/vr/ - Retro Games

I never liked Pinball because of the luck factor. And because I suck too. My favorite table is Medieval Madness.

>live in a place with nopinball
>arcade opens for the first time nearby
>quarantine happens days later
Escape from the Lost World has been growing on me more lately. I had the opportunity to pick one up a couple years ago, but the seller was real shady. I like pinball but I don't like getting stabbed 4 hours away from my house

>>6302525
>Escape from the Lost World
Now that's some unique taste, anon. What do you really like about this?

I hate pinball but I like the aesthetics. If I had a huge house and the money to buy random crap I'd dot a few /vr/ and /tv/ related machines around my home.

>>6302642
Aesthetics are the obvious thing that set the game way over the top for me. It's like owning a piece of artwork, though they did a wonderful job of combining the aesthetics with gameplay; that they actually managed to integrate the vacuum-formed mountain plastics as ramps is cool as shit. They make for some unique shots that you won't get on other machines. Otherwise, it's a very simple game. It probably wouldn't last very long in any collection if the owner wasn't big on Bally's scratchy audio, the goofy unlicensed dinosaur theme, and the odd layout, but I dig all three. That it's so simple also means that it's easier to take care of than, say, Blackwater 100, which is probably the better game otherwise.

>>6302370
the more skillful you are at pinball, the less luck factor there is. The best players have it down to where there's barely any random elements left.

>>6302893
I agree with the cool ramps. It kinda reminds me of Congo.

>>6302357
For me it's Tales from the Crypt and Jurassic Park.

>>6302357
The wide body Williams pinball machines were the best, especially those where Steve Ritchie had a hand in designing the thing. My favorite pinball machines were High Speed and Pinbot 2. Many years ago, a friend had Star Trek: The Next Generation. That was a really nice machine even though I don't like ST:TNG. We all sucked at pinball so it was great to be able to remove the glass top and move the ball using our hands to make all the bonus shots. It was the only way we were ever able to see all the effects in the game as there were no pinball wizards in our arcades.

>>6302897
Ever since I was a young boy, I played the silver ball. From Soho down to Brighton, I must have played them all. But I ain't seen nothing like him in any amusement hall. That deaf, dumb, and blind kid sure plays a mean pinball.

Loved pinball back in the 70s. Drifted away toward console games in the early 80s, especially after finding I could play Advent and Star Trek at Uni.

>>6302525
Whereabouts do you live? Sometimes people post that there's no pinball where they live and I look it up and there is some. But I guess you have an arcade now so it's a moot point.

>>6302525
>>6302642
Escape From The Lost World is one of the only pinball machines that feels different from every other pinball machine without resorting to a crazy gimmick. I like novelty. It's almost like a father to The Pinball Circus. RIPython.

How to find pinball and pinball tournaments in your area:
US, Canada, Australia, Japan, Finland, London
https://pinballmap.com/
Worldwide:
https://pinside.com/pinball/map
Europe:
https://findapinball.com/en/

Tournaments:
Depending on where you live, there may be a facebook group for players in your area.
You can also find tournaments near you here:
https://www.ifpapinball.com/calendar/

Pinball Simulators that will give you a free virtual pin or two as a sample:
Pinball Fx 3 (Sorcerer's Lair, Fish Tales)
Zaccaria (Time Machine)
Pinball Arcade (Mary Shelley's Frankenstein)
Stern Pinball Arcade (Also Frankenstein)
There's also Visual Pinball, which is a freeware pinball simulator.

How to become Good at Pinball (wholly optional):
https://www.deadflip.com/tutorials/ (techniques in .gif form)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL-WQLGFMr97DnxeE1Rmi-wAwa-Vm7D-7i

Individual machine tutorials:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ci7gXjSLq9o&list=PL-WQLGFMr97CQpOQDEvRqAiSqcvSuK11h
https://pinballvideos.com/t

>Someone painstakingly recreates Total Nuclear Annihilation
>Ruins it by adding Overwatch shit in the videos
What the fuck, literally nobody asked for this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OA_5fqjv4zQ

>>6302357
Have put many a quarter into the Addams Family machine at a cinemaplex in the town I used to live in. It’s the pinball machine I’m most familiar with.

>>6303767
Best selling pinball machine of all time, natch. Not a very good tournament game though. At least not if the players are good enough to make it last forever.

Fuck, I just realized that my local pinball arcade is probably dead thanks to Corona. RIP

>>6303767
Some guy offered me to buy his cabinet for 200 dollars, I declined because I wanted to buy the Rock Band set. I fucking hate myself.

