In a competition setting or on a difficult machine, it's best to pick one multiball and try to milk it. Your options are Crate Multiball, which both starts and collects 250,000 point jackpots by bashing the Crate repeatedly, or Coffin Multiball, where left ramp lights lock at left orbit, and after 3 locks, a 500,000 point jackpot alternates between the ramps. If the left orbit and extra ball lane are easy for you, you can also focus on just collecting as many Dead Heads as possible from the top lanes instead.
For game progress, complete the 6 Tales on the table to advance to Scared Stiff wizard mode, and be familiar with the right ramp, the spider hole, and the spider wheel so that you can collect all 16 spider awards and start Spider Mania.
The skill shot is a precise-power plunge just less than full power to the TV hole just below and to the left of the Crate. This skill shot scores 250,000 the first time and an additional 250,000 each subsequent time, with no maximum that I am aware of. Missing the skill shot can be a little dangerous as it gives the ball some unpredictable side to side movement at the top of the playfield, but it's usually not too bad.
What most people do on a Scared Stiff plunge, though, is soft plunge so that the ball enters the Spider hole from the back, giving a free award from the Spider wheel. The reward is better a lot of the time, and if you miss this one- especially if you plunge too short- the ball will usually end up in the flipper area without hitting any switch in the game, at which point you can drain the ball for free and try the plunge again since the playfield was not validated.
A setting exists on Scared Stiff that makes it so balls will be autoplunged out of the shooter lane after a lock is made. If this is the case, you must be quick and shoot the ball before the game does on its own to collect a skill shot.
There are 6 Tales to complete around the playfield to light Scared Stiff wizard mode. Some of them will be completed accidentally, while others take a bit more work, especially if you play through the tales more than once.
Once you complete all 6 Tales, Scared Stiff is lit. (If your last Tale was one of the multiballs, Scared Stiff will not be lit until single ball play resumes.) When Scared Stiff is lit, there's nothing to do other than shoot the Crate, because everything is unlit aside from the Spell targets explained later. Shoot the crate to start Scared Stiff. This is a 30 second timed mode where your goal is to collect 10 jackpots. Odd numbered jackpots can be collected on either ramp. Even numbered jackpots must be collected at the Crate. Your jackpot progress can be tracked by the meter set into the playfield. The first jackpot scores 250,000 points. Each subsequent jackpot scores 50,000 more than the previous, up to 650,000 for jackpot #9. The 10th jackpot, Scared Stiff, causes the machine to freak out; you score 5,000,000 points, extra ball is lit, and Monster Multiball begins, which is a 4-ball multiball where both ramps and the crate are always lit for 1,000,000 point jackpots until one ball is left in play.
If time runs out or the ball drains during Scared Stiff, all 6 Tales will unlight, and you must play them all again for another chance; however, your progress and the number of jackpots you collected will carry over to the second time around.
The right ramp scores 25,000 points. Consecutive shots to the right ramp score 100,000, then 150,000, etc., up to a maximum of 450,000 points. At 3 right ramps, your base bonus is held to the next ball. At 8 and 30 right ramps, extra ball is lit.
Shoot the Spider hole just to the right of the right ramp when it is lit to spin the Spider wheel on the backglass. If the Spider hole is not lit, shoot the right ramp to light it: the right ramp will then also score a Web Bonus equal to 50,000 points times the number of Spider wheel awards colelcted so far.
When you shoot the Spider hole to spin the wheel, the spider on the backglass will rotate. Use the flippers to stop him spinning. Whatever the red part of him is pointing to is the award you get. There are 16 awards in all. If you stop on an award that's lit (because it has already been collected), you get nothing and the spin was wasted. The awards are:
Collecting all 16 awards completes the Spider Web, and starts Spider Mania. During Spider Mania, everything on the wheel is recollected:
Everything is lit! Boogie Man, Beat the Crate, Leaper Mania, and Double Trouble all still last for just 20 seconds, but all of the other scoring rules last until single ball play resumes. Not much else to say here other than have fun and rack up those jackpots. As far as this game's two wizard modes go, Spider Mania is much more difficult than Scared Stiff, so congratulations if you get this far.
A weak left orbit shot that doesn't quite make it to the Dead Head lanes can fall into a hidden fourth lane that spots an entire Tale for you! During Scared Stiff, this secret lane also spots one jackpot, but there's not really any reason to try to do that on purpose.
Scared Stiff has a conventional in/out lane setup. There is a kickback in the left out lane that can be lit by completing the Cast a Spell standup targets in the lower left of the table two times. Completing those targets when the kickback is already lit scores 100,000 points. On the right is a Telepathetic Power target that toggles whether or not the right out lane is lit. If it is, draining through the right out lane scores a Telepathetic mystery award, though I believe in this case the only things it can give are points and bonus multipliers.
Base bonus appears to just be a count of switch hits: I am not sure exactly how it is calculated. Only the base bonus is affected by bonus multiplier, which is advanced by Telepathetic awards or by completing the top Dead Head lanes when the Return of the Dead Heads tale is already lit. Getting to 8X bonus multiplier lights an extra ball; I believe 12X is the maximum. After base bonus, you get other points added to your bonus for:
There is no mid-ball bonus collect. 3 right ramps over the course of the game gives you a one-time hold bonus, but this just holds the base bonus for one ball. There is no way to carry bonus multiplier between balls.
The game manual does not list a point value that can be assigned to specials or extra balls. (For once, the 1,000,000 for a special listed in so many other Williams manuals might be correct, it makes some sense this time! But I can't say for sure.)
The timers on Scared Stiff (15-60 sec., default 30), Boogie Man Boogie (15-40 sec., default 20), Double Trouble (15-45 sec., default 20), Leaper Mania (20-40 sec., default 20), and Beat the Crate (15-40 sec., default 20) can all be adjusted.
The Spider wheel can be disabled, which would mean the Spider hole gives awards randomly (and would presumably never repeat). Disabling the Wheel itself would make this game play a lot more like The Addams Family, and ostensibly make it easier to reach Spider Mania. Other mechanics in the game can be disabled as well, but none have as interesting rules compensations as the Spider wheel.
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