It had happened, Williams had closed. The last machine they made was SWE1.
The conditions were right, I had the money, I saw my "Last Chance" to own a New in Box (NIB) williams pinball and decided that it was for me. On March 18th, 2000, I want to the Pennsauken NJ arcade auction and met Rob Lawshe of R&M Amusements in the parking lot and exchanged the money for the machine. I strapped it on my truck and drove home.
It sat in my garage that night because we were having a party and I wanted to take my time in opening / assembling it. The next day, my friend Steve came over and we began the process of putting a brand new game together.
Me, posing with a box.
This is what you see as you get inside.
The legs, manual, and hardware.
An important notice was taped to the top of the game about the glass being installed upside down. Pinball 2000 (PB2K) used special pinball glass to make the image of the monitor appear to be sitting on the playfield. Very cool.
The art on each side of the game is different. The game is gorgeous.
on it's back awaiting it's legs.
That's good, now to install the head. Notice how we used the cardboard? It never touched the concrete.
Goodies!
No dirt, no smoke, no dust. So much nicer than the games I've restored.
Ready, but still unplayed...
The date was a day off, but these are stats the machine would never show again.
A little less than a month later I would be ready to move on and take a loss on the game in favor of something new. The game was traded for an Indiana Jones(IJ) at the Allentown pinball show with some money. The IJ was traded for a Monster Bash (with some service) in the Spring of 2001.