>>6303120
I own a TFTC, and it's surprisingly sturdy compared to Bally/Williams. Never had to fix anything in a year.

>>6303150
Based wide body anon.

>>6302357
>>6302370
>>6302525
>>6302642
>>6302654
>>6302893
>>6302897
>>6303112
>>6303120
>>6303150
>>6303329
>>6303348
>>6303671
>>6303679
>>6303695
>>6303767
>>6303773
>>6303825
>>6304362
>>6304372
What are some Pinballs?

For me it's Monster Bash. I love stacking modes, table design is flawless and the monster rockband theme is simply awesome. Besides that, Twilight Zone and Star Trek are great tables. Also, anything involving Brian Eddy. Especially Indiana Jones, Attack from Mars and Medieval Madness. And many of the Steve Ritchie tables, with Getaway being the most action packed.

>>6303348
Oh, this takes me back.

>>6302357
I don't like pinball but if there's a swamp thing I'll put a coin in I guess

when i was a gay little kid I made my own cardboard pinball tables a couple of times with cardboard flippers and marbles and lots of tape
i always wanted to design my own real tables one day which is why i was disappointed that every commercial table is boring and shit and bad

they got the bing bing down but where's the fuckin wahoo

Street Fighter II

Pinball is my favorite game to play at an arcade. There's a lot of chance but also some level of skill it feels. I'm not great at it, but there's a thrill to every game I try. Can't say for sure what are "good" tables, but the Tron Legacy table was pretty great when I played it. Would love to get my hands on one.

>>6302370
>I never liked Pinball because of the luck factor.

There is little luck factor on a good machine. On some, I can almost guarantee walking away with eight free games on the machine. Doctor Who was one of my favorites.

Of course there are some absolutely horrid pinball machines out there: The worst was Space Invaders.

>>6304473
My local bar has this one, and I tried to like it but it was disappointing: the modes are rinse & repeat, the bumpers are incredibly dull, but the DMD is really good.
I guess that's just not a layout I enjoy.

There's a spiderman table at my local barcade, but it's refurbished to have the comic theme instead of the movie theme. It's a great table to play. Rewards skillful shots with lots of multiballs and is pretty generous with the ball save.

>>6302357
Love pinball. I don't consider myself a pinball guy, but I do get it might be the highest order of collecting vidya.

A friend, a retrocollector as well, piles up pinballs at his house and he sold me a SMB one. Despite the bad rap it has, I love everything out of it.

So far my favourite ones (a mixture of gameplay, aesthetics and self-experience) would be Theater of Magic, World Cup 1994, Terminator 2 and the Pinball 2000 series.

I'll try all the pinballs I can when I'm on errands. Last time I found one (Road Show) in the entrance of a supermarket.

My number 1 reason why I avoid pinball machines (and arcade machines) is the germs. Really disgusting to think about all the different things that people touched, including things touched by other people with dirty hands, and how rarely people wash their hands properly, etc.

>>6305883
Nice favourites of yours, ToM, WC94 and T2 all are solid games! Not a fan of the pinball 2000 series, though.

I'm having a blast with Judge Dredd, which surprisingly has no bumpers but the playfield is fucking genius to me. If you can find one in a good condition on your errands, try it!

>>6305904
Imagine not wanting to leave atoms of your dick on pinball buttons for people to rub.

>>6305883
The two pinball 2000 games that were never made were Wizard Blocks and Playboy 2000. Both looked cool.
Wizard Blocks has the two laser insert paths that shoot at the flippers, which later showed up in Dialed In.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6GsYoEwdwXM

There was another cancelled Playboy pin from Heighway, which you can see here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xAfVUHro3sQ

And someone made a pinball 2000 version of demoman, which I'll find later.

>>6305972
Found the Demolition Man 2000:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_QHsqqRJmaw

It's a shame the Star Wars Episode 1 pinball wasn't very good. Not even an auto-launcher! Now that's just sad.

I have something to say, so listen up:
Scoops are extremely over-rated. Here's why:
They slow down the ball and can't combo into anything.
The things that a scoop can do (hold the ball while you select a mode or something) can be done by an up post on a ramp or orbit or some such.
If you drain from one (as is possible on almost every scoop) then it feels bad. If it's your pin then you can sometimes get the settings perfect so that never happens, but that's not likely to be done by operators on location.

Keith Elwin agrees with me. He said so. You may notice that Jurassic Park has no scoops, and neither does the pro version of Iron Maiden.

