UK Machine Record
Black Knight
Williams · 1980 · at 2 UK venues.
The original Black Knight introduced Magna-Save to pinball and established Steve Ritchie's reputation for aggressive, fast machines. The game is built around defeating the Black Knight while navigating a relatively unforgiving layout.
The Magna-Save buttons are the defining feature, giving the player an active way to rescue balls that would otherwise drain. That simple addition changed how players interacted with the outlanes.
Finding an original in good condition in the UK is increasingly unusual, but it remains historically important. Magna-Save isn't a bonus feature. It's part of the game plan.
Written by Silverball
Played Black Knight enough to have an opinion? Write it up.
No guide to Black Knight yet
Guides here are compiled against the machine’s published rules, credited to what they were built from, and dated. That makes them slow: the machines standing on the most UK floors get one first — but anyone who plays this machine can write their own.
Strategy tips written by players on PinTips , not by Silverball. Best-voted first.
Always hold right flipper up when plunging or the ball will come screaming down to the lower playfield. Hit drop sets to light MagnaSaves.
- General
Shoot the horseshoe in the middle for bonus X, but ONLY when you have a magnasave lit on the left outlane. Be ready to use it!
- General
Lock ball in upper saucer, lock 2 balls in upper for 3 ball MB. Better to start MB on upper PF, but can be started from lower PF.
- General
On hard settings, shoot horseshoe (between left ramp and center drops) on lower playfield to light lock.
- General
inlanes light center ramp / spinner for good points
- General
At the beginning of MB, try to loop the upper shot back into the lock for 15K per shot if it's 3 ball and 10K per shot if it's 2 ball.
Tips belong to the players who wrote them. Read them all, vote, or add your own on PinTips, a Match Play project.
No tutorials for this machine
We only list videos from a short list of channels we rate, and we never run a search to fill the gap — so most machines have none here rather than a page of whatever YouTube would have returned.
Nobody we follow has reviewed this one
Same short list of channels as the tutorials. A machine with no review here has not been passed over — it simply hasn’t been covered by anyone we list.
Where a machine sits is Pinball Map’s work, not ours, find Black Knight near you on their map. Ratings, tips and tournament results here are ours.