Asking questions of a proprietary nature ("How many of game X were produced?" "What games do you have in the works for next spring?" "What game is designer Y working on?") will not get you very far, as Uncle Willy is constrained from answering them.

If you have questions about fixing, restoring, or purchasing an older game, Uncle Willy would like to refer you to Ask Uncle Willy #10.

Question:   On Demolition Man pinball, how does one score a "special"?

Answer:     Uncle Willy loves these simple questions.  There is no way to
            score "special" on Demolition Man.

            The history behind the lack of a "special" on Demolition Man is
            not quite as simple.  Early in the development of the game,
            Demolition Man suffered from a lack of controlled lamps.  As
            Uncle Willy recalls, ten separate lamps were originally allocated
            for the Cryo-Claw.  In order to have enough lamps, none were
            reserved for the outlanes.  The design team wasn't real keen on
            "specials", anyway, so it didn't seem to be a big loss at the
            time.
            
            As it turned out, the playfield was finalized long before the
            entire Cryo-Claw mechanism was designed.  Getting one lamp
            mounted near each of the five Cryo-Claw awards was difficult
            enough, and the five extra lamps were abandoned.

            By this time, it was too late to add any lamps to the playfield,
            so even though there are two unused controlled lamps on Demolition
            Man, they could not be added to the outlanes.  (The other three
            controlled lamps ended up under the "Acmag" ramp.  The lamps there
            had originally been on a general illumination string.)

            Uncle Willy recalls several times during the final rules develop-
            ment for Demolition Man where a conversation similar to the
            following transpired:  "What sort of award should we put here?"
            "Well, if we had lamps on the outlanes, we could light 'special'."


Question:   On my Funhouse pinball, it appears as though the signs on the steps
            has the awards listed in reverse order.  e.g. "Funhouse Frenzy",
            "Lite Extra Ball", and "Score 500,000 Points", from top to bottom.
            The awards are scored in reverse order on the steps.  Also, the
            manual refers to colored lamps on the steps (green, red, and
            yellow), while my game does not have colored lamps.  Did the order
            of the steps awards change at some time?  Are the lamps supposed to
            be colored?

Answer:     It appears as though the signs on your Funhouse are mounted in
            reverse order.  Uncle Willy supposes this is due to an assembly
            error at the factory.  In fact, Uncle Willy has just found out
            that Pat Lawlor's personal Funhouse game has two "Frenzy" signs--
            the "Lite Extra Ball" sign is incorrect.  If you refer to a
            Funhouse flyer, you will see that your signs are in reverse order.
            (You will also note that the "Light Quick Multiball" sign changed
            to "Score 500,000 Points" from prototype to production.)

            The flyer also shows the lamps to be uncolored.  After much
            research in the field, Uncle Willy has determined that the lamps
            never had colored filters, and that the manual is in error.

Question:   I have a Fireball Home Edition pinball, and need help fixing it.
            Can you provide any information on this?

Answer:     Uncle Willy is sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but there is
            little you can do to fix one of these games.  If there is a basic
            electrical problem, e.g. power supply or bad drive transistor,
            you may be able to diagnose and fix the problem.  However, if the
            computer is not running at all, there is no way of getting a
            replacement part, as it is a custom-programmed component.  If you
            were lucky, you might be able to find a working circuit board or
            component that was scavenged from some other machine.  However,
            Uncle Willy has never seen anyone offering these for sale.


Question:   In The Twilight Zone pinball flyer, it shows some door panels
            differing from the production games (Player Piano, Quick
            Multiball, etc.).  Is there anyway I can get software that has
            the rules associated with these door panels, and if I do, will it
            work in a production Twilight Zone machine?

Answer:     As anyone with a Twilight Zone flyer and access to a Twilight
            Zone game knows, there are many labels on the light inserts
            which changed from the game pictured in the flyer.  (As best as
            Uncle Willy can recall, there were only 2 or 3 Twilight Zone
            games assembled with the playfield as pictured in the flyer.)
            