Things that can make scoops less bad, short of removing them entirely:
Adding a ball save (as on Total Nuclear Annihilation).
Having it not cross the flippers (as in the left scoop on Addams Family)

I like scoops that feed upkickers instead of ejecting balls back onto the playfield. Creature from the Black Lagoon's snack bar is one, as is Demolition Man's computer. I think that's probably the best solution there is.
I have yet to tear into a modern Stern game with up-posts, but up-posts on older games like Junk Yard relied on coils that had to continuously be energized to stay up, which could lead to some (admittedly pretty minor) long-term mechanical issues. I imagine this problem could be fixed if they switched to any sort of click-on, click-off mechanism like Earthshaker's right ramp uses. They're also no good for long-term ball locks unless they're designed like Lord of the Rings's right ramp, though this causes a disruption in the flow of the shot that they're designed to block. Scoops, when properly designed, feel really good to shoot, which is a feeling that is lost when a post comes up to block an otherwise normal shot. I would never write scoops off entirely, but I'd still take anything over a scoop that dumps the ball down the middle. Any scoop that needs a ball save to be fair is an utterly failed design.

I recently got to volunteer at Free Play Florida, and I rediscovered the joy of pinball. You can emulate consoles all day, but you can only simulate a pinball experience, it's something that is very tangible. Seeing this table brought me back to the entrance of my local arcade when I was a teen.

I also had a lot of fun on this table.

I think pinball died out because it got up its own ass with every game being exactly the same bullshit in different configurations and zero interesting new ideas with an interchangeable movie licence slapped on as branding.

There's no fundamental reason they shouldn't continue to be popular: the mechanical/electronic/physics thing is a totally unique design space, not primitive or outdated, and the digital era should have multiplied the possibilities but instead it became wayyy less diverse than the earlier inventiveness of mechanical penny arcade machines and transitional electromechanical games. Only a trainwatching sperg can tell the difference between "modern" tables which is fine for the spergs but not really an ideal market situation for things designed to be installed in random bars and convenience stores to attract impulse players.
Nobody *wanted* pinball to die out, because it's conceptually cool. We gave it a grace period of a few decades that was squandered; I'm sure it was operators' fault being attracted by flashy follow-the-leader shit at one point but it's got to have just been apathy for at least twenty years after that. Maybe after all the boomers get fatal pneumonia someone will resurrect it.

>>6306510
Are you some kind of Stern bootlicker?

I fucking love scoops, they feel rewarding to hit.

Kickers like Yagov on F-14 Tomcat or the raptor pit on Jurassic Park are my favorite shots that I never intentionally shoot for.

For me, it's turnaround shots -- intelligent, nihilistic, and with a wicked sense of humor

>>6306805

>>6302357
>What's your favourite machine?
The Addams Family and motherfucking Fish Tales

>>6306812
that's adorable, i love the flippers being the jaws

>>6306753
>>6306510
>>6306632

Scoops are fine if they lead to a subway like the map hole in Pirates, if they aren't hit often like the Depths on the far left in Pirates, or if they aren't hit directly like the scoop in Wonka. And the Gobstopper is fine, of course.
Okay, so I'll amend my comment and say scoops are fine as long as they can't send the ball SDTM. 32, you've convinced me.

>>6306685
Which death of pinball are you talking about? Because the 90s games are widely loved by pinheads. And... pinball has never died since it was invented. They've been made continuously, year after year. There have been ups and downs, but I don't think "death" is accurate.

>>6306805
Agreed. That's a really fun shot to hit. Almost every turnaround is.

>>6306841
>the 90s games are widely loved by pinheads
Like I said, autists are an exception. The whole point of public installs is to appeal to the public, which they don't anymore.

I'm not gonna dignify that "pinball isn't dead" cope.

>>6306852
>>the 90s games are widely loved by pinheads
I'd also like to point out that this is a tautology, you exhibit A sperg

>>6306510
TNA is overrated trash

>>6306685
I feel like pinball could benefit immensely from some fresh faces or some sort of restructuring or, hell, anything. I don't think playfield designers interact with artists as much as they used to back in the day, so playfield layouts are typically optimized for the same old boring gameplay with as many shots as possible instead of having fewer, but more interesting and well thought-out shots. In the past, you'd have people like Python Anghelo collaborating on a lot of games with playfield designers like Barry Oursler and Mark Richie to make those playfields more interesting. You also had people like Dan Langlois who were just crazy fucking good at coming up with unique ideas for layouts, and they were given the resources to realize their visions. For as much respect as I have for people like Pat Lawlor and Steve Richie who are still in the industry today, there's not a lot they're doing to push the envelope of what makes a good pinball game. Still, it might be the higher-ups (particularly at Stern) who are really rushing to get cookie-cutter games out the door and stifling their creativity. I'd love to see companies taking more risks.

