Some have worn their fingers on its sides so much that they couldn’t even bend them. Like table football or billiards, the pinball machine is one of those iconic objects that have marked several generations. To treat themselves to a game of “pinball”, the teenagers pushed open the doors of cafes where they made change at the bar to nab large two or five franc coins. Once slipped into the coin mechanism, the coin brought the heavy wooden box back to life, which came to life in a permanent fireworks display of sound and light.
With just two fingers, the player could afford adrenaline-pumping minutes to return the steel ball with the beaters, aiming for the ramps and bumpers. The true marker of a whole generation. “I’ve always loved playing there. There was one in the high school where I was in Nantes. It was very popular and was often found in arcades where we went to play video games. What’s fascinating about pinball is that you’re manipulating a real object. You are not glued to a screen.
Like many teenagers in the 1990s, Noël Le Moult gradually abandoned pinball, seeing the object disappear from the cafes he used to frequent. And then, one day in 2009, the big teenager he had become offered himself an old pinball machine. “It was a Transporter The Rescue model, something not very common”. He didn’t know it yet, but this purchase would gradually change his life. Or rather that of his companion. “Me, I was not passionate, I knew nothing about it. I thought he was just having fun, that he would be fine. Amandine Le Moult kept herself a bit far from the passion for Christmas, until the day she wanted to give him a hand with some paint touch-ups on his pinball machine. This painter then discovered a universe that fascinated her. So passionate that she decided to make it her job.
“We were not in the disposable society at all”
After several years repairing old machines, Amandine created her small business. Baptized Flip Again, it is based at the home of the couple, who resides in Martigné-Ferchaud, in the countryside of Ille-et-Vilaine. In a small lean-to in their house, the lovers pile up around twenty pinball machines that they have to put back in working order. The oldest date from the 1960s and are entirely mechanical. The most recent grew up in the 2000s and are full of electronics. “It’s a pretty big object so you have plenty to do with it. They are beautiful machines, which were designed to last. We weren’t in disposable society at all. Each pinball machine has its history, its experience. That’s the fun thing about fixing. We prolong the life of the object, we bring it back to life,” explains the young woman.
A fan of odds and ends, Amandine sometimes has to ask her husband, an electronics engineer, for help when it comes to touching the connectors of her pinball machines. Now well referenced among the microcosm of enthusiasts, Amandine and Noël are constantly looking for machines to get back on their feet. The problem is that they are no longer the only ones. “There is a marked resurgence of interest. The community is very active, there are tournaments, exhibitions. Even the manufacturers play the game. They bring out several new models each year and it’s hard to come by,” explains Noël.
Demand obviously drove prices up. To afford a new model, you often have to pay more than 20,000 euros. The second-hand market suffered the same fate and it is not uncommon to see old damaged bikes snapping up several thousand euros. “For a model that works, it takes between 2,000 and 5,000 euros. It has become madness, ”admits Amandine. Inflation had a merit. Now, owners of old pinball machines are less hesitant to have them repaired, even when the game has suffered years of inactivity. “They know they can resell them at a good price,” assures Noël. But most of the time they prefer to keep them. Just to see if they haven’t lost their touch.