Video games first achieved massive popularity in arcades, bars, and boardwalks that were once the domain of pinball. Ever since Pong began to replace pinball machines in the nefarious teen hangouts of the word, there's been something of an arms race between video games and pinball. Computers and video screens were added to pinball machines to compete, while video games left the arcade for homes, and never looked back. Despite video games' ultimate dominance, the state of pinball in 2015 is surprisingly strong. Although the arcade arms race has been settled since the late 80s, it resulted in some pretty amazing pinball machines, like Stern's The Walking Dead.

Based on the AMC show, The Walking Dead pinball is all about killing zombies. You accomplish this primarily by bashing various interactive toys on the playfield. The theme is a good fit for the inherent violence of pinball. We opted for the Limited Edition (LE) for the IGN office-cade, which features unique art and a bunch of cool additions to the playfield -- like a functional "crossbow" shot which fires a pinball onto the playfield.

The Walking Dead Pinball 9 IMAGES

Here's an image slideshow of some of the best features. It's not as cool as the video, though.

Stern is one of just a handful of companies still producing pinball machines in 2015 (and just a few years ago, they were the only company) and their latest machine is the culmination of years of technological advances in video games, computers, and pinball design. In the video above we show not only how a brand new pinball machine is shipped and assembled (don't worry: we used time-lapsed footage), but we also reveal some of the unique features The Walking Dead LE pinball machine offers.

Samuel Claiborn is IGN's Managing Editor and a professional video game cheater. TCELES B HSUP to follow him @Samuel_IGN on Twitter and at Samuel-IGN on IGN.