>>6306841
Speaking of satisfying shots, fucking Laser Cue. The extra ball target at the top feels fucking amazing to hit. You'd expect there to be a saucer there like on Alien Poker, but the ball just sails around the orbit and smashes into the target.

>>6306852
>>6306858
also I can only post one image per post so please pretend that I posted a sad cat in response to these posts

>>6306865
TNA feels super messy to me. I don't like how the game throws ballsaves at you like candy to compensate for how easy it is to lose the ball making ridiculous shots, and the entire upper half of the playfield feels like wasted space. I appreciate its homebrew origins, at least, and it isn't the same old modern pinball machine we've seen a million times already

Auto launchers feel like a microcosm of the problem imo.
When I was a kid they were rare, and having a good launch felt like an important element of play. Some tables maybe even had areas you couldn't get back to. But thinking about it now I can't remember the last time I happened across one that didn't use a button (or... trigger). I mean I know they're still around but I'm sure it's been nearly 10 years since I've seen one in a pub.

Going back in time the analogue nature of the launch WAS pinball. Before flippers were introduced that was literally the entire game. There used to be a whole class of bar games which modern pinball displaced based around this concept with either balls or coins. There are some sweet Japanese mechanical games where you have to navigate a course of pins and traps this way by fine-tuning your fling. It's fun! Angry Birds ripped off those Flash games for a reason.

Launching with fixed energy by pressing a button might have been high technology once but that was a long-ass time ago and it feels silly to point out that nobody is impressed by the gimmick today.
Yet.
Why remove half the game from your game?

>>6306926
Almost all modern games use plungers. I think the last game to not come with a plunger was Terminator 3 in 2003. Modern games have the option to auto-plunge with the action button on the lock-down bar, but I'm assuming you're not talking about that.
Speaking of which, are you familiar with Ice Cold Beer? That's a flipperless game that's great:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVCbTto_Jfc
And of course, there's Fire Escape:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QoHptBkbz44&t=31s
Not as common as ICB, but I think Fire Escape is better. Someone should reproduce that game.
>>6306858
Not really a tautology. They're loved compared to other pinball machines. That's what I meant.

>>6306926
Because a surprisingly high number of people absolutely don't give a fuck about skillshots. They just want to hit both flippers at the same time.

>mfw my gf "doesn't care" about The Addams Family's skillshot and just wants to launch the ball real hard

For people trapped at home, Stern distributors are renting pinball machines for a few hundred a month.
https://www.thisweekinpinball.com/this-week-in-pinball-march-30th-2020/
https://sternpinball.com/find-a-dealer/

Played the pinball games on Windows. Something about space.

I have Sonic Spinball.

Did Kirby had a pinball game? I dunno i like gimmicky pinball.

What is it about pinball that brings the autists out in full force?

>>6308501
take a wild guess, anon

>>6308470
Kirby had two pinball video games that were released. One small one for Satellaview and one for game boy. I remember hearing about a third being hinted by the developer, but I think it was cancelled before being officially announced. But I could be misremembering.

More info on renting a pinball machine for your house:
http://blog.pinballmap.com/2020/04/02/rent-a-pinball-machine/

>>6310043
Isn't renting pretty cuck-ish, though?

>>6310158
*hits pipe* Ahem. Is renting pinball machines the ultimate cuckoldry?

I cannot think or comprehend of anything more cucked than renting a pinball machine. Honestly, think about it rationally. You are playing, enjoying, and maintaining a machine for at least a few months so it can go back to the distributor and get ravaged by another owner. All the hard work you put into your beautiful little game - waxing the playfield, replacing burnt-out coils, making sure the flippers are aligned, cleaning the lockdown bar, playing with it. All of it has one simple result: its flippers are more enjoyable for the men that will eventually nudge it in every direction.

Raised the perfect machine? Great. Who benefits? If you're lucky, a random man who had nothing to do with the way it grew up, who purchases it. He gets to play its tight playfield every night. He gets the benefits of its kind and sweet gameplay that came from the way you maintained it.

As a man who rents a pinball machine, you are LITERALLY dedicating at least another few months of your life simply to take care of a machine for another man to enjoy. It is the ULTIMATE AND FINAL cuck. Think about it logically.

>>6302357
>What's your favourite machine?

FunHouse

>>6310252
That's a nice version, anon.

>>6310252
heheheh

>>6310308
Pat Lawlor once said that it would have been cool to make a Simpsons game with a Bart head like Rudy's head.

