Bugs Bunny's Birthday Ball is a 1990 pinball game designed by John Trudeau and Python Anghelo and released by Midway (under the name Bally). It is based on the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoon series from Warner Bros. This is the first of only two licensed pinball machines to ever feature the Looney Tunes characters (the second being Sega's Space Jam).
Content
Gameplay
The game is a celebration of Bugs Bunny's 50th anniversary, accompanied by his various co-stars and lots of cake. One to four players can play. The player must use the "Skill Shot" to help Wile E. Coyote chase the Road Runner, break a few eggs in the inverted "Chicken Coop" playing field, then drive "Tweety's Slide" to the main playing field and collect 1 million score points, hit Daffy Duck for a "Big Score" of 500,000 points and light "Speedy Gonzales' Keek-Out" for 1 million points, then shoot the curved, pivoting center ramp so that the Tasmanian Devils take the Tasmanian She-Devil player on a challenging "Tazmanian Shopping Spree" up the ramp, which will score up to 500,000 points or an extra ball. If the player helps Bugs blow out all the candles on his cake, Honey Bunny will reward him with a 50 million bonus, with the player getting the best score from his opponents for a surprise package.
Playing field
The playing field includes 3 flippers, a plunger skill shot, 3 pop bumpers, 3 catapults, 19 standing targets, a drop target with 3 benches, a kick-out hole, a spinning target, a caught ball and a left outlane recoil. In the top left corner of the playing area is a small inverted playing area with a flipper to propel the ball down to loop around a ramp and hit a caught ball. In multiplayer operations, a unique playing field award feature exchanges scores between players.
Development
According to Python Anghelo, the game was quickly made to fill a gap in the Bally production line. When he and John Trudeau were developing the game and The Machine: Bride of Pin-Bot at the same time, they worked insanely fast on both games in a short amount of time. They did so much, so fast, that one day Python nicknamed John "Doctor Flash". From that point on it stuck.
voice cast
Greg Burson as Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Speedy Gonzales, Foghorn Leghorn, Barnyard Dawg and Chickens
Bob Bergen as Porky Pig and Tweety Bird
Mel Blanc as Yosemite Sam, Sylvester the Cat and Tasmanian Devil (archive recording)
Paul Julian as Road Runner (archive recording)
