Eight ball is a pool game played with the cue ball and 15 object balls. It is the most common game played socially, even if you don't know it by its name, it's likely what you think of when you think of playing pool. Each player must pocket 7 balls, then pocket the black number eight ball to win the game.

The game begins with the object balls racked in a triangle with the black number eight ball in the center, placed on the table so that the foremost ball is on the foot spot. Players may lag for the right to break.

After the break, no matter how many balls may have been pocketed, the choice of groups (solid or stripe) is not yet determined. This choice is made with the next shot. A player may continue to shoot as long as the shots result in pocketed object balls. After a player has pocketed all of his/her group of object balls, he/she shoots to pocket the eight ball. The decision as to whether or not the game is to employ called shots may be left to the players, however a shot on the eight ball itself is generally a called shot.

Certain fouls result in the loss of the game, the important ones are:

  • Jumping the eight ball off the table.
  • Pocketing the eight ball in a pocket other than the one called.
  • Pocketing the eight ball prior to having pocketed the other object balls.

Want more information? Please see billiards.

Eight ball is a cue sport where the object of the game is to pocket all of your balls (1-7 Solids or 9-15 Stripes)in the pockets predicted, then legally pocket the 8 (Black) ball.

The official rules are copyrighted, so can't be reproduced here, but they basically boil down to this:

  • When racked, the 8 ball (Black) must be in the center, and a solid in one rear corner and the stripe in the opposite corner. (Which corner doesn't matter.)
  • For a legal break, the breaker must break from behind the head string and either sink an object ball or propel at least four object balls into a rail. If a break isn't legal the balls can either be played or re-racked.
  • The table is always open after break, regardless of balls pocketed.
  • If the breaker scratches on break it is a foul, and the table is open and played as is. The next shot must be taken from behind the headstring.
  • A shot is legal when the called object ball is pocketed in the called pocket, or if a miss, a cueball or numbered ball must touch a rail.
  • A shot is a foul when one of the following happens: the shooter fails to contact his object ball first; the cueball leaves the table; the cueball is pocketed; when no balls have been pocketed; or at least one ball doesn't strike a rail.
  • When a foul is committed the shooter has ball in hand anywhere on the table, except for the first shot after the break in which case it has to be in the kitchen.
  • Loss of game occurs when the 8 ball is dropped in a pocket other than the one designated; the 8 ball is sunk early; or a foul occurs when trying to pocket the 8 ball.

Eight Ball

By Bally

Model No: 1118-E
Released: January 17, 1977

Designed By: George Christian
Art By: Paul Farris

Eight Ball was one of Bally's early solid state pinball machines. As such, it used electromechanical devices for sounds, bells and chimes, instead of the electronic sounds that would soon become commonplace.

At the time of its production, it set records for flipper pinball machines - 20,230 units of this machine were built. It was not until The Addams Family (also by Bally) that another machine would have a bigger production run - and that was the only machine to top Eight Ball.

The popularity of this billiard-themed machine helped spawn a sequel, Eight Ball Deluxe.

There were some legal problems upon release of the machine, as there was a character on the backglass artwork who was extremely similar to Fonzie from Happy Days. The settlement involved is unknown.

The Playfield:

The plunger lane launches the ball to the top of the machine, where two gates guarantee the ball will head through one of the four rollover lanes, down into the three pop bumpers right below it. A lane at the top left of the playfield will send the ball into the top, with a spinner at the lane's entrance. On the right top is a turnaround horseshoe lane, which directs the ball into the pop bumpers.

On the left and right sides, just below the entrance to the lane is a target. The bottom right has the traditional triangular kicker, along with an outlane and an inlane. The bottom left has no inlane, only an outlane with a kicker to return the ball.

In the center is artwork of a rack of billiard balls in order with one at the front and fifteen at the end. Each ball has a light for the number, and the light will activate when the ball is lit.

Rules:

Hitting the target for balls 1-7 will light the ball. Balls 1-4 are in the top rollover lanes, ball 5 is the target below the left lane, ball 6 is the target below the right horseshoe, and ball 7 is the right inlane. Upon lighting balls 1-7, in any order, the eight ball is lit, and the player must hit the target to the upper right, between the bumpers and the horseshoe. Then the player must light balls 9-15 (the same targets as before, in the same order). The eight ball will then light again, and hitting it will light special.

The right horseshoe, shown on the playfield as the "bank shot", will award, in sequence, 100 points, 300 points, 1000 points, Kick Back, Spot Ball and Double Bonus. The bank shot cannot light the eight ball.

Sources:
Pinball Machine: Eight Ball, http://www.xmission.com/~daina/machines/eight_ball.html
The Internet Pinball Database, http://www.lysator.liu.se/pinball/IPD/

Note: I am in active correspondance with Warner Chappell Music (the rights holders) over permission to use these lyrics. Please spare them from the Copyright Axe Squad for now. Thank you.

Update: Warner Chappell has not given me explicit permission in a replicable form. However, they did look at the site while I was asking them and did not request a removal. I just think they have no mechanism for actually granting this type of permission.


Eight Ball

by Underworld / on The Beach soundtrack

~ an experiment in poetic form ~

more explanations follow

today
today
i saw a man

today
i saw a man

using an empty

whisky flask

as a walkie talkie

today
today

i saw a man
today

with a flaming eight ball

tattooed on his arm

today
today
today

i saw a man

today
i saw a man

using an empty
whiskey flask as a walkie talkie

today
i met a man
who threw his arms around me
and I've given
and I've given

today
today
today

today
today
today

we laughed
we laughed

waiting for a train

for a few

into the city

seconds

today

that white stuff
that white stuff

waiting for the train

that stuff

into the city

that's what makes me feel

today

feel
feel

today

feel

happy

.

.

.

You made it this far. I'm flattered. In any case, if you didn't know, the actual text above is the lyrics to the Underworld song Eight Ball. It can be heard on the soundtrack to The Beach (and, as far as I can tell, is the only redeeming thing about the entire film). Figures that it plays during the credit roll. In any case, while I wanted these lyrics up here, I firmly believe in avoiding unadulturated lyrics nodes, and have d/v-ed and killed a few in my time. So, while hardlinking almost half-heartedly, I realized that it just might be possible to embed something vaguely poetic inside the lyrics, using the...well, you can figure that part out for yourself.

A personal recommendation: Underworld produces some of the most amazing working/coding music on the planet. It's trance, but somehow it gives you energy instead of sapping it. It's techno, but somehow you can sit still and meditate while listening to it. It's electronica, but is organic enough to tweak all manner of reflexes in your instinctive DNA. It's dance music, but best danced to alone in a crowded space with visions of synesthesia dancing in your brain.

I wish, wish WISH I could experience synesthesia while at an Underworld concert. Just my unaltered senses alone are overloaded enough to knock me on my portly ass.

Also slang terminology for 3.5 grams of a powder-based drug. Cocaine and Meth are likely choices. The "clever" naming convention comes from the fact that 3.5 grams is one-eigth of an ounce.

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