>>6303679
Pinball fx3 is such a shame. I really like their extra graphic feature but they censored so many shit from Williams tables for a 12+ rating

>>6311317
I don't even like the extra graphics feature. Having some stupid 3d model start tap dancing obnoxious animations while I'm trying to play really annoys me. The censorship is the worst though, especially with their "think of the children" mentality. If they aren't doing it for the sole purpose of pandering to the esrb, it has no fucking place and is outright disrespectful to the source material.

Thank god for visual pinball. Looks better, plays better, and it's free. Plus some of those data east games don't have a ghost of a chance of getting a re-license.

>>6311594
At least you can turn off the graphic feature though

>>6311594
Alan Moore protested when DC comics tried to introduce a ratings system to their comic books in the 80s. The evils of a rating system are subtle indeed.

>>6311610
The fact that it exists in the first place annoys me. It's so goddamn unnecessary.
It's like I witnessed someone taking a literal shit on the pinball machines, then the owner came by and cleaned it up.
Sure it's out of sight now, but every time I play, I have the memory of that absolutely stupid shit stinking up my favorite games.

Yea, I'm letting my autism go unchecked at this point.

>>6310252
>tight playfield
my sidessssss

How do you guys feel about the digital pinball games on Sega Saturn

>>6312745
I looked up Last Gladiators on Youtube: the tables look painfully boring, but the music is really nice.

>>6312745
I absolutely fucking love Last Gladiators and Necronomicon. Honestly they're the two biggest reasons I got a Saturn. Pinball Graffiti and True Pinball are worth getting too. Fantastic Pinball is one of my favorites, but I think the PS1 version is a tad bit better, plus way fucking cheaper to buy.

Honestly, the Saturn is a fucking powerhouse of great pinball games, most of which are exclusive to the system.

>>6313264
>Pinball Graffiti
What the fuck did I just watch?
I have absolutely no idea what's going on; all the playfields are late 70's tier boring, but Card Master is somehow incredibly attractive.

>>6313264
It's a shame we haven't gotten a physical Lovecraft game yet. Although having a big Cthulhu action figure might kill the mystique. I guess you could do a hologram like in Creature from the Black Lagoon.

I have no idea about pinball machines, no interest in them, but the fact that some people have fun with those things makes me happy for some reason. God bless you.

>>6313438
Watch some gameplay footage and fall in love!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0cYZElOmFoQ

Favorite backglasses? Backglasses with big monsters on them have consistently been my favorites since they're some of the most eye-catching. Scorpion is special to me because it tickles me how the game is named after the boat and not the enormous hydra coming out of the water; gives off a "business as usual" vibe

>>6314395
Enjoy it, friendo.

Are there any good virtual pingball games? I know it's not the same but with lockdown and all...

Is there any reason why pinball machines use such inflated numbers for scores?

>>6314723
It was a gradual process. The more games that kept coming out, the higher the companies pushed the scores up in order to keep people interested. This peaked in the mid-late 90s and more recent games have backed down from this for the most part.

>>6314439
>Those chase lights along the dragon when locking a ball
Oh baby

>>6314723
It's a choice left to the designer when creating a game. Old EM games originally used the ones digit in their score reels, though at some point they stopped using the ones digit entirely and started making all scores some multiple of 10. I think the original reasoning was that people would see it and think higher score = better. In the alphanumeric and DMD eras, scores might've been inflated a bit more to show off how many more digits pinball manufacturers were able to display using the new technology. I think the issue came to a head when Attack from Mars released, which accentuated its incredibly loud and high-energy presentation with ridiculous scoring. Ever since, it's been a matter of preference. Some designers may prefer inflated scores because they like the way that "million" and "billion" roll off the tongue. Some designers may like more reasonable scores to make getting to a million points feel more like an accomplishment. Jersey Jack in particular has been using almost insultingly deflated scores, though there's still a lot of variance when you compare a game like The Wizard of Oz to Pirates of the Caribbean, which each had different designers.

>>6302357
I've never seen a real table before. My local arcade(s) just had coin-ops, and the pubs usually had one arcade machine, and/or some quiz game shit.

>>6314701
Scroll up.
Pinball FX 3 is the best, IMO. But there's also Pinball Arcade and Zaccaria. They each come with a free table or two. At the moment, Pinball FX 3 is doing a promotion with NINE (9) more free tables, but only until April 8th (three more days):
https://twitter.com/zen_studios/status/1245788550425174017
And there's a freeware pinball simulator called VPX.

