On April 10, 2012, from the makers of the uber-fantastic Williams Collection Pinball game released The Pinball Arcade:
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The first four tables will be Tales of the Arabian Nights™, Ripley's Believe It or Not™, Theatre of Magic™, and Black Hole™.
Each month we will be updating the game by releasing two tables as DLC and adding new features that will include online tournaments and head-to-head play.
With many of the all-time greatest tables from Williams®, Bally™, Stern Pinball™, and Gottlieb™; The Pinball Arcade™ is set to become the most realistic and comprehensive pinball game ever created!!!
They plan to offer two DLC tables a month for "years", and that includes licensed games like The Twilight Zone and Terminator 2: Judgement Day.
Cross-Purchase is supported so one DLC bought works on the PS3 and Vita at no extra charge.
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**** 2013 UPDATE ****
The Pinball arcade is coming to the PlayStation 4 with a brand new engine filled with lighting enhancements and a smoother physics engine. As a bonus for PS3/Vita owners, PS4 content will be offered at a Cross-Discount:
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PlayStation 4: Our fans got an early look at the PlayStation4 version of the Pinball Arcade at the E3 show in Los Angeles last week. We were part of the Sony booth, and the game was amazingly well-received by pinball aficionados and novices alike. Our new PS4 lighting technology allows us to model individual lights for each of the 100+ lamps on the typical pinball table (complete with attenuation, blooms, and reflections). The result so far is a level of graphical realism never before seen in a video pinball game and it's going to get even better as we continue to improve the technology! Check out the video below for a sneak peek. In more good news, Sony has announced a Cross Discount feature for the PS4. This will allow us to offer customers who have previously purchased Pinball Arcade content on other Sony platforms a discount when they buy that content on PS4.
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Originally Posted by DaverJ /forum/post/21907166
For the Black Hole, I also noticed what you reported - but I thought I read in the rules that the targets have to be hit in a certain order, indicated by lights. I assumed that the ones that didn't register weren't the next one in the series to be eliminated. Was this a wrong assumption?
You have to hit them in order if you want the special multipliers but otherwise you can knock them down in any order. They always seem to register properly when hit by the ball bouncing off of the bumpers, it is just when the ball is sent via the flippers that they do not seem to trigger (from my experience).
I spent some time on the Vita version this weekend. I only played Arabian Nights. There is little to zero lag in the flippers. If I could have the response of the Vita version along with the big screen my TV has, I'd be a happy camper. I'm 46 and even with helper glasses I have a hard time seeing what I'm doing on the Vita. For example, getting the super bonus shot after charming the snake is really difficult as I can't as accurately see what I am doing compared to my PS3/TV setup.
I'm at almost 12 million on the PS3 version, I just can't get past the lag! Is 19 mil enough to get on the leaderboard? Maybe I should try some more!
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Originally Posted by TornadoTJ /forum/post/21941213
I spent some time on the Vita version this weekend. I only played Arabian Nights. There is little to zero lag in the flippers. If I could have the response of the Vita version along with the big screen my TV has, I'd be a happy camper. I'm 46 and even with helper glasses I have a hard time seeing what I'm doing on the Vita. For example, getting the super bonus shot after charming the snake is really difficult as I can't as accurately see what I am doing compared to my PS3/TV setup.
I'm at almost 12 million on the PS3 version, I just can't get past the lag! Is 19 mil enough to get on the leaderboard? Maybe I should try some more!
Speaking of leaderboard, have you noticed how many people listed have "(Vita)" next to the name? I don't know if it's because this game has been more popular with Vita owners or because it's easier to do well because of the lack of lag.
At any rate, I wish they would offer a way to filter for PS3 and Vita scores in the leaderboards, as it seems it could make a difference regardless in how the game plays. (I don't have a Vita so I can't speak from experience). I did however manage a score of 52+ million on "Tales" the other day, which blows away my top score on that table in "Hall of Fame Pinball" (which I believe is in the 30 million range). But of course I still can't get the Harem Multiball table goal.
