and money and prizes.
Congratulations regarding the recent opening of the Superelectric Pinball Parlor. What was the impetus for the location?
We had a lot of positive response from our Third Fridays events at our studio space, so we decided to do something and kind of expand on the idea and start the storefront. It gives us an opportunity to sell a lot more machines. We have a lot more exposure and we’re still working on getting snack foods and a liquor license for the parlor space. And we just wanted something fun for everyone to do in Gordon Square.
Apparently, one person’s fun is another person’s despair. What’s the secret to playing competitive pinball?
You know, it’s a lot of practice. Just being able to practice your shot and aim for the feature or whatever awards the most points. Also, gaining a little bit of knowledge of the game as you play. Each game has different rules, so it takes some time to figure out the rules and find out different strategies to scoring the most points.
What’s the most amount of money you’ve spent playing pinball in one evening?
Probably $30 on the Wizard of Oz pinball machine at the Time Warp Bar in Westlake. It’s a beautiful game but a money-eater for sure.
Overall, what’s your favorite machine?
Right now we just picked up one called Black Knight 2000. It’s really neat. I really loved it for a long time so it’s cool to actually own it now and be able to play whenever I want.
As far as the pinball battle tournament winner, is that person bestowed with the title of Pinball Wizard?
We call them our Monthly Battle Champion but yeah, they’re all wizards in our book.
Finally, are you tired of incessant pinball wizard references?
You know, it comes with the territory, I guess. It’s not the worst reference.