>>6314820

>>6302357
God I want this

>>6315656
>Stern

Anon, I... :(

>>6314820
>I've never seen a real table before.
How depressing

>>6302357
>playing pinball on a machine
I know this is a boomer board, but let's face it: most people just played this.

>>6315728
Step up nigga

>>6315656
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NIj3uc_cme0
It used to be not so great but then it got a code update and now it's better.

>>6315954
speaking of scoops that dump the ball straight down the middle, I have no idea how that demon head was greenlit

>>6316232
Stern machines fucking love bullshit that shoots the ball right down the middle. I wasn't even surprised when I first played it.

>Indiana Jones isn't the GOAT pinball table.

>>6316401
It has some fun gimmicks but it's not my favorite. The gun shaped plunger ummmf

>>6302357
I absolutely love pinball. There's actually a pinball convention that happens every summer about 15-minutes from my house that I look forward to all year. Sadly because of COVID-19 it's likely not going to happen however. But unfortunately I don't make the kind of money or have the space to own my own machines. Here are a few of my favorites in no particular order.

White Water
Medieval Madness
Centaur
Theater of Magic
Elvira's Scared Stiff
Bram Stoker's Dracula
Jurassic Park
Star Wars Trilogy
Indiana Jones (90s version)
Attack from Mars

>>6316714
It's a shame Theatre of Magic isn't a good tournament game.
I've never seen a Star Wars Trilogy, nor heard anyone say anything good about it.
Which Jurassic Park do you like? Do you know there's a new one?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mp-KO7-uTkY

>>6317456
Keith Elwin was such a dick with the pro version.

>>6317456
Star Wars Trilogy is not a very good game, I don't think. I will say that the X-wing (a copy of the T2 cannon) is used in kind of a cool way. There's a bank of drop targets with a hole behind it and a loop that can be shot from it. There's also an interesting Special shot on the bottom left, but the playfield is otherwise pretty bare. Really not a lot of effort went into the game overall.

>>6317459
Are you the same anon who was complaining about Keith's disingenuous response to the question of what the dinosaur head would do on the pro model during the preview stream? Stern has made it abundantly clear that they don't give a shit about delivering products they're proud of. Not a whole lot that can be done about that except for just wait for the management to change hands, I don't think. I guess there's also something to be said about letting designers do PR in a hobby where designers and players alike act like entitled manchildren. It's asking for trouble

>>6317538
I'm not the same anon. I only wish Stern would go bankrupt with their cheap shenanigans and sterile playfields.

The only pinball I ever played was Psycho Pinball on the PC

What game are you most excited for:
James Bond, TMNT, or Led Zeppelin?

>>6319108
>TMNT
Wait what? I mean, the Data East pinball was absolute trash...

>>6319108
>Led Zeppelin
Jesus could they pick a more boring band to get their own pin? Can't wait to fall asleep to stairway to heaven multiball.

You guys should try visual pinball X, it is great and free

>>6321621
It's okay, I usually use to test tables I wish to purchase, but the physics are pretty bad.

>>6320071
(These are three licenses that are rumored to be upcoming for Stern).

A new Guns N Roses and Toy Story are rumored for Jersey Jack.

>>6303695
>painstakingly recreates
>nevermind the overwatch shit, NOTHING in the display is based off the real video display
>isn't even playing the reactor music while the reactor is active

I want to thank all the posters in this thread for telling me a little bit about something I originally didn't care about but now find pretty interesting after reading these posts.

>>6315728
>pic is of the inferior windows bundled version
you couldn't be more right

>>6322245
You're welcome, anon.
Next step is finding a pinball close enough from you so you can play.

>>6323237
comfy dying of coronavirus after playing pinball

>>6321983
Vpx has the best physics of any pinsim, are you sure you're not confusing it for vp9?

>>6322224
You have to pay for the soundtrack and dump the files into it. As for the videos, I don't think those have been dumped publicly yet.

>>6323264
I'm not confusing it, just comparing it to real pinball physics.

>>6314820
same, i've never seen one in my life

is steve richie still salty that flash gordon is a better game than black knight?

>>6323376
Wuh? Why would he be? Black Knight got 2 sequels, I would imagine he's very satisfied with that.

>>6325978
None of them are very good games, though. You'd play them a few times each and get bored while Flash Gordon is timeless

>>6326040
Comparing a modern game to a pre-DMD game is a bit like apples to oranges for me, funnily enough. Modern games are just so much more complex. Not saying they're "better", just different.

>>6326108
>Modern games are just so much more complex
TNA would like to have a word with you.
I feel like modern games are too focused on multiball.

