1979 Tahiti

~ Last of the Mystic Lines Games ~

These first three pictures are courtesy of Andy at itllfly67@home….. - A bingo pinball fan who really didn’t want to let his game go and hoped a bingo fan like me might find a home for it – Andy emailed me a couple of times and finally let her go in October of 2001

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I always liked the Bally Tahiti cabinet, it just fits the game name so well with those palm-fronds gracing that orchid and young island girl. Quite distinctive and always one of the easier cabinets to recognize. Later a few of these games were renamed Mystic and I guess if one was to romanticize about that island girl long enough, in an odd way it kind of fits too. Bally’s Tahiti was released in 1979 and was one of the last three games to ever come out of the Belmont plant, just a little over 26 years after United released their Tahiti, completing the ranks of bingos that shared names: Hawaii, Circus, and Caravan that Chicago actually used several times over the years.

Although you’ve heard me talk about these 20-Hole bingos all being Special Games, offering a game-within-a-game, Tahiti is really the exception there. This pin really offered nothing new, other than the Scores Double When Lit arrows and a twist on the Ball Return (hold/double hold feature) feature, when enabled, offering the player the choice of returning the balls in the left-or-right halves of the playfield.

Bally put a 40-Coin limit on these dime games and likely a player had to pump close to that many in to see all of the features, but that 4-digit replay meter tells the whole story with a possible 1200 payout, equating to $120 pocket money………………

Out of all of the Bally’s, Tahiti’s flyer was the only true-color, high-resolution, flyer and with it’s being released in Belgium only, helps show on things were changing – Especially it’s fine-print that Bally had on all of their last flyers, stating how the games were subject to the state and federal laws pertaining to these games.

The manual for this game was also tailored toward Belgium, giving a lot of extra machine detail, including listing the part numbers for the 50hz “Belgium Motors” – etc. This manual was one of the few to make a reference to the schematic and subtly makes note to how the two work together, which is so very true. At the end-of-days, obviously the manuals were being tweaked for the new European users based upon feedback through channels – It’s nice to know that everyone who first faces a bingo is a bit stymied……..

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~ Hopefully when one of the owner reads this page, they’ll grace us with a few comments as to how much they like the game ~

<<<Associated Links>>>

http://danny.cdyn.com/mysticflip.htm

http://danny.cdyn.com/playfields3.htm

Created on 11-24-2001 – Last updated 8-28-2010