For those about to rock — Stern’s 2012 AC/DC in its Pro Vault Edition brings the thunder of the world’s loudest rock band to the playfield, designed by the legendary Steve Ritchie, the man behind so many of pinball’s fastest, most iconic layouts. Even in this streamlined Pro configuration, the machine’s star is unmistakable: a swinging bell, hung front and center, ringing out over a rotating ball cannon and a field of fifteen standup targets. It’s a loud, aggressive, song-driven Stern built to make you play air guitar between balls.

The strategy is all about the bell, the cannon, and the songs. Every multiball is started by driving the right ramp, and the different multiballs come from working the loops for Tour, the ramps for Jam, and the target banks for Album — so a player who learns which shots feed which multiball can steer the whole game. The bell is a scoring engine unto itself: hitting it repeatedly lights two-times and three-times scoring for a stretch, and continuing to ring it extends those windows. When firing the cannon, the safest bet is the left loop if you’re opting out of the song jackpots, and using the cannon on the bell rather than the AC/DC targets is usually the smarter play unless the points are truly big. On default settings, racking up combos or completing all three target banks twice lights the extra ball.

AC/DC is a genuine crowd-pleaser, a machine that turns a legendary catalog into a thunderous pinball concert. Ring that bell, pick your song, and rock the house. It’s high-voltage fun from one of the greats.