>>6326129
>Play a modern game
>"[NAME] Multiball!"
>Lights up every shot on the playfield
>Voice actor says "Jackpot!" in an unenthusiastic voice whenever you shoot a shot
>"Jackpot!" "Haha, Jackpot! Wow!" "Jackpot!" "Jaackpoot!"
>Shooting enough shots lights a super jackpot
>Shooting super jackpot relights all shots
Every time I play a modern game and this happens I throw up a bit in my mouth. Multiball has really lost its value from the days when it was the goal of a machine and jackpots were actually worth something

>>6326147
I agree with you, anon. Also good job on describing the new Black Knight.

>>6302357
My favorite machine would have to be Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends. I love the Hat Trick shot in which Bullwinkle on the back will pull either a bear, a lion, or Rocky wearing bunny ears out of his hat (Rocky gives you an extra ball).

I don't own a machine sadly and the place I go it is closed due to the lockdown.

>>6326108
I really like Police Force. It has a lot of things to do in it.

>>6317456
The 1993 Data East machine

When it comes to taking photos of a pinball cabinet, do you nerds have a particular preferred way, like just the playfield and marquee?

People are making pinball in Dreams:
https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=dreams+ps4+pinball

>>6327595
When somebody asks "what does X machine look like" I prefer to take pictures like >>6326394 posted, showing the full playfield and backglass. They're both equally important in showing off what a game "looks like." When I'm talking about how a game plays, I'll post the playfield or a zoomed-in section of it.

>>6326129
>I feel like modern games are too focused on multiball.

I'd argue they're too focused on modes and monitor flare. I really hate that all current pinball manufacturers are moving away from DMDs, I hate lcd color screens.

>>6328193
It'd hurt a lot less if they actually put effort into their LCD displays, but so far virtually every LCD display that I've seen looks like half-assed garbage. The one exception I'll make is Pirates of the Caribbean, which looks like they actually paid somebody to make it, and it does an excellent job at showing all of the information you need to know at any given point in the game. DMDs have built-in Aesthetic, so they don't need too much fiddling to look good, though some of Gottlieb's older DMDs and Stern's later DMDs managed to look like hot garbage against the odds. It's mainly when you can tell that they just converted 3d models or scenes from a movie to dots, like TRON Legacy or Ghostbusters, instead of making the artwork from scratch to suit the medium as was the case with older games like White Water. Creature from the Black Lagoon was a nice halfway, using photographs of people in tandem with drawn-from-scratch backgrounds.

>>6328231
I agree, the lcd are lacklusters and too much of a flashy yet boring distraction.

>>6328231
I personally think JJP just has LCDs down pat when it comes to being helpful. I've put a ton of time into hobbit and absolutely love how the screen keeps everything necessary for progress on display at all times with the exceptions of during major events like starting Smaug Multiball, killing Smaug, or running one of the wizard modes.

>>6330308
This is the same company that made Dialed In and Willy Wonka, which have some of the least-helpful LCD displays I've gotten to experience. The Hobbit and Wizard of Oz are pretty alright in the information they communicate, but what bugs me about them is how lopsided they look. A bunch of dwarves crammed in one corner, a few coins in another. Ugly.

I installed visual pinball, and then I discovered that I'll have to register on websites to download tables and/or read to learn how to work it.
I decided to install Pinball Arcade instead.

is star wars pinball for the switch any good?

>>6330867
Just use a temporary mail.

>>6330867
>I'm too lazy to use 10 minute mail so I'm going to pay money for vastly inferior versions of pinball

>>6331175
Yes to the first part, but pinball arcade is free right now on steam.
>>6331150
I'll give it a shot sometime. I found a few tables for download from other sites, but they didn't seem to work out of the box. Got a bunch of errors. I'm assuming it's something about missing a ROM, or not having some plugin installed, or trying to run it on integrated vpu instead of the nvidia.

>>6331194
>pinball arcade is free right now on steam.
It's always been "free". You have to buy the tables individually.

>>6331197
Yea, I'm just trying out the one free table. I'm not going to spend money yet on something I'm just exploring.

>>6331804
It was way better before they lost the Williams/Bally license. Everything good is gone apart from a few Stern tables. Everything Gottlieb is trash.

Anyone ITT played Cactus Canyon IRL? I have it on Pinball Arcade and it's awesome, but it's fucking super rare in the wild.

>>6332491
>Everything Gottlieb is trash.

>>6332524
I've played it. Not extensively. It's good. There's Cactus Canyon Continued, which makes it better. Hopefully the Chicago Gaming remake will finish the code.

(for those who don't know, the CC code is in an incomplete state)

>>6332969
He probably just means 90s Gottlieb.