            Some of the lamps that changed labels are:  "Clock Millions" ->
            "Power Payoff"; "Jackpot" -> "Camera"; "Quick Multiball" ->
            "Camera"; "Player Piano" -> "Super Slot"; "5 Million" -> "Lite
            Gumball"; "Gumball" -> "Bonus X"
            
            Several other small changes were also made.  Most of these changes
            have been noted in discussions on rec.games.pinball.

            Getting back to the question of "early rules" in Twilight Zone,
            Uncle Willy suspects you would be severely disappointed if you
            were to install an early ROM into your game, assuming that you
            could find one.  Many of the rules for the labels on the old door
            panel lamps were never implemented.  For example, there never was
            a "Player Piano" rule, and "Fast Lock" was never implemented as it
            was envisioned.  (What *was* "Quick Multiball" was renamed as
            "Fast Lock".)  The lamp labels as shown in the TZ flyer are the
            result of the design team sitting around on the last day before
            the artwork screen for the black portions of the playfield had to
            be finalized.  The "Hitch Hiker" and "Player Piano" labels were
            created with the expectation that an appropriate feature would be
            attached to them later.

            Much of the rules from the finished Twilight Zone game were
            missing at the time of the photo shoot for the flyer.  As one
            would guess, many of the effects -- sounds, lamps, and display --
            were also missing.  It was after many of the rules had been
            implemented, and the design team started to balance the scoring,
            that it was decided that a "5 Million" award on the door panel
            was not very exciting.  (Thus, the "Lite Gumball" label in that
            position.)

            Another interesting piece of trivia is the initial rule set for
            MultiBall on Twilight Zone.  Originally, the MultiBall had a
            roving jackpot shot.  The jackpots were lit in order as:  Piano,
            Camera, Dead End.  (This explains why the Camera has a "Jackpot"
            label in the flyer.)  The Lock shot would relight jackpot after
            the third one was collected on the Dead End.  The consensus of the
            design team, and others at Williams who played that version of the
            rules, was that jackpots were awfully difficult to make, and that
            MultiBall was pretty frustrating as a result.

            As you can see from this brief discussion, the task of creating
            rules for a pinball machine is not simple.  As much as the design
            team carefully thinks out features and rules for a game, there is
            no substitute for actually playing a given rule set.  Rules and
            features get modified, enhanced, and scrapped many times over
            during the course of pinball game development.


Question:   On the Whitewater pinball, does "Secret of the Cow" mean anything?
            Is the rumor true that on higher difficulty settings that one must
            get "Secret of the Cow" in order to achieve the Vacation Jackpot?

Answer:     (Quick:)  You do not need the "Secret of the Cow" for Vacation
            jackpot, and it does not effect the Vacation Jackpot.

            (Long:)  To get secret of the cow, you must collect all of the
            Gold Rush items (Flashlight, Map, Key, Camera, and Cow) before
            completing the Boulder Garden.  Then, get a Boulder Garden award.
            Instead of the "Spirit of the River" display, "Secret of the Cow"
            is shown.  Note that "Secret of the Cow" is for entertainment only,
            no points or anything else is awarded by it.


Question:   On the Corvette pinball, there is an audit for "Car Wash".  What
            is this feature?

Answer:     The "Car Wash" is a feature that can be scored during a race.
            Uncle Willy would hate to spoil the fun of discovering this for
            yourself, so he is not telling how to do this one.


Question:   Why does one only get to enter 3 initials for high score to date?

Answer:     Hey, what's the matter with a little tradition?  Actually,
            experience has shown that giving players more than 3 initials
            results in all sorts of creative and potentially offensive names
            on the high score list.  Trying to filter out the offensive words
            just ups the creativity level as players think up letter
            combinations that get by the filter.  Trying to catch words from
            other languages greatly increases the difficulty of the filtering
            task.  In general, the slight benefit to be reaped from allowing
            more than 3 initials is just not worth the effort involved.

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