Auteur Theory and Pinball

Kids don't understand the concept of authorship. It takes awhile walking the planet to realize that the reason one likes both Where the Wild Things Are and In the Night Kitchen so much is because the same person wrote them. Or that the same guy (Alan Miller) programmed two of my favorite Atari 2600 games: Robot Tank and Surround. I think I was in Junior High before someone pointed out to me that many my favorite comics were all written by Larry Hama (actually, the comment was much snootier: along the lines of "I can't believe you buy comics based on characters rather than the writer").

And I thought those days were gone: I know if I've read an author before when I open a book. I know the province of a movie before the lights go down. Imagine my surprise when I found that my two favorite pinball machines were designed by the same person. It's bit like realizing Eleanor Rigby and Yellow Submarine are both songs by the same band. The machines are The Addams Family and The Twilight Zone and the designer on both is a man named Pat Lawlor.

Even people who aren't pinball aficionados have likely played a game designed by Mr. Lawlor. The Addams Family is the single best-selling pinball machine of all time. Over 20 thousand machines are out in the world, shouting "The Mamushka!" But Mr. Lawlor's not only responsible for the two greatest pinball machines -- he's also the designer of more than a dozen instantly recognizable pinballs, including Funhouse, Earthshaker, Whirlwind, and No Good Gofers. Pat Lawlor is currently running Pat Lawlor Design, responsible for newer titles like Ripley's Believe It or Not, RollerCoaster Tycoon and most recently a pinball machine based on Family Guy.

Now, dozens of people are involved with something as complicated as a pinball machine. But Lawlor's machines all express similar design principles. The most obvious is innovation. Lawlor's first design, Banzai Run, featured an additional pinball playing field in the backglass. Twilight Zone had more related patents than any other pinball game (since eclipsed by Pinball Magic). In fact, every Lawlor game has something never before found in a pinball machine from Earthshaker's internal motor that shook the entire machine, to Addams Family's magnets under the playfield all the way up to the recent NASCAR game's circular racetrack.

The second hallmark of a Lawlor design is that the playfield is arranged to play in a horizontal direction as well as a vertical one. In addition to the standard flippers at the bottom of the machine, Lawlor's tables frequently include flippers on the sides of the playfield as well. These flippers target ramps, tunnels and other items that can only be "hit" from this horizontal perspective.

A third element in Pat Lawlor's designs is a sense of storytelling. Can a metal ball and two flippers present a narrative experience? Well, there's not a lot of character development, but players accomplish goals through play and are led through a sequence of events. For example traveling the country in Road Show or opening an amusement park in RollerCoaster Tycoon.

Finally, there's a host of more subtle features that distinguish a Pat Lawlor machine. Lawlor has a signature 'flow' which pinballers refer to as the path the ball takes as the game is played. Play is dynamic: the game pauses occasionally to give the player a breather before unleashing utter chaos. I'm thinking of the moments before multiball in Addams Family as the most extreme example, but even when the mechanized Thing picks up the ball is a welcome respite after a tricky shot. Perhaps most memorably, Lawlor's games are funny! Characters are unique without being annoying (unless their purpose is to be annoying). Situations are offbeat without succumbing to "wackiness". I often find myself laughing out loud in the arcade.

Do these factors add up to a distinguishable, recognizable design? I argue yes. Consider Lawlor's contemporary Steve Ritchie, best known for tables like Black Knight, Terminator 2, High Speed and Star Trek: The Next Generation. Ritchie is inarguably a master of pinball design as well, but makes significantly different decisions: playfields are open where Lawlor's are more confined. Ritchie's 'flow' is vertical with an emphasis on ramps and loops whereas Lawlor's play tends to be more horizontal. Ritchie's tables lack the multi-level or mini playfields often found in Lawlor's designs. This is not to say Ritchie's pinball machines are wrong or bad, but they're obviously designed from a different perspective.

I'm not entirely sure François Truffaut would agree that a pinball machine can have an auteur like a film. But in many ways a pinball machine can be closer to a single author's vision than a movie can. Few directors are also screenwriters and composers, while a pinball designer's vision becomes a player's experience. Heck, an Addams Family pinball promo video shows Lawlor overseeing assembly of the machines, tweaking each one as he goes. Lawlor's signature (a red button) shows up just a surely as a Hitchcock cameo does in one of his films. Where David Lynch casts a musician in a supporting role, Lawlor includes a shot through the pop bumpers. I know I'm dancing about architecture, but it was a pretty nifty feeling to realize that pinball machines bear the creative stamp of one or two people, rather than a soulless committee in a corporate office somewhere.

[Photo from the upcoming documentary TILT: The Battle to Save Pinball]