>>6333019
I gotta admit I have a tremendous soft spot for Gladiators.

>>6333019
>He probably just means 90s Gottlieb.
I did

>>6333063
I have a soft spot for Waterworld because I enjoy collecting dirt.

>>6304572
I hate this table so much.

>>6333019
>>6333080

>Cactus Jack
>Both Super Mario pins
>Cue Ball Wizard

I wasn't aware 90s Gottlieb was even a low point, I enjoyed these.

>>6333338
EARLY

>>6331194
All the ROMs need to be downloaded separately, they only host the table files. Internet pinball database has ROM versions by table.

I used to swear off 90's Gottlieb games entirely until I owned a Waterworld. They're generally extremely clunky games, but the mechanics they came up with for a lot of their games (like the dirt >>6333235 mentioned) were pretty ahead of their time. Surf n' Safari is an extremely well-rounded game, and Stargate is pretty complicated for what it is. I think Tee'd Off is my least-favorite because it's the most aggressively cheap and clunky. Cactus Jack's is a pretty irredeemably bad game, but the goofy theme saves it in my eyes.
That said, never own a Gottlieb game. The current owners of the Gottlieb license make it incredibly frustrating to get manuals, schematics, and replacement parts for their games.

>>6302357
i build retro arcades.
my dad want's me to build a pinball machine.
there are no kits.
buying pinball machines is costly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pch2SpgsolU

>>6334087
>buying pinball machines is costly.
You'll always at least break even when you sell a pin.

>>6302357
The Walking Dead is pure and utter cringe. Why would anyone make a PinBall Machine of that?

>>6334524
An ip doesn't have to be good to be a good pinball. Flintstones movie was terrible, but still was a great machine. Fortunately for you, the Walking Dead pin is pretty mediocre at best.

>>6334558
That's good to know.

>>6333774
Can you expand on the situation with replacement parts? I was thinking of buying a Super Mario Bros pin at some point.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lyPG3357htE
I can't wait to be honest

>>6334442
This is not literally true, obviously. But you won't lose too much of your money on the resale.

>>6334558
Most people like it.

>>6334748
>Most people like it.
Most braindead fans will like anything. For example Marvel fanboys will like & defend any MCU movie that comes out. Even something as bad as Captain Marvel.

>>6334748
Unless you buy your pins from scalpers it's 100% true.

K, got Visual Pinball set up with Judge Dredd. Pretty good so far. It's all overwhelming for a newb. Am I expected to be able to see what's going on on the DMD (and all the flashing lights on the table) while I'm super focused on the ball?

>>6335654
Well, most of the info on the DMD is available on the playfield, determined by which inserts are lit.

>>6335654
You get a sixth sense over time for what pinball games in general want you to be shooting at and when you need to look at the DMD. Part of it is just learning each game, though. In Judge Dredd, you're primarily playing multiball (shoot the five JUDGE targets to light ball locks on the left ramp; during multiball, shoot the hole behind the JUDGE targets to light a jackpot and the left ramp to score it) or scoring modes (shoot either the left ramp or the sniper tower in the top right, whichever is lit; you'll get a very short description of what you should be doing on the DMD when the mode begins, and the shots you need to make will be flashing afterwards)

>>6335654
>Judge Dredd
Based and Dreddpilled.

To add to >>6335767, you can also get extra balls by hitting enough crime scenes (usually 7); they appear randomly in a few spots (upper left shot, upper right small loop, upper right big loop, and right ramp. You gotta complete them all before new ones light up.

>2 week bump limit coming up
It's been real, bros

>>6334597
Gottliebs aren't impossible to own, but they're frustrating. You can't share manuals or schematics online, so there's less information available online about repairing Gottliebs. Replacement parts (esp. game-specific ones) will be more scarce, and you can expect to get them from the same few retailers. You might have better luck with Super Mario Bros. in particular though because it's a more popular game in general due to the theme

Thanks for the responses.
As much as I love Judge Dredd, I miss the lengthy progression and variety of tasks in Space Cadet. I may shortly look for another table that has more of those elements.

>>6302357
MADE THIS WALLPAPER

>>6302370
There's not much "luck" involved in pinball at all.

>>6338410
Saved.

>>6338015
Judge Dredd has way more variety of tasks, though.
Did you check out the classic tables such as Twilight Zone, The Addams Family, and Creature from the Black Lagoon?

>>6339089
I will.

What's the standard way to experience new pinball machines that represent cutting edge development?
Do local arcades buy new pinball games as soon as they come out? Or might one have to rent or buy them directly from the manufacturer?

Bump