The Outpost Arcade Chandler, Arizona
Season 3 started exactly how women’s pinball should:
competitive pinball
machine chaos
weird conversations
random Spotify playlists
and at least one machine attempting spontaneous combustion.
I finished tied for 3rd overall with 27 league points, and honestly? I’m really happy with how the night went. I am gunning for A Division this season, and this felt like a strong start.
Round 1 — King Kong
Round 2 — Sorcerer
I was player 2 on Sorcerer where I stole Shaniya’s locked ball, got the Multiball, blew it up for a while, started another multiball, and racked my points up to over 300k. By ball 3, Shaniya came back swinging. She brought her score up to 700k and I managed 600k and a 2nd place finish behind Shaniya Lee.
At this point the room was already operating at full women’s league energy:
conversations about Hollywood marriages,
discussions about callus removal,
random life stories,
and absolutely no transition whatsoever between topics.
Round 2 still going — Xenon Literally Caught Fire
Okay. So this happened. Xenon had some kind of issue mid-game and started smoking / overheating enough that everyone immediately started joking:
“Xenon had a hot flash.”
Then Rick & Morty broke too.
The two machines are side by side, so naturally we decided the games had caught a virus from each other.
Machines got moved around, pairings shifted, and chaos took over for a little while. Honestly, that’s kind of part of league life sometimes.
Also, I never thought I’d see the day where I said:
“I’d rather play Rick & Morty than Venom.”
Yet here we are.
Round 3 — Venom (Unfortunately)
Venom started rough for me. I had a decent start:
skill shot,
a lock,
some loops,
a few Mayhem shots…
…but the scores escalated FAST.
At one point:
Player 1 was near 90 million,
Player 2 was over 30 million,
and I was trying to claw my way back into the game.
Then I finally got Mayhem Multiball with Milo and things started clicking. Ended up putting together a comeback game and finished 2nd with 38 million.
Honestly, considering how that game started, I’ll absolutely take it.
Round 4 — Star Trek: The Next Generation
Then came STTNG with Hailey Buhrman in the group.
For context: Hailey finished 1st in Women’s State last year and I finished 2nd, so I knew this was going to be a battle.
She proceeded to casually destroy the machine for 685 million.
Meanwhile I was over here trying to survive:
ball locks,
multiball setup,
Q challenge attempts,
and general STTNG stress.
I managed over 104 million and secured another 2nd place finish, which honestly felt really good against that group.
Sometimes league pinball is:
“You are not beating this person tonight, but you CAN still beat everybody else.”
That’s valuable too.
Round 5 — X-Men Chaos
X-Men started horribly for me.
Like… three ball saves and only 500k horrible.
The whole group was struggling early except Meghan, who immediately decided she was going to become an X-Men wizard.
Then suddenly I got Sentinel Multiball and Save the Innocent going on Ball 2 and jumped to 64 million out of nowhere.
That machine felt like:
panic,
panic,
panic,
giant scoring explosion,
drain.
I finished 2nd again behind Meghan, who absolutely crushed league all night long and earned the top spot overall.
Spotify Music in my earbud + Conversations = Peak Women’s League
Tonight’s soundtrack included:
Queen,
Puff the Magic Dragon,
Conway Twitty,
The Strokes,
and whatever else Spotify felt like throwing at me. My Spotify likes on shuffle is a dangerous place.
Meanwhile conversations somehow rotated between:
callus removers,
celebrity marriages,
random life updates,
and pinball strategy.
Women’s league conversations are truly their own genre.
Final Thoughts
I’m really proud of this night.
Not because every game was amazing — they weren’t.
But because I kept recovering.
I had rough starts, machine weirdness, missed shots, drains, and still kept fighting back into games and protecting points.
That’s the stuff that matters if I want to make A Division this season.
Incidental Exercise Receipts
Also:
Xenon caught fire,
Rick & Morty died,
Venom remained suspicious,
and Patrick Swazey still has the greatest name in Arizona pinball.
Honestly? Pretty successful Monday night.
Still counts.