Do you have what it takes to bring this home?  Join us on 8/16 at The Isley Brewing Company for the RVAPinball City Champoinships.

This past weekend was the first ReplayFx in Pittsburgh, PA at the convention center downtown.  ReplayFx was run by PAPA.org and added video games and console gaming, among other things, to their usual pinball offerings.

Pinburgh, the annual match play PAPA tournament, was held as part of ReplayFx.  This involved moving all of the pinball machines from the PAPA facility to the convention center.  This must have been a tremendous undertaking as the posts on social media showed that they only had a few days at the convention center to set up what I think was five hundred or more machines.

Pinburgh consists of ten rounds in which you are matched with four other players and sent out to play on a bank of four machines.  Each bank has an electro mechanical machine, a modern DMD machine and two earlier solid state machines.  During the first five rounds on the first day, you accumulate points to determine whether you qualify in a, b, c  or d division for the second five rounds which are played on the second day.

At the end of the second five rounds, the top 40 from each division compete in playoff rounds to determine the champion of each division.

I qualified for b divison, but did not make the b divison playoffs.  I was pleased with this finish as it was an increase over my d division qualifying th year before at my first Pinburgh.

On the morning of the third day, there was a consolation tournament for those of us who didn’t qualify for the playoff rounds.  I entered this tournament with more than 200 or my fellow losers.  This tournament had groups of three playing on one machine.  Once you lost twice, you were out.  I lost my first game, but went on a run and ended up in a tie for fourth place.  I won a certificate for $25 worth of a ReplayFx clothing.

ReplayFx had much more than pinball.  As my friend Taylor said, at least there are lots of things to do here instead of moping around about how bad we are playing.

I entered the blindfold Donkey Kong contest in which the players took on the first level of Donkey Kong II.  The partner at the controls was blindfolded and the other partner give him directions on how to move. I had a great partner and we practiced as much as we were allowed.  When the competition started, there was a four way tie.  We pulled out the win for a $100 check and a certificate for $25 worth of ReplayFx clothing.

The experience was fantastic and I recommend it to anyone who can make the time to travel to Pittsburgh for the first weekend in August.

There is more to tell from ReplayFx which I will have in upcoming posts.