Williams Taxi
Taxi is one of the better pinball games made by Williams in the eighties. It's a simple but fun and addictive game.
The Santa Claus image on the cabinet makes it attractive for kids, but adults will enjoy playing the game too.
Gameplay
The goal of the game is to pick up several passengers: Marilyn, Gorbie, Santa Claus, Dracula and Pinbot (known from his pinball machine) and drive them around to score points.
Most important are the two ramps. They let the ball go across the whole playfield and are real fun if you are able to shoot them continuously. The left ramp will drop the ball at the left inlane, the right ramp at the right inlane. So a skilled pinball player is able to repeat shooting the left ramp, then the right, then the left again, over and over. This is not only fun to do but will also earn a lot of points.
My game
Bought it, enjoyed it, sold it to make room for another game.
I wouldn't mind owning one again if room was not an issue..
Things to look for when buying
Marilyn Monroe or Lola version ? (see trivia)
Condition of the main ramp. The Dracula catapult on the left side shoots the pinball very hard into the back end of the ramp. Most games have a damaged / cracked ramp or even a ramp with a hole shot into it. A game with a perfect ramp is probably rare (and then please install some kind of protector for it).
The game has 4 regular score displays but also a 5th. That one is the older numeric style of score display. It's used as the taxi meter in the backbox which shows a bonus the player can earn. The longer you can keep the pinball in play, the higher this bonus will become.
There's a white taxi plastic on top of the backbox.
Trivia
This game was produced in 2 versions. First the Marilyn version was created, with
a blonde Marilyn Monroe-like image on the playfield and backglass. Because of legal problems
this image later changed to a brunette Lola. The Marilyn Monroe version is therefor more collectible,
however this game seems to appear more so is not rare at all (certainly not in Europe,
it's possible in the USA more Lolas have been sold).
In the cabinet of the game there's a real bell which rings during the game.
Promo plastics represent the characters you pick up during the game.