If you have ever played any form of pinball, you will recall the distinct sounds as the ball bounces around. The pinball machine — a steel ball rolling on a sloped wooden surface — has switches and ...

At the Pacific Pinball Museum in Alameda, the first blinking, brightly lit machine to catch my eye is “El Dorado,” a 1970s-era game, replete with bucking horses and cowboys, that once made an ...