Silverball Pinball Museum - Asbury Park New Jersey

I know this doesn't really qualify as a park but it is "sort of' "kind of" park - related, so please allow me to indulge.

I was bummed that once again I missed great Adventure's holiday offerings in December and it has been a while since I have been anywhere park-related. My family and I needed something indoors and somewhat fun to do a couple of weeks ago and I figured we would try to head to Asbury Park again. The last time I tried to go there (it was a summer weekend) and the town was so packed, that I couldn't even park my car.

This was one of those places that really delivered. In a nutshell, Silverball features a slew of mostly older pinball machines from the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s with a few new ones and several popular video games such as Pong, Pacman, etc. The games for their age are in wonderful shape and the clientele when we went (midday on a January Saturday) was family oriented, respectful and just really enjoying themselves. From what I understand, it gets more adult at night, but this is to be expected. The pay one price (either by the hour or day was reasonable) and the folks that work there seem to be very decent and attentive. At times, it seemed a little crowded and people kept bumping into each other with a customary, "Oh, excuse me," or "OOppps...sorry about that."

Once admission is paid and you receive a wristband, the games are all on free play. On top of each machine is a "history" about the game and a list of top scores for adults, children and those over 50. Some food was available too and a birthday party was going on - but we were too busy playing tables to notice too much. They also are hosting a major fund-raiser for Autism Awareness in March...with sea food, bands, raffles, etc.

Two of my all time favorite machines were there, "Space Mission" and "Eight Ball Deluxe" but I saw many classics including Fireball and a mechanical golf game I remembered as a child.

This time, plenty of meter parking was available right around the back and seeing the water from the (rainy) boardwalk made it seem like summer can't be that far away.

In any case, this is a MUST visit if you like pinball and classic arcades. Kids seem to be discovering this from their parents and it's kind of a good thing.

I am looking forward to another (and much longer) visit in February.

Thank you for reading this.

This sounds similar to the pinball museum in Las Vegas except there admission is free and you pay to play each game. 1 quarter for the really old analog ones, 2 for the middle aged digitals and 3 for the modern fancy ones. It was neat listening to some of the older people there talk about how they used to play this machine or that machine when they were kids.