BINGO PINBALLS

 

Bally's BIKINI
Magic Screens

A major evolution in "bingos" came about in late 1958 with the introduction of what was referred to as the "Magic Screen" in Bally's CARNIVAL QUEEN. Up to this point (except for MIAMI BEACH which had a gimmick which added extra columns to the card) all bingos, that I know of, had one or more 5 by 5 number "bingo cards" on their backglasses; some games, however, also had 3 by 3 number "super cards" in addition to the regular 5 by 5 cards. The "Magic Screen" was also a 5 by 5 number card, but had a moveable "overlay" which changed the scoring patterns on the card.

When a new game was first started the "basic screen" appeared which allowed only "in-line" scoring (3 to 5 numbers in a row on either a vertical, horizontal, or diagonal line) as was the case in earlier games. These lines were also of three colors (red, yellow, and green) with corresponding sets of payout odds for each color on the backglass as previously described.

screen home
laguna beach
screen in home position
The "Magic Screen" overlay, however, also had additional "columns" containing various "scoring patterns" which could be moved in front of the bingo card. As each new column was exposed to the player, one of the columns on the opposite side of the card would disappear. When five or more new columns were exposed, the original "in-line" scoring lines would have completely disappeared exposing an entirely new pattern.

In order for a player to qualify to move the screen he must (from depositing extra coins a the start of a game) light up one or more letters ('A', 'B', 'C', etc) on the backglass. Each letter lit (and like all bingo "multiple coin features" they lit in a "pseudo-random" fashion as extra coins were deposited) would allow the player to move the screen an additional position, but only during the period of play when movement of the screen was allowed. Buttons on the front rail of the machine (labeled "Left" and "Right") allowed the player to control movement of the screen, but only between the positions for which he had first qualified.

screen position b screen position e
laguna beach
screen positions B and E
These new positions of the screen added columns which contained colored "scoring sections" instead of the normal "in-line" scoring patterns of the "basic screen". And, as was mentioned earlier, as each new column was exposed, one of the original "in-line" columns would disappear. Besides these "sections" being of various shapes, scoring a winner within a given colored section required only that a certain number of card numbers be lit in that section which need not all be adjacent in the section (as opposed to "in-line" scoring in which the 3, 4,or 5 numbers required to score must all be adjacent in the same line.)

The addition of "Magic Screens" to bingo machines became a very popular feature with players as it gave them several advantages. If a player had qualified for screen movement, he always had the opportunity of changing the screen position up until he shot the fourth ball (and sometimes as late as after shooting the fourth or fifth ball if he also qualified for these extra "advantages" during "multiple coin play" at the start of the game).

This gave the player two major advantages. First, if his initial balls did not land in holes forming a winning "in-line" pattern, moving the screen could result in these "losing numbers" becoming a "winning combination" In one of the additional "colored scoring sections". Secondly, if he had a winning "in-line" pattern, after collecting replays for that winner moving the screen could result in additional "winners" for the balls he shot in one of the colored scoring sections. The only restriction was that you could not score twice for the same number of numbers (3, 4, or 5) in the same color. A final advantage was that even if the first few balls shot did not produce either an "in-line" or "section" winner, the screen could be positioned by the player such that the remaining numbers to be lit to score a winner were ones which he felt were the easiest to shoot for.

features
bikini
blue and supersection features
All of the colored "scoring sections" on the screen (except for a special "Blue Section", and an "Orange Section" on "OK games") were red, yellow and green, like the colored lines on the "basic screen", and scored according to the corresponding color odds on the backglass. One Yellow Section and one Red Section had stripes on them and were referred to as "super sections". If the corresponding "super section feature" was lit on the backglass, winners in these sections required one less number than normal (ie. 2 scored as 3, 3 as 4, and 4 as 5).

The "Blue Section", which contained only 3 numbers, scored a large number of replays for lighting 2 or 3 numbers, depending on which, if any, of the special "Blue Section features" were lit during the depositing of extra coins at the start of the game. More details on the "Blue Section" and "Orange Section" scoring will be given during the detailed discussion of Bally BIKINI's features.

In addition to the "Magic Screen" features, the great appeal of "OK bingos" came from their "Futurity Features". The idea of these is that something occurring during the play of one game affected what happened in the next game.

This idea was used to some extent in earlier pingames, but not in such a sophisticated manner as in the "OK bingo". "One-ball Horserace" pingames in the late Forties and early Fifties had an "A-B-C-D feature" in which four bumpers, when hit in sequence, would cause something special to happen (such as lighting all seven "horse selections") in the next game when the sequence was finally completed. A similar idea was used in the so-called "Spell-Name" feature used on some "One-Balls" and a few amusement pins as well.

As far as "pre-OK" bingos were concerned, an example of a "future feature" was the "Ballyhole feature" in CYPRESS GARDENS in 1958. If the "Ballyhole panel" on the backglass was lit during extra coin play, and the player got a ball into the "Ballyhole" (number 16), when he started his next game the letters A-B-C-D-E would automatically light on the backglass giving him the "Turning Corners" and "Moving Line" features of the game without having to deposit extra coins.


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