Northwest News in Fort Wayne, Indiana reported on the recent rise of Lauren Hockemeyer and Garrett Meekin who recently earned themselves a Biggest Mover award in the IFPA World Pinball Player Rankings. Click HERE to read the article.

We’re halfway through the 2018-19 IFPA North American Championship Series season, and we couldn’t be more excited about how this season is shaping up.

We currently have 51 States and Provinces included in the NACS with over 11,000 players participating. This will all culminate in the various IFPA State Championship and Provincial Championship finals held across the continent. These finals will all be held simultaneously on January 19th, 2019, with over 1000 finalists competing for not only a State/Provincial Championship title, but also a spot in the IFPA North American Pinball Championship.

New for this year, we have currently collected over $40,000 in endorsement fees across the 1870 events that have been played in North America so far this year. Also new is the establishment of “Super States” which will expand the number of qualifiers from 16 to 24. Any State/Province with at least 400 unique players and 100 unique events will be eligible. So far through half the year we’ve already seen 4 States hit this level (Washington, Michigan, Ohio and Texas).

View the current NACS standings and prize money distribution HERE.

A reminder that the official satellite spots for the IFPA16 World Pinball Championship will come from the 2018-19 IFPA North American Pinball Championship, and the 2018-19 IFPA European Pinball Championship. The highest finisher in each final that has not yet qualified for IFPA16 will win a free spot into the World Championship.

blog post courtesy of Nitro Pinball

Our first annual Vancouver FlipOut Pinball Expo, held in September of 2016 was a fantastic success: Old school arcade classics and the latest cutting edge pinball technology; a local autistic pinball prodigy, competitive and amateur tournaments, the world’s largest pinball machine, and much more. 2017 proved to be an even bigger success and prompted our move to a larger venue for 2018!

Hundreds of visitors attend our three-day expo in Downtown Vancouver with over 100 pinball & arcade machines set to free play, guest speakers, vendors and tournaments for all ages and skills.

Mondo thanks to everyone that helped, supported, sponsored & attended! None of this would be possible without the incredible team involved. This truly was a magnificent gathering of pinheads from around the world! I look forward to VFO 2018, at our new home The Roundhouse in Yaletown. As Oscar Goldman would say “Better, stronger, faster!” — See you Sep 7-9, 2018!

Click HERE for more details

blog post courtesy of Alessio Crisantemi

Daniele Acciari from Rome has triumphed, winning the title of 2018 Pinball Italian Champion, in the eSports & Pinball event at Qlash House.

Treviso, Italy – A real triumph that of Daniele Acciari in the Luca Pagano’s Qlash House, where he won the title of 2018 sports pinball Italian Champion. And he does it “in his own way”, that is achieving a nothing short surreal score on a pinball machine still almost unknown to the players, as the brand new “Iron Maiden” by Stern Pinball, proposed in national preview at the “eSports & Pinball” event, thanks to the partnership between Ifpa Italia – organizer of the event – and the Chicago producer, together with its Italian distributor Tecnoplay.
Second place for the Venetian player Daniele Baldan, while the outgoing Italian champion, Roberto Pedroni, must be satisfied with the third place. Fourth place for the Swiss Levente Tregova.
A success came at the end of the two days of great entertainment went on stage in Villorba, near Treviso, during which the pinball event took place alongside that of videogames, with a competition on the famous game “Herthstone”.

In addition to the main tournament won by Acciari, a side tournament was also played on only “classic” pinball machines (that is the vintage pinball machines of the Sixties and Seventies).
Here Pablo Iacoponi from Pisa won, before the Roman Gabriele Tedeschi and the British number one in the UK ranking, Rick Mallett.

SPACE TO VIRTUAL PINBALL TOO– However, the real news has been represented by the virtual pinball tournament: a competition that represented the middle way between the world of sports pinball and that of competitive videogames. The player Davide Della Ianna from Lombardia won the virtual tournament, before Mirko Plumari and the Slovenian Ales Rebec. But space also for women, with the Italian delegation of the International Pinball Association, which also awarded the best player of the event: Antonella Iannotta, who prevailed over the other participants. To celebrate sports pinball women and the virtual tournament winners, a series of gadgets and trophies were directly sent from Stern Pinball in Chicago, partner of the event together with Tecnoplay and Double Pinball.

More press for back-to-back World Pinball Champion Raymond Davidson. KING5 News out in Seattle checks it his growing collection of WWE LE machines. Click HERE to watch the piece.

Here are the May 2018 IFPA winners for Player of the Month and Biggest Movers:

Player of the Month:
Julio Vicario Soriano (251.38 WPPR’s)

Biggest Movers:
Lauren Hockemeyer (+17,692 spots), Mark Walz (+13,779 spots) and Garrett Meekin (+9,322 spots)

These players have now all qualified for the Stern Rewards Program for 2018. Congrats to everyone!

Safe to say Raymond Davidson is now Mukilteo’s most popular celebrity. Click HERE to read the piece by the Mukilteo Beacon.

blog post courtesy of Elizabeth Cromwell

Like H.B. Reese bringing chocolate and peanut butter together, Replay Foundation is bringing together two great causes for a common (delicious) goal. 50% of all money donated will benefit the Women’s International Pinball Tournament (WIPT) prize pool. The other 50% will benefit our friends at Path of Play, helping children and families touched by autism.

Click HERE to find out more information.

64 of the world’s greatest players traveled from 18 countries to compete in the 15th Annual International Flipper Pinball Association’s World Pinball Championship, June 1-3, 2018, in Keswick, Ontario, Canada. After nearly 3 days of intense competitive pinball, the tournament came down to Raymond Davidson vs Daniele Acciari, who battled it out for the title of World Pinball Champion. Watch video of the final round HERE.

Games played: Cheetah, The Shadow, Attack from Mars and Surf ‘n Safari. Commentary by Levi Nayman, Jack Tadman, Tim Sexton and Greg Povarelli.

— Watch live at http://www.twitch.tv/buffalopinball

64 of the World’s greatest players traveled from 18 countries to compete in the 15th Annual International Flipper Pinball Association’s World Pinball Championship out in Keswick, Ontario, Canada. After nearly 3 days of the most intense competitive pinball experience the world has to offer, there could only be one World Pinball Champion.

After defeating Johan Genberg from Sweden (4-2), Eric Stone from the USA (4-0) and Trent Augenstein from the USA (4-2), Raymond went on to defeat Daniele Acciari from Italy (4-0) to retain his World Pinball Champion title. Trent Augenstein defeated Adam Becker for 3rd place.

This is Raymond’s second Major Championship, making him the 9th player in competitive pinball history to do so.