Williams Jack Bot

JackBot didn't do very well in the arcades. Only 2,428 were produced. Players believed that this machine was a tiny bit out of date. And it was actually! At Williams, a production-gap almost occurred and another game was needed quickly.

JackBot is a remake of the 1986 Williams classic Pinbot. Things haven't changed much since then. In fact, the playfield layout is exactly the same, only the length differs from the original. "Lucky Star" was the name for the game that was under consideration for a short period of time.

Since the cabinet size changed over the years, the playfield has a few cm more at the backside. But that's about it. The artwork on the playfield and on the plastics was updated and a few features were added.

In our opinion, the ballhandling is better than the original. Due to the different bats and flipper units obviously. The sound on the other hand, is a bit too smoothly we believe. In 1986, Chris Granner added a great dimension to Pinbot with its futuristic galactic sounds. It's a pity they didn't even tried to equal this…

Playing the game nowadays, the only conclusion is that this machine is still fun to play. It features a wide open playfield, a Visor with its matrix and of course the Casino Run.

The JackBot in the Hyperballs Pinball Museum is in original condition. A pin with a very few plays. Well, to be honest, finding a worn out JackBot is harder to find ;-)

This machine was fully shopped and provided with new legs, posts, rubbers etc. and a CPR repro Pinbot mini-PF. A NOS spiral ramp and a NOS mainramp were installed, together with a new Vishay dotmatrix display and a Rottendog powerdriverboard (like it is in most of our pins).