Shawn K. Quinn

Regarding Texas Pinball Festival 2026 and the immediate future
Regular readers will notice I have attended the Texas Pinball Festival, including the Wizards tournament, for the past four years starting in 2022. I appreciate the opportunity to attend and compete in the tournament over the past […]

September 5, 12, 23
Moving on to the few outings I was able to complete in September. Admittedly this is a bit sparse, but there's a reason for that which I may or may not be explaining soon.

September 5, Del Mar Lanes:

One of my better runs on Godzilla at this location. Still looking to beat […]

August 4, 8, 9, 15
I've got a lot to catch up on, as I didn't realize I managed to get two whole months behind. This post will cover what I was up to for August, with the following post covering September.

August 4, Poison Girl:

A pretty good evening, I'd say, with 250k+ on Playboy (Bally) […]

July 11, 14, 25, 27
I'm going to go ahead and combine all of these into one post, since I'm unfortunately so far behind.

I endeavor to get everything within a month at most, but that was just not possible this time around. There is also the possibility that posts here may become fewer and […]

Blue Rooster June 15 and Comicpalooza June 21
Not a whole lot to report on for these. Stranger Things at Blue Rooster is still on the same (ancient) code, which thankfully is the only thing really "wrong" with it. I managed to beat my previous grand champion score by a little bit.

I also got a […]

Blue Rooster May 18
About a week ago now, I happened to be at The Blue Rooster Pub & Grill. They had a Stranger Things (Pro) that, as it turns out, was on pretty old code. (Skill shots scored 500K, 600K, etc instead of 5M, 6M, etc.) It also had (upon my arrival) some of the default high scores […]

Del Mar Lanes May 14
And then, for the first time in quite a while, I felt the urge to swing by Del Mar Lanes and get in a round or two on Godzilla (if nothing else, to confirm it's still there and playable). The high scores have been cleared since my last visit; my 606M+ grand champion is still […]

Cidercade April 25
This was another in the many (mostly) monthly visits to Cidercade. The highlight was Game of Thrones, 256M (high score #4 and Stark Champion). Most of the rest were pretty run of the mill. And yes I am playing more video games when I go to Cidercade, not because I'm giving up […]

Yesterday's Bar & Grill April 4
After work in the Bryan/College Station area, I dropped into Yesterday's Bar & Grill, which has the only known pinball machine in the area per Pinball Map. That game is a Star Wars Pro (Stern) with a couple of minor issues that don't (usually) affect playability […]

Cidercade March 28
Admittedly most of this visit was run of the mill but there were a couple of highlights: 20k+ on Pengo, 74k+ on Ms. Pac-Man, 135M+ on Deadpool, with the rest being more or less run of the mill.

https://www.skqrecordquest.com/2025/04/30/20155/

Texas Pinball Festival 2025 part 6: Closing thoughts and a look at the future
So with that, another Texas Pinball Festival is in the books, for me and for everyone.

First, a review of the tournament. It has been long enough since the event that I now know my overall tournament standing for IFPA […]

Sorry for the extra noise, I am having to make edits to prior blog posts, and they should not be re-tooted when that happens but somehow they are.

Texas Pinball Festival 2025 part 5: What do you mean, he's not done playing pinball for the weekend?
After the closing ceremonies it was time to make my way back to Houston. Due to road construction in Huntsville, I decided to take a rather indirect route down I-35 through Waco, picking up Texas […]

Texas Pinball Festival 2025 part 4: On the show floor
Despite spending what seemed like almost the whole weekend in the tournament room, I did have some time to check out games on the show floor.

It's hard to pick out highlights from these, as in a lot of cases I don't know what constitutes a […]

Texas Pinball Festival 2025 part 3: Finishing up the tournament
After some time on the show floor (which I will cover in the next post), lunch and dinner, some rest, and breakfast, it was time to get back to the tournament. Saturday's play would have four rounds or eight games.

It was already […]

Texas Pinball Festival 2025 part 2: The first six rounds
We move on to Friday and the first day of the first year of the new format for the Texas Pinball Festival Wizards tournament. For those who don't keep up with the ins and outs of the competitive pinball scene, I will summarize the changes […]

@fluffy True, it's a different situation with Jim Henson and The Muppets, as the popularity of the latter was much higher. ALF/Gordon was one TV show, one (made-for-TV?) movie, and not a whole lot more. Sure, kids of the 80s remember him but the current generation probably doesn't really […]

@fluffy I remember ALF quite fondly. It does seem like it was the guy's big break and he's trying to make the most of it, but at some point maybe it's time to try something new.

Texas Pinball Festival 2025 part 1: Northbound and down
And so it began.

Months of anticipation and many emails from both the main Texas Pinball Festival staff and the tournament directors later, the day had finally arrived. I had stayed up later than I wanted to packing everything in a […]

March 19 Cidercade Houston
So on the morning of March 18 I get a text about my free admission rewards at Cidercade expiring in three days. Ordinarily I wouldn't have dragged myself out to Cidercade this late on the night before I'm set to drive up to Frisco for the Texas Pinball Festival, and […]

March 16 Einstein's Katy
And then it was time once again for the monthly Einstein's visit.

There were a few of relative gems on this outing: 150k+ on Stars, 54.3M+ on Black Knight: Sword of Rage (Premium), 3.9M+ on Rick and Morty.

I would fit in one more arcade visit before it was time to head […]

March 3 Little Dipper
Highlights in brief: 80.5M+ on Star Trek, 796k+ on Jacks to Open. The rest weren't really anything special.

(This was originally supposed to be a league night for Bayou City Pinball League, but cancelled due to low attendance.) […]

I'm back from TPF. I'll start working on the blog posts tomorrow, hope to have them all done by the end of the week.

These are dangerous times for everyone in and around the US, but many times more so for those without the protections of US citizenship. Those of us who are privileged enough to be able to speak freely and without the immediate threat of draconian consequences have a special obligation not to […]

There are a lot of Canadians who don’t want to visit the US just now. But if you have to, I would strongly advise going by air, because US CBP is in the airport in Canada. So they can still arbitrarily refuse entry because you voted Liberal or your name is Nadia or whatever, but they can’t […]

Texas Pinball Festival 2025: Back in the saddle again
It's that time again. The Texas Pinball Festival is this weekend, March 21-23. As you may have heard, the tournament format has completely changed this year. Instead of the previous "limited entries" format, the field of 160 players will be […]

Reminder: My Texas Pinball Festival updates will be on Telegram this year: https://t.me/skqrecordquest

@kcivey So much for an impartial jury. How many potential jurors got excluded during voir dire? Is there a way to find out?

I am actively seeing people apologising now, and saying "I know this is too political for the rules here, but I am losing access to my source of life-saving medications and am now actively spinning everything down and preparing for death. If you are interested in $THING_I_DO, please support […]

Substack rival Ghost is now connected to the fediverse https://techcrunch.com/2025/03/19/substack-rival-ghost-is-now-connected-to-the-fediverse/