I’ve tried the “Game Mode” settings on my TVs (Samsung Plasmas - sadly going the way of the dodo) and there’s not much improvement. It’s weird, because the lag on the Williams PS3 release on disc back in the day had no discernible lag, even without a Game Mode setting. (Had other issues with that release, like Bluetooth handshaking between the system and controller sending a false flipper button press to the game.)
From what I can gather, adding to the impression that the ball simply stops when you hit things in Zen Pinball is the fact that there is no sound effect for the impact. All sound effects are what the rules would generate besides the flipper and a rather quiet plunger sound (if the game uses a normal plunger, which is increasingly rare as they’re substituted for a minature thing that functions like a plunger, like the trebuchet in Thor or the axe in The Walking Dead).
Zen Pinball’s tables seem to all have been made by the same team, at least as far as rules go. For pretty much all of them, you have to finish spelling things to start modes, and until recently, once you were in a mode (whether it’s a required mode, a multiball, a hurry-up, or what have you), you were locked in it, unable to progress in anything else, until you failed or cleared the mission, or the ball drained. As a result, you spend a large amout of the time not really doing anything but progressing towards a mode, then when you reach it, you have to stay totally focused on that mode until it ends, then you spend a large amount of time building up to another mode. I think it says something that their best tables, in my opinion, are the large exceptions to these, like Sorcerer’s Lair and Super League Football.
I don’t know why they’re so obsessed with spelling things.
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Well, it’s understandable. Complete this word and get something related to the word. Been done for years in real pinball and will continue to be done.
Problem is, their words are usually way too long, or too hard to actually spell, or whatever. Zen games are so much wood chopping I don’t understand how they have any success at all because it’s just totally not fun.
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The problem I have is that there are too many of them. They could afford to be more creative and more varied.
Fantastic Four is, I feel, the worst offender I’ve played. These are the words and phrases I can remember that you’re encouraged to spell:
F-A-N-T-A-S-T-I-C (allows you to lock balls for Fantastic Four-Ball Multiball)
F-O-U-R (increases the bonus multiplier)
I-N-V-I-S-I-B-L-E (activates Invisible Flip)
T-H-I-N-G (lights Thing Multiball)
T-O-R-C-H (allows you to lock balls for Sign Multiball)
B-A-X-T-E-R (activates Skrull Invasion)
F-O-R-C-E (activates left kickback)
F-I-E-L-D (activates right kickback)
I heard that some of the Star Wars tables are even worse though. No, wait, the South Park one is worse. (The Butters one is way better about it though.) I haven’t played it enough to know the rules, but it was mentioned on TV Tropes:
South Park: Super Sweet Pinball contains C-H-E-F (begins the Chef mode), M-A-N-B-E-A-R-P-I-G (lights the center orbit to begin the Treasure mode), S-C-H-O-O-L-B-U-S (lights the lock for Road Trip Multiball), C-A-R-T-M-A-N (begins the Probe mode), S-A-R-C-A-S-T-A-B-A-L-L (lights the Field Goal Jackpot), L-A-D-D-E-R (collects the Ladder Jackpot), K-E-N-N-Y (begins the Kenny mode), R-A-N-D-Y (begins the Bat-Dad mode), J-I-M-M-Y (lights a Kickback), S-T-A-N (begins a hurry-up), K-Y-L-E (lights the lock for Mr. Hankey Multiball), and S-O-U-T-H-P-A-R-K (lights the Wizard Mode).
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