Pinball machine collector hopes to reunite Fredericton with 'a lost art'
Downtown business to feature games dating back to 1970s, host burgeoning community
Dylan Papazian-Clare still remembers playing pinball with his dad at the old Empire Theatres in Fredericton, spending most of his tokens on a game called Fish Tales.
He calls it a "campy" game, with a fishing theme that fits in perfectly in New Brunswick.
It's one of the machines he hopes to use to introduce more people to pinball at Flippins Bar/Arcade, which is scheduled to open in Fredericton's downtown at the end of August.
"I was in love with it, was hooked as a kid and I played [pinball] until, you know, they disappeared," Papazian-Clare said.
"A lot of games vanished through the mid-2000s, the arcade industry kind of crashed out completely. Pinball was kind of put on the back burner all across the world. So myself, like many others, kind of forgot about it."
But Tom MacArthur, who founded the Fundy Flippers Pinball League in 2017, says there's been a noticeable resurgence.
"Over the last six years or so, I would say there's been about [200], 300 people that have shown at least interest in being involved," MacArthur said.
"We've noticed really large growth in the people I would say from 20 to early 30s. They've really embraced it."
After encountering pinball machines again at Hanwell's Kingswood Entertainment Centre in 2016, Papazian-Clare began collecting machines — including Fish Tales. He's now amassed 40.
With a growing number of machines at home, he also began inviting interested community members over to play in a league. He now caps registration at 28 spots, all of which are regularly taken.
Relocating those machines out of his home and into a public space will be significant for the pinball community, MacArthur says.
"If you don't know the person that has the machines, it's pretty hard," he said.
"But if you say, hey, I'm going to go check out that arcade bar, you step in and they have a bunch of games, and you can start playing, talking to other people, it's a really important step to the whole pinball hobby."
For a few months, Eighty Three Bar Arcade served as that space.
Papazian-Clare was working with the arcade on machine maintenance and orders, and saw the community's interest — until the King Street building was destroyed in a fire in 2022.
He hopes to recreate that space both for diehard fans and those who don't yet know that they love it.
"This place is like, it is a bar, but ultimately it's a community space for events … it'll be a safe space for them to come in and enjoy themselves and participate in something that you just don't see everywhere every day anymore," he said.
"It's going to be awesome to have a space for people to come in and really get to partake in this activity that kind of feels like a lost art in a way."
Papazian-Clare also plans to use the space to open and host a chapter of Belles and Chimes, a women's and 2SLGBTQ+ pinball league — the third chapter in Canada, after Toronto and Ottawa.
Those who visit the arcade will find pinball machines going back as far as 1973, and as new as 2018. But there will also be arcade games like Pac-Man for those who aren't hooked on pinball.
But MacArthur believes young adults in particular enjoy the physical aspect of pinball.
"It's interesting, because this is a generation that would have grown up with video games," he said. "Many of them have really gravitated towards the tactile and physical aspect of pinball, and the sheer randomness of it sometimes."
Papazian-Clare agrees.
"Through the machine as you're playing, you know, you can feel the ball bouncing around, you can feel all the pop bumpers going and everything," he said.
"It's very satisfying, you know, in a world that's so digital now to have something that you can actually physically interact with in your hands and your actual physical movements directly."
Whether customers are drawn to Fish Tales or Pac-Man, Papazian-Clare believes there will be something for everyone.
"I can't wait to see the smiles."
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