D&D Pinball Machine

In 1987, Pinball games were made for just about anything that had reached popular consciousness. You know you were a success if you had a pinball game made for your intellectual property. In this year, Bally made the Dungeons and Dragons Pinball game.

The playfield is really gorgeous and unusual. The central featue is the pyroclastic plume that erupts from the dragon that lights up score markers. The flippers and the inlane/outline combinations are not standard. In addition, there is a teleport feature were the ball goes in one place and comes out another (really a second ball) and saving throws. You heard me, saving throws. More on that below. There were strobe lights above too.

Only two thousand of these beauties were ever made. You can see that the POV shot below with everything lit up nicely. 

Check out the button underneath the flipper on the shot below. That's a "Magic Save" which stops the ball from draining down the right or left side. Of course, it also sports a stylized version of the old logo with the dragonl ampersand.

 

I believe this is the original catalog shot below.