I really like the weak, no hold, stuttering flippers when you know they are coming. For me it’s like going to a pizza shop with a spider-man that hasnt been serviced for 5 years. Flippers are super messed up BUT as a result the replay is low. Makes you change your strategy and play better…feed me Ritchie!!!
Also I’m stoked for DI and as a side note I played my woz for the first time last night after about 2 weeks of lotr and was reminded how happy I am to be alive and playing pinball now and fortunate to have the games, culture, and people of Pinball we have today. LOTR ( esp the code ) is amazing but it’s amazing to see where pinball went over the course of 10 years.
Lots of new challenges but so so many positives!!! See ya this afternoon @KevInBuffalo!!! I’ll be out on my anniversary weekend… But darn if I don’t have to step out for extended periods of time …ha… Just kidding…or am I?
Thanks to @FunWithBonus@KevInBuffalo and @Nick_BuffaloPinball and everyone at JJP who made the stream possible. It was great to see good coverage of the game. I was disappointed by the general quality of coverage from expo (all companies, not just JJP). This should have been the reveal, it would have gone over better. We have such a strong streaming community, it has to be worth flying some of them in to cover your events.
Is there a summary of the announcements available? I picked up:
Obviously, standard edition announced. $8000, not numbered, stainless steel armor, tempered glass, printed theater decals, yes on the shaker, no on the lit ramp.
I believe I heard there’s a naming adjustment coming? I wouldn’t really expect the full name to change since it’s baked into the art of the game and playfield. Perhaps a subtitle?
Was there anything else really big? Regardless the game looks fantastic. Stoked that several local operators already have LEs ordered.
I got to watch the stream finally tonight. I’m very impressed now that I got to see gameplay. Definitely seems like a game that could be a hit. I’ve never seen magnets act like that before. They seem to add a lot of variety to the gameplay without feeling cheated by them instadraining on you.
Some of the sounds seem repetitive in the video, but I tend to not notice things like that while playing.
I like the way multiball works with allowing the player to start a two ball or three ball multiball. I also LOVE the attacking of the flippers the game does in multiball.
Can’t wait to play one. Still not a theme I like, but it could totally be a game I learn to like a lot from the gameplay alone.
“There’s nothing worse than playing against a guy who’s sitting there trapping two balls on a flipper and then playing with the other ball for the next ten minutes. I find that a complete perversion of what pinball is really all about. It’s okay to catch the balls, it’s okay to set up a shot – it’s okay to do that. But don’t stand there and shut down the rest of the game by doing that.”
Begs the question as to whether tournament players are a problem? Are we a big enough group that should be influencing design decisions, especially decisions blatantly ‘against’ our style of play.
It’s no doubt a strategic way for Pat to address our issue and weaved into the story line in a way that makes sense.
Should designers be focusing on things like this more often going forward?
I love Josh putting out a nice soft ground ball for me to pick up and throw in.
I don’t think there is a valid “should designers be focused on X?” question. Designers should focus on what they think is important and makes a fun game. They all have their own peeves and biases around game play and design and rules. If the game makes money it is a success. Objectively this is really the only criteria by which games should be judged.
Of course that doesn’t mean we have to or will like every game that comes out, or like every decision that designers make. I will say that in terms of ways to reduce the impact of traditional tournament-style play, this is a pretty clever way to go about it. The game remains strategic, there are rules to follow and things to do as well as things to avoid, you can still trap up just not forever, and there’s actual benefit in terms of score (well, hopefully) to breaking your trap and hitting these shots. There’s actual skill involved in making this work from what I can see. This is a vast leap forward from “I design games that good players will get bored with in two weeks” which is what he always used to say.
I’m still pretty stoked to actually play this sometime.
I’m all for pins with fewer spammable shots. A good game should have you playing all over the place, whether you’re dropping quarters between beers or on the stage with the all-stars. The less a game is a repetitive parlor trick, the better.
I am really confued here. Not any of Pat’s games that I can think of feature lucrative single shots in multiball that feed back to same flipper. Earthshaker sure, but in single ball play. Contrary, a lot of his games are exelent for tourney usage.
Maybe, what he really means is more generally targeted at expert play that only utilise a subset of the game rules or shots in a repeated manner. I have not read the interview yet.
The cure is simple. Be careful when awarding shots returning to same flipper. And put limits on progressive scoring. And progression on the number of shots to light/start X again and again.
I had a massive streak of left orbit/side ramp action on a STTNG in a tournament a few months back. That felt definetly pinball to me.
) is amazing but it’s amazing to see where pinball went over the course of 10 years.