The Australian Pinball League is inviting you to the Grand Final of the Australian & New Zealand Pinball Open for your chance to win a brand new Metallica PRO Pinball Machine. Secure your place a.s.a.p., 19 wildcard entries are available for players from outside Australia and New Zealand. Anyone interested in competing at the Grand Final at the Hard Rock Cafe in Sydney on February 22, 2014 needs to apply no later than by January 31, 2014. All applications will be considered and approved or declined within 48  hours. For more info about the championship, the Grand Final Format and how to register click here: http://www.australianpinballleague.com.au/#!anz-pinball-open-page1/c1l09 

The 11th installment of the most prestigious pinball tournament on the planet is currently in the final month of qualifying. Players are looking for either a Country Exemption spot or At-Large bid into the big dance where the world's best 64 players will do battle to crown the next World Pinball Champion. Last year, IFPA10 shattered records with an incredible 19 countries being represented, along with an At-Large cut line of WPPR rank #76.

This year Denver will serve as our host with a week packed full of events. The 2014 Lyons Pinball Spring Classic will kick off IFPA's World Championship Week in Colorado on May 16th-18th. This tournament will be part of the PAPA Circuit, as well as serve as the official Satellite tournament for IFPA11 where we will have one spot up for grabs for the World Championship the following weekend. After the Spring Classic is finished, the IFPA State Champions will play off in the inaugural IFPA US National Championship where we will crown our first National Pinball Champion.

The official Pre-IFPA tournaments include the 1Up and 2Up in Denver, along with another location TBD for Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week. Details of those tournaments will be available in early 2014.

Thursday will kick off the main event festivities, where the 2nd edition of the Epstein Cup will take place. Will Team Europe retain the cup, or will Team USA take it back on home soil?

IFPA11 then officially starts Friday morning where the field will slowly work its way down from 64 until only 1 remains.

The IFPA11 World Pinball Championship is sponsored by Stern Pinball, Jersey Jack Pinball, Raw Thrills, Farsight Studios, Betson Enterprises, Marco Specialties, Planetary Pinball Supply, Play Meter Magazine, GameWorks, Zen Studios, Pinball Center, Brady Distributing Company, Game Exchange of Colorado, the Amusement and Music Operators Association, the American Amusement Manufacturers Association and the Professional and Amateur Pinball Association.

For more details on IFPA11, click HERE.

IFPA HQ is taking New York City by storm. This time it's The Verge, who just released an article featuring Modern Pinball NYC Co-owners [player]Steve Zahler[/player] and [player]Steve Epstein[/player]. Click HERE to read the article.

The Flip Out Hunger series of tournaments ended up with thousands of dollars in cash and food to local food banks across the US. One of the cities to participate was Oklahoma City, OK which make donations to the Regional Food Bank. These donations were matched dollar for dollar by Chesapeake Energy and the Famiglia Family. FOX25 news was there to cover the event. The Flip Out Hunger tournament in Oklahoma City is one of the nearly 450 annual IFPA endorsed tournaments where players can earn World Pinball Player Rankings points, and qualify for the IFPA World Pinball Championship. This tournament is also part of the IFPA State Championship Series, being included in the qualifying for the IFPA Oklahoma State Pinball Championship. Featured in the article is tournament organizer [player]Shawn Lee[/player] (ranked 1521st in the world). Shawn is also currently qualified in 5th place in the IFPA Oklahoma State Pinball Championship. Click HERE to read the article and see the video.

Charles Passy (ranked 12,221st in the world) and WSJ This Morning's Gordon Deal look at the growing popularity of pinball leagues. Click HERE to listen to the ~9 minute interview.

Qualifying for the inaugural IFPA State Championship Series is down to its final 30 days. With all the events we've added to the IFPA calendar for December, many states are in for a last minute shake up of the standings before we officially close the 2013 season.

We currently have 28 states included in the SCS, which will all culminate in the IFPA State Championship finals. These finals will all be held simultaneously on February 8th, 2014, with 448 finalists competing for not only a State Championship title, but also a spot in the first IFPA US National Championship.

The player count currently stands at 4940 included in the various IFPA State Championship standings (view current standings HERE).

For those players that have qualified for more than one State Championship, if you know which state you plan on playing in, please contact the IFPA with that decision at [email protected]. This will help us expedite filling the playoff qualifiers for the states that you will not be playing in.

We wanted to take this opportunity to address a few frequently asked questions we've been receiving as the year winds to a close:

1) Once we close the 2013 standings (typically the first week of January), we will be sending invites out to players from each state. It is extremely important that you have an email address on file with the IFPA, so fill out an IFPA profile ASAP if you are interested in competing. If we have no way of contacting you, you will be skipped in the standings. Click HERE to edit your profile.

2) Players will have ONE WEEK to respond after the invitations are sent as to whether they are interested in competing or not. A non-response will be treated as a negative response after this one week deadline.

