According to the Strong National Museum of Play, pinball can be traced back to the 18th century, to a game called bagatelle. The latter, a French invention, bears a passing resemblance to the modern game, but it’s constructed entirely of wood, with no lights or wires anywhere.
Hundreds of years since bagatelle became pinball, the game represents a lesson in how to stay relevant. It’s changed its identity many times, following technological trends in step with movies, gaming, music, and other forms of entertainment.
So, while it used to be a hefty, dusty machine found in dark corners, pinball is now playable wherever there’s a phone or computer to run it.
Pinball Gauntlet
One of the more unusual steps in pinball’s evolution is also its most recent. Live Pinball Roulette takes its cues from roulette online, but abandons the wheel for a pinball gauntlet.
At the outset, the ball ascends from a plunger and along a rail. Yet, once it reaches the pins, it’s on its own. The player can’t make any actions, and the ball is fated to fall out of the bottom of the machine.
The good news is that Live Pinball Roulette retains roulette’s betting system, which means there can still be rewards for playing. Fans make bets on colours and numbers, including the famous red/black and odd/even options from roulette.
The ball falls through pins and buffers to the exit trap, or the ‘trough’ below. This is where things get interesting. The trough is divided into numbered and coloured segments. If the ball falls into a segment chosen by the player, they win a prize.
In Live Pinball Roulette, the action is chaperoned by a human host on webcam. It’s all streamed from a TV studio, complete with costumes and set dressing.
Strategies
Just like roulette, Live Pinball Roulette supports detailed strategy. The player can’t influence the trajectory of the ball, or change the game from one of luck to skill, but they can enhance their odds by betting in different ways. Again, these are identical to those used by roulette experts. 
For example, the D’Alembert method, named after a French mathematician, tries to lower the amount of risk involved in playing roulette. So, players decrease their bet by a single ‘unit’ after a win and increase it by the same amount on a loss.
There are lots of strategies like this, all of which have been analysed backwards and forwards over the decades. A few others include the Martingale system, the Fibonacci, Labouchère, Paroli, and even the James Bond strategy, despite the latter’s association with baccarat.
Live Pinball Roulette arguably has more in common with another ball and pin game – pachinko. This popular Japanese hobby has had a parallel evolution with pinball, changing from wood to adopt plastic and flashing lights, but the game area is usually circular.
Still, Live Pinball Roulette is an evolution on a template that’s remained remarkably consistent over the years – even after it entered the digital realm.
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