Stockholm Open Tourney Report

I was fortunate enough to win the Finnish Open in April and as a prize received a cruise, accommodations for 4 days, and entry to the Stockholm Open. So with the trip all but paid for, I only had to take care to feed and move myself within the City.

Stockholm in May is just gorgeous and the City is cosmopolitan enough to offer the best the world has to offer while still retaining its Scandinavian charm. Even a bit of rain each day could hardly dampen the enthusiasm surrounding the City now that Summer is here. It was a great trip and I was able to enjoy both the area and the pinball.

The Stockholm Open had an ideal location at the Student Union/Club House/Student Center in the University of Technology. It was easy to get to by metro (and $10 buys a city transportation pass for the entire weekend), had food available inside and outside the building, and the machines were spread out in several very open rooms. There was no crowding and the tournament was easy to maneuver within and around.

The guys running the tournament were friendly and kind enough to explain the rules to this pinball tourney newbie (and not talk condescendingly to me for being female, either, which was a change). It was also nice to see the guys again whom I had beaten in the finals of the Helsinki Open - they were able to extract some measure of revenge, though, as, to quote Indiana Jones, "chose <my machines> poorly".

Friday morning play was expectedly quiet with only a few people starting to play their entries by 11:00. There were several machines outside the main tourney room that could be used for practice and most people had congregated there. The side tourney (split flipper, reversed, etc.) and classic machines weren't ready for play until Saturday.

There was a large selection of machines in the main tourney area although admittedly most dated to the same 1990s time period. There was also a Pinball 2000 Revenge from Mars. Missing, of course, were the old Stern and Atari games - I don't believe they ever sold them in any decent quality in Europe. All the same, it would have been nice to see a friendly face such as Big Game, Cheetah, or even Middle Earth. A rather luckluster F14 Tomcat seemed to be the only entry from that era (High Speed was a no-show on the day of the tourney). Also, surprisingly, was the lack of Gottlieb games since they seem to be so prevalent in Helsinki.

I walked up to play my first machine, Indiana Jones, and knew I was in trouble when the scorekeeper looked at me and said, "oh, by the way, the flipper might break in the middle of play." I looked at him and asked, "You tell me this NOW? After I've already chosen my 3 entry machines?" He was nonplussed, shrugged, and said, "It happened to the guy before you. It may or may not break for you. But we aren't going to fix it because everyone has to play with the same disadvantage."

Ok, I was a bit annoyed at that statement. I pointed out to him that it wasn't the same disadvantage for everyone as he had tried to assert; rather, it ended making the game a matter of pure luck and not skill at all - ending up mattering whether your flipper randomly breaks at the beginning of your game before you've scored points or later. He shrugged again, walked away, and I knew which way the wind was blowing for me this tourney. :)

So I play the game, choke, walk to the Addams family, start playing, and the upper flipper breaks! I'm so doomed! I couldn't get the ball up the ramp, hit the train, or do anything useful. So I finish that entry, sigh, walk over to F14 and indicate I'd like to play. The scorekeeper presses the start button just as the guy who was playing it right before me walks up and exclaims to me, "Don't play that game, it's broken!" I cringe. 3 for 3, right? Well, fortunately, in this case, wrong. Turns out, the tourney mode shuts off the rapid save and the previous player didn't realize that and assumed the rapid save was broken. Admittedly, it didn't really matter at that point if the machine was broken or not - I had done poorly on the other games anyway so my entry would be useless.

So I finish a very lackluster first entry and turn to see the Indiana Jones game being repaired. A few minutes later, Addams Family was being repaired to fix the weak flipper. Ah well, so much for entering early.

I took the hint and played other games for the rest of my entries but never really found a set of machines I was comfortable playing. Strangely enough, it was a Capcom machine (Pinball Magic) onto which I'd set my highest score for the tournament (though that was only a paltry 7th highest). Games I know well and should be able to play to a top 5 (such as Indiana Jones) hated me (Ah, how many times did I hear, "This is how we say goodbye in Germany......").

On a more positive note, I went to play one of the side tourneys and ended up at the Reversed Flipper machine. One of the Americans, who later introduced himself as Chris Newsom, was already playing the machine but when he saw me waiting offered to let me play 2 player with him. I thought that was really cool and I really enjoyed playing those 7 or 8 games with him. Reversed Flipper is difficult enough but I imagine it is even more so with the distraction of having to stop and let someone else play a turn and then go back to the mindset needed to reverse your thoughts. So my thanks to Chris for being a really nice guy and making the tournament enjoyable as well as challenging. He was setting high scores left and right and I hope he ended up winning on that reversed flipper machine.

After I finished the main tournament, I hopped on the metro to check out the Fine Art Museum downtown. Admittedly, being the American that I am, when I saw a beautiful full size painting of Marie Antoinette I snickered and thought, "those stupid Frenchies are probably pissed the Swedes have this picture of one of their Queens." Then I looked at a small painting next to it and saw George Washington staring back at me and thought, "HEY!" Those stupid Swedes stole one of our national treasures!". Ah Americans.

Sunday was gorgeous and I was able to enjoy more of the City before heading back to the Cruise ship and my return voyage to Helsinki.

Andrea
WPPR ranked 54, though you couldn't tell that from my play this weekend *sigh*

Props

-- To the Helsinki Sorkka Pinball Open organizers for booking me the cruise, hotel (and coming to the hotel to make sure I was taken care of), and tourney entrance as the Sorkka Pinball Open prize. I'm sure they had to pay more since I am female and they respected my privacy enough not to stick some of the other Finns going (all male) in the rooms with me to save money. Sam and Antti, you guys went out of your way and I'm only sorry that I didn't represent you better during the main tourney. Congrats to Antti for winning the classics.

-- To the Stockholm tourney organizers for being courteous, choosing a great venue, and for having all the standings and scores available at all times for players to view.

-- To Chris Newsom for being a really great guy both during the main tournament (when he was really humble when reporting high scores) and also for letting me play the Reversed Flipper machine at the same time he was. I contrast Chris' attitude with one of the Swedish guys who asked me if I was waiting to play one of the tourney games and when I nodded yes, told me to go away because he was next. Hokay


SLOPS

-- To the IDIOTS in the cruise ship cabin next to me who stayed up all night drinking tax free beer and singing that Stupid Lordi Eurovision Hard Rock Hallelujah song ALL FRIGGIN NIGHT LONG!! I was so sleep deprived when I arrived at the tournament on Friday morning that my hands were shaking on the flipper buttons.

-- To the lack of coordination on the part of the volunteers taking the scorekeeping on Friday morning (which was fixed by late Friday, I should add). I kept getting conflicting answers when asking questions and no one seemed to care about broken machines until later in the tourney day. This was just for the volunteers and not the organizers, though. The organizers were VERY helpful.

-- To the missing Stern and Atari games. I miss you guys and really wanted to show those Swedes how those games are played! :(

-- To the guy who propositioned me on the boat over the buffet dinner on the way home. No offense, dude, but there isn't enough alcohol on the entire ship to make that offer even remotely enticing.......
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