3) No player is allowed to compete in multiple IFPA State Championships. Players that qualify for more than one IFPA State Championship will have to make their choice during that one week period of registration.

4) We will continue going down the standings list of each state in order to fill all 16 qualifying spots. This may involve us going down to 30th, 50th or even 100th place, but we will go as far down as possible to fill the field. We will be sending alternate qualifer invites to players outside of the top 16, so please respond as soon as possible whether you are interested in competing.

Any questions about the SCS, or anything IFPA related, please contact us at [email protected]

More news coming out of IFPA HQ:

NBC's TODAY Show will be shooting a segment at Modern Pinball NYC on Tuesday, Dec. 3rd at 5PM and we want you to join us! Keep reading!

Guests will enjoy two full hours of completely free pinball-play (no admission fee! no coins!) at Modern Pinball NYC plus the possibility to be seen on NBC's TODAY Show — Weekend Edition! (Too many exclamation marks? Well, I'm super excited!) Help us on our mission to bring pinball back to NYC (and the rest of the country!) by showing your support and making this a blowout event for the viewing public! We want to show the world how much fun pinball is for everyone, especially families and children.

This media event follows the recent Wall Street Journal article and MarketWatch article about Modern Pinball NYC's mission to bring pinball back to NYC with other venues highlighted as well.

We may need to limit participation so please respond soon!

If you're interested please email me at: [email protected] so we may consider you. Also let me know if you would be bringing any guests (please list their ages as well).

Team Europe currently holds the Epstein Cup for another 6 months, but the race for who will be representing both Team Europe and Team USA at the 2014 Epstein Cup only has one month of action left. 8 players per side earn the right to represent their country in this prestigious event, so let's take a closer look at how the teams are shaping up.

For defending champion Team Europe, assuming all of the current top 8 players participate, include: [player]Daniele Celestino Acciari[/player] from Italy, current World Pinball Champion Jörgen Holm from Sweden, [player]Jorian Engelbrektsson[/player] from Sweden, [player]Mats Runsten[/player] from Sweden, [player]Franck Bona[/player] from France, [player]Roy Wils[/player] from the Netherlands and [player]Robert Sutter[/player] who are all locks at this point. The 8th position is still up for grabs and is very closely contested between four players from four different countries. [player]Paul Jongma[/player] from the Netherlands currently sits in the 8th spot with a 7 WPPR point lead over David Grémillet from France, [player]Marcus Hugosson[/player] from Sweden and [player]Julio Vicario Soriano[/player] from Spain who are all separated by less than 1/2 of a WPPR point.

For Team USA, assuming the top 8 players participate, things are pretty locked up. Included would be: [player]Zach Sharpe[/player], [player]Keith Elwin[/player], current World Pinball Champion [player]Bowen Kerins[/player], [player]Cayle George[/player], [player]Trent Augenstein[/player], [player]Joshua Henderson[/player], [player]Andy Rosa[/player] and [player]Robert Gagno[/player] from Canada. There is a battle for the first reserve position between [player]Jim Belsito[/player] and [player]Steven Bowden[/player]. Jim currently holds a 3.64 WPPR points lead.

For more details on the event, click HERE.

The first event in the inaugural IFPA European Championship Series in on the calendar. The Dutch Pinball Masters in the Netherlands will kick things off February 8-9, 2014. Details of the tournament can be found HERE.

Other countries included on the ECS calendar for 2014 include Germany (German Pinball Open), France (Les 24H Du Mans Flipper), Belgium (Belgian Open Pinball), Finland (K15 Open), Denmark (Danish Pinball Open), Switzerland (TBD), United Kingdom (UK Pinball Open), Norway (Oslo Pinheads Open), Italy (Italian Pinball Championship), Romania (Romanian Pinball Open), Hungary (Hungarian Open), Poland (Polish Pinball Open), Austria (Austrian Pinball Open), Sweden (TBD), Spain (Torneo Madrileño de Pinball).

The IFPA will be tracking the WPPR performance of players by results from these 16 events. At the end of the 2014 calendar year, the top 32 players with the most WPPR points from the ECS will qualify for the final. The IFPA European Championship will be played the Saturday following Super Bowl Sunday, which will be on February 7th, 2015 to coincide with the 2014 State Championship Series playoffs here in the US.

We will be creating a dedicated page on the IFPA site shortly that will include the list of the tournaments, detailed rules for the ECS and live standings updated during the year. Any questions, please contact the IFPA at [email protected]

The Orlando Sentinel released an article on the Southern Pinball Festival. SPF is one of the nearly 450 annual IFPA endorsed tournaments where players can earn World Pinball Player Rankings points, and qualify for the IFPA World Pinball Championship. This tournament is also part of the IFPA State Championship Series, being included in the qualifying for the IFPA Florida State Pinball Championship. Click HERE to see results from the tournament. Click HERE to read the article.