Thanks for the links! I'm a huge retro game freak but don't actually know much about pinball. I love reading the history of the tables, knowing just how popular they were, and learning the different goals and missions for each. Great reads, especially for a pinball newb like me
I currently own all the tables, and here is how I would rank them from my most favorite to least favorite... however I will admit that I have not spent enough time on all of them for these ratings to be final... In particular, I got TZ and then had problems with it due to the Kickstarter fiasco, and then by the time I got it fixed, ST:TNG came out, which is one of my all-time favorite real tables, so that's all I've been playing lately, so TZ still hasn't grown on me yet... anyway... 1. Star Trek: The Next Generation 2. Monster Bash 3. Medieval Madness 4. Theatre of Magic 5. Cirqus Voltaire 6. No Good Gofers 7. Twilight Zone 8. Tales of the Arabian Nights 9. Bride of Pinbot 10. Taxi 11. Ripley's Believe It or Not 12. Elvira: Scared Stiff 13. Harley Davidson 14. Elvira: Party Monsters 15. Creature from the Black Lagoon 16. Funhouse 17. Black Knight 18. Gorgar 19. Black Hole 20. Big Shot Most wanted table: The Addams Family
Just read the article and my unfortunate impression is that the Farsight guys might be enthusiastic and down right genuinely nice people but not exactly crème de la crème when it comes to programming and management skills. I hope they improve in a number of areas but most importantly in QC (quality checking). Some of the bugs and mishaps of the past are almost inexcusable.
Think theyre doing a fine job. Problem is i'm sure 'some' of the hardcore pinball gamers arent happy, but the mass market of casual pinball players 'seem' to really enjoy the app. I love it, all my friends who have this enjoy it. I havent come across any huge issues or criticise if the ball is moving 0.00001 slower than the arcade machine etc.
It´s not about the 0.00001 slower moving ball, it´s about the fun and the challenge of the real thing. On one side the guys from farsight promise a simulation of the real thing, but on the other side they purposely set the difficulty on a strange "family mode", they desinged themselves. I wouldnt mind about the difficulty in any other pinball game.But this company bought the right´s of all this classic tables, so I will never get other versions with the real difficulty.For the casual gamers this might be no problem, very fun for them, to get jackpots and multiballs on the first game. Real pinball is about learning, getting better step by step.
But there are also many casual pinball gamers, i wasnt even into pinball before this app, do like having the odd go here and there and then go back to one of my other 200 apps i've got installed. I'm sure things could be perhaps improved (i havent noticed major issues), after reading that interview to get some things changed sounds a complete nightmare To be fair i would probably join you and agree with you if i had major issues but so far i'm just loving the app and enjoying having a game here and there.
I'm still waiting on tips from all of you who are saying that "its too easy". I want to be playing 30+ min games on all tables too, just like some of you claim. Is tilt the magic ingredient? Do you pause the game and calculate pinball trajectories before each hit? Seriously, if the original tables are that much harder than these, then I'm glad I didn't waste my quarters on them as a child. Also, I've heard that some versions are easier than others. Is everyone here playing on ipad?
Yes I´m, playing on Ipad. Iphone screen is to small to see every detail.No tricks like pause. On a real pinball you could play about 5 Minutes as a beginner.Increasing after some practice to 20 minutes.Not to bad for a quarter. You could earn free games too by score,special or matching the last two numbers by luck.
Well, the only times I have games over 30 minutes are on TZ. I've had a game go for over 45 minutes once and reached LITZ twice. For me, TZ is one of the easiest tables to master on Pinball Arcade. I play on my iPod touch.
Well, the android beta wih the new tables and portrait mode is out so it shouldn't be too long before the iOS update.
Good news, someone posted at the PA forum asking when the iOS update will be out. Jeff Strong, a moderator, posted this If they follow their usual pattern, we should see it tommorrow.
They both play great! The new portrait menu works well too. The flipper physics on AFM seem to be improved. They're not as bouncy.
I'm playing on iPad. Had it on an iPhone too but lost the phone. Seriously, have you ever considered the possibility that you are just not very good at pinball? Heck, I'm not good at pinball at all but today on my way to work I played Twilight Zone for more than 40 minutes. Couldn't finish the game before my commute to the city was done with (a score of only about 900 million.. yeah I missed a lot of lucrative shots). Rule nr 1 in pinball, any pinball: Learn ball control. 2nd rule: Never shoot the ball willy-nilly-randomly. Always have a target and make sure you hit it. Missed shots, especially when trying for any ramps, usually lead to drains on the sides (well very rarely in PA but in real life). That's how the tables are designed. Learning basic ball control, how to get hold of the ball is not that hard to master and once you do the games get much easier and more fun. For instance in twilight zone, whenever the ball goes into the slot machine thing (or at the start of a ball if you don't go for skillshot), do NOT flip the right flipper when the ball comes back down from the ejector/hole. Simply let the ball bounce from the right flipper to the left one and take control of the ball. There are numerous these kinds of situations. Be patient and just watch the ball movement. Due to the non-random behavior in pinball arcade you can learn patterns where the ball will always do the exact same identical thing (in real life all ejectors, bumpers etc all have some random flex and weirdness making it much harder to predict the outcome of a certain situation, even if you've witnessed it thousands of times before). One of the most important ball control techniques are the various flipper passes. The easiest of them being the slingshot-corner-pass. When you have the ball in control on one flipper and want it over to the other, simply drop the ball a fraction of a second and then flip it back so that it hits the low corner of the slingshot triangle. This will bounce the ball down on the flipper and make it fly to the other side. Another important technique is to catch a moving ball so that when it comes towards the flipper you flip up just in the right moment to kill the energy from the ball. This way the ball stops dead in the held up flipper. It's a bit tricky but can be done quite easily after a bit of practice. This technique is actually easier in real life than in pinball arcade because the latency of the ipad/iphone makes it a bit tricky to have proper timing. There are also some physics oddities in play here.. perhaps the simulated rubber on the flippers is a bit too hard and doesn't absorb energy the way it does in real life.. or then the weight of the ball isn't calculated properly or something. Many possibilities. When I first started playing pinball back in the late 80's I was as frustrated as you sound.. randomly trying to shoot the ball all over the place without any strategy nor goal in mind. After wasting a lot of quarters you either give up or decide that it's smarter to learn some technique. Back then there was no internet to look up pinball advice but you could simply watch other players and try to find a pro. Then just be nice and ask them for advice.
WE MUST BUILD AN ATOMIC BLASTER! Attack from Mars is one of my favorites. Really like the icon. Genie I'm not familiar with, but some late 70s action is appreciated and it seems challenging.
