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I once was told by a friend that you either love North Star or you hate it. Well he used to play the machine as a kid, and I'm sure it took alot of his paper route money to master North Star. When I first got the game and it just kicked my butt! I quickly learned you don't pansy around with North Star when the ball is in the flipper area. With quick reflexes and just the correct amount of nudging and shaking the machine, you can nearly always bring the ball to one of the flippers and stay in control.
The game is a fast drain with large flipper spacing and an out lane to the side of each flipper. The game has a post protecting the outhole in the center of the flippers, but it does little good when the ball comes in on an angle such as a rebound of a slingshot.
The rest of the playfield is as classic as you can get for the era. 5 top rollovers require skill shots with the ball shooter. There are 5 pop bumpers in a circle center playfield which make for some fast play! Points will score replays but making Specials is what makes this game so exciting to play! Specials are scored by making one of the 2 side playfield kicker holes or going over a rollover button dead center in the playfield among the cluster of pop bumpers. The kicker hole Special is lit by making any sequence of green or yellow rollovers. The Green sequence lights the right kicker hole special, and the Yellow lights the left kicker hole special. But don't be fooled, the topmost green and yellow rollover are no easy shot from the flippers. But with proper ball control and timing it can be done, by going 'up' the rollover lane off the flipper. More often however these rollovers are made randomly off the bumpers.
As the Green and Yellow sequences are made each kicker hole (100 pts normally) advances by 100 points, making both sequences awards 300 points in a kicker hole. Nothing beats a double or even triple POP..POP..POP as you score a kicker hole special and your points award replays at the same time! The white sequence of rollovers light the center playfield rollover button only for Special. The center playfield rollover button is not lit for special all the time. It comes on 'occasionally' as explained on the score card, but you need to hit it quick because a one point increment of score turns it right off again. The neat thing is as you score more rollover sequences, the frequency of the rollover button lighting up increases. If you are skilled (or fortunate) enough to make all the rollover lane sequences on the playfield you are awarded a replay and then you get
ROLLOVERS SPECIAL WHEN LIT!
Not having played the game as a kid I now know why North Star is so collectible! What fantastic action, not to mention Roy Parker out doing himself with the Aurora Borealis, Nuclear Subs, Eskimos and of course the North Pole sign depicted as a barber pole! Back to the Top
