Ask ten collectors which 1990s Bally or Williams game to buy first and you'll hear the same few names. The Addams Family, Twilight Zone, Medieval Madness and Attack from Mars all come from the dot-matrix years, when Williams and its Midway arm, which sold games under the Bally name, built everything on the WPC system. WPC arrived in 1990, and WMS closed its pinball division on October 25, 1999. That's a short window, and it holds most of the games people dream about. They differ in how many were built, how much moves on the playfield and which board sits in the backbox, and those three things shape what owning one is like.
Start with how many were made
Production numbers decide how much choice you'll have. The Addams Family (March 1992) ran to 20,270 units, which makes it the best-selling solid state pinball machine of all time. Twilight Zone (April 1993) ran to 15,235 and Terminator 2 (July 1991) to 15,202. Compare the late games. Attack from Mars (December 1995) was built in 3,450 units, Medieval Madness (June 1997) in 4,016, Monster Bash (July 1998) in 3,361 and Cactus Canyon (October 1998) in just 903.
A big run is a real advantage on a first machine. With that many built, you can pass on a rough one, compare a few, and wait for one close enough to drive to. With a run of a few thousand, you'll take what comes up.
The Addams Family: the easy first pick
Pat Lawlor and Larry DeMar designed The Addams Family, and it broke every earlier sales record for flipper games. Its signature toy is Thing, a plastic hand that comes out of its box, picks up the ball with a magnet and takes it under the playfield. The game also takes over the upper left flipper during Thing Flips and tries to shoot the ball into the Swamp on its own. It's one of only two Fliptronics I games, the other being Addams Family Gold. Ask for a video of Thing grabbing a ball and of Thing Flips firing. Some games change their rules to work around a broken feature, but you're still missing part of what you paid for.
Twilight Zone: more machine, more to check
After The Addams Family, Midway gave Lawlor full creative control, and Twilight Zone took 16 months to design. It was the first of the WMS SuperPin widebody games, with more features and patents than any pinball game before it. There's a working gumball machine that holds three balls, a 12-hour analog clock, a triangular mini-playfield called the Powerfield with magnets that fling the ball, and the Powerball, a white ceramic ball that magnets don't affect. It's wonderful when it all works and a long list to verify when it doesn't. Ask the seller to show the clock moving, the gumball machine loading and releasing a ball, and the Powerfield in action. Ask too whether the ceramic Powerball is still in the game.
One battery detail is specific to this game. The clock can show the real time, and a real-time clock needs a battery to keep time. With NVRAM alone, the time won't advance while the game is off. A Twilight Zone with NVRAM plays fine. Its clock just won't be right after a power cycle.
Terminator 2 and the early WPC games
Steve Ritchie's Terminator 2 was the first Williams standard game designed around a dot-matrix display. Along with White Water (January 1993, 7,008 units) and Judge Dredd (September 1993, 6,990 units, a SuperPin widebody designed by John Trudeau), it runs the original WPC-089 CPU board. That board matters when you're buying, because leaking batteries on it drip straight onto the switch matrix circuits and corrode the traces.
Attack from Mars and Medieval Madness: Brian Eddy's pair
Brian Eddy designed both and Lyman Sheats wrote the software for both. Attack from Mars has a fan layout, so every shot can be made from the two bottom flippers, and its big saucer at the top center shakes and flashes as you beat the Martians. Medieval Madness followed on the same WPC-95 system. Its castle has a solenoid portcullis and a motorized drawbridge, and two trolls pop up from under the playfield during certain modes. In a video, you want to see the drawbridge come down, the portcullis go up and both trolls rise and drop.
Both games have remakes. Chicago Gaming Company released Medieval Madness in March 2015 and Attack From Mars in June 2017, under license from Planetary Pinball, which holds the rights to make Williams machines and parts. The remakes add modern electronics and all-LED lighting, and some versions get a larger full-color display. A remake is a fine buy if you want the game with less old-board risk. You just need to know which one you're looking at, so ask for the serial plate and a photo of the boards in the backbox.
Monster Bash and Cactus Canyon: the late, rare ones
George Gomez designed Monster Bash, and Tom Kopera and Matt Coriale designed Cactus Canyon. Cactus Canyon was the last traditional Bally pinball before the move to Pinball 2000, and it shipped with incomplete code after production stopped at 903 of a planned 925. CGC has remade both. The Monster Bash remake arrived in November 2018, and the Cactus Canyon remake came with expanded rules. With 3,361 and 903 built, originals don't come up often, which makes them a hard place to start.
Check the board generation
Every game here keeps its settings in memory backed by batteries on the CPU board, and the board generation tells you where the risk sits. The first WPC-089 board lets leaked electrolyte drip onto the switch matrix. The WPC-S board, used on games like Theatre of Magic, moved the batteries to a daughter card, and that mostly ended the board damage. WPC-95 brought them back on board inside a plastic shell, in a spot above the ASIC socket that's an even worse place for a leak. So on Attack from Mars, Medieval Madness, Monster Bash and Cactus Canyon, a clear photo of the CPU board matters as much as a playfield shot. The battery guide covers what to look for.
Which one we'd start with
For a first machine, we'd lean toward The Addams Family or Twilight Zone, mostly because there are so many of them. You get to be picky about condition and wait for a good one. Pick The Addams Family if you want the most choice and one main toy to check. Pick Twilight Zone if you want the most toys in the era and don't mind checking a lot of moving parts. If an Eddy game is the one you really want, either original is a great buy in good shape, and the remakes deserve a look if you'd rather skip the old boards.
What to ask before you commit
- A photo of the CPU board in the backbox, with the battery area in focus.
- A video of the signature toy working in a real game, whether that's Thing, the clock and gumball machine, the castle and trolls, or the saucer.
- The display test from the service menu. A healthy DMD is bright and fully lit, with no dark or blurry spots.
- A run through the switch test. Newer machines also list problems, like dead switches, when you open the coin door.
- Close shots of each ramp entrance. Clear ramps tend to crack at the entry points and curves.
Then read the playfield guide and the listing red flags before you message anyone. You can see every game from these years in the DMD golden era, or start from Bally or Williams.