The Pinball Blog has a short write-up on an apparently new home pinball machine from Zizzle, this time with a classic Atari theme. It looks great, and by my calculations, will be their third generation product. If you remember, I have the first generation model, shown in the photo at the bottom of this blog post. The second generation added a few minor improvements, including more environmental lighting. Both models sold for between $100 - $500 depending upon when and where you were able to score one.

I'm not sure what this latest model adds, if anything, over the previous generation, but one obvious disappointment is that the board layout is exactly the same as all other previous models of Marvel and Pirates of the Caribbean machines. While the board was designed by top pinball machine pros - and it shows in the amazing value-to-quality ratio of what is really just a high end toy - it's disappointing they haven't used the long gap between releases to come up with a new board layout, or at minimum a fancier version of the original design. There's a real opportunity there for people like me who own and enjoy an earlier Zizzle machine, but would only consider an upgrade or addition for something truly different. In any case, I'm sure the roughly 3/4 scale machine with realistic pinball action will still be worth it, but for existing owners, even with the tempting Atari theme, it's probably a pass. As expected, though, we'll be keeping an eye on this one...

A photo of my first generation Zizzle Marvel Heroes pinball machine from January 2009. By Monday, where you see the toy slot machine, will be a Midway TouchMaster 5000.