I haven't even looked at the leaderboard. I should have because I got that near 12 mil on the day after release day (I think that's right, I would have to go back through this thread).
On one hand the Vita version is better because there's no lag. But, it's a helluva lot harder to see!
I did find out the lag on my new TV is 18ms. It's not the cause of the PS3 version lag.
My top score in Pinball Arcade Arabian Nights is 33 million. In the Williams Arcade version it is around 60 million.
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OK, I've finished my testing. There is no inherent lag in the PS3 game. At least, not any moreso than was in their Williams Arcade release that received universal praise.
In fact, looking at places like NeoGAF where you'd expect an avalanche of complaints, most who have commented said they don't sense any lag. There is one guy there writing non-stop that the PS3 and Vita version is full of lag (but also says sometimes it is barely detectable
), but it isn't some epidemic of complaints by any means.
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Here's what I tested...
For one, remember when I said above I didn't notice lag in Black Hole but noticed delay in Arabian Knights after two nights of owning the game? I figured out why. When I played the AN table on the second night for the first time, it was right after watching a Bluray movie and my set was still on 'Cinema' mode which adds lag. I've played in 'Game' mode since then as well as on my lag-free monitor - there is no added lag from the game.
I went back and played the Arabian Knights table on the Williams Arcade release for two straight hours. I noticed the table is on less of an incline than Pinball Arcade because the ball moves slower, and the lighting is worse as is the compressed audio, but playing gave me a feel for the earlier release. I immediately went to the AN table in Pinball Arcade and my combos were spot on.
Who knows why a few out there are saying they experience lag, and I definitely notice it when I play action games in general. But whatever is going on (tech problems or something else), the game itself has no issues.
About the physics of the game... I agree they still aren't "real life' perfect, but of all the video pinball games I've played this engine is the best. I noticed a few quirks since my last post, like sometimes the ball taking off faster from a soft flipper hit than it should, but all in all they did a great job with this release. I do hate the new plunger camera though. I can't get a strong feel for it yet.
I've finished my testing and there is definitely detectable flipper lag in the ps3 game. I compared it to the Williams game using Arabian table and exactly the same TV settings. Test one was done by trapping the ball on one flipper and then flipping the other flipper. All I was doing was looking for any perceptible amount of time between when I hit the flipper button and then when the flipper started to move. I do not see any lag in the Williams game but I do see some lag in the arcade game. I don't think it is lag in the actual video though. I only base this on that I don't see any lag with the plunger control. I did realize that some of my earlier perceived lag was due to the faster ball movement. We're talking about just the most slightest amount of lag that I think it can be compensated for after only playing a few games.
Agree with Brakel, there IS lag in the PS3 game. My Panasonic ST50 plasma is known to have less lag that most, if not all, TVs on the market today. I've tried setting it in game mode, and it's still there. It's just like in Zen Pinball - hit the flipper button, pause, flipper reacts.
One of life's mysteries I suppose. I used the same timing to hit the ball into the Bazaar with the left flipper as well as the central ramp with the right. I get just about the same results with each whether I play on the HDTV or the lag free monitor.
The one obvious difference between the two to me is that the ball travels faster on PA compared to the WC version because the table is tilted more. As a result, it is easier to hold the flipper to catch the ball on the older game.
With that said, flipper action does have a different feel on Arabian Nights compared to Black Hole, but machines feel different in real life too.
Fantastic! I almost saved her twice last night (one skeleton left to kill, grrrrr) in my tests but didn't get that high a score. I agree that selecting a free jewel (or two) in the Bazaar is the way to go... unless you DON'T go for the jewels and quickly try and beat the seven challenges manually for that score?
More than any other modern table I've played from this video pinball developer, I feel Arabian Nights gives you an easier chance to complete the story. I hear Ripley's is pretty lenient though so I want to really dive into it next.
The uber-popular Twilight Zone table will be added ... but only if the Kickstarter fundraising goal of $55,000 is reached in 30 days:
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We’ve received many requests to bring the Twilight Zone pinball table to the Pinball Arcade. This table was released by Midway under the Bally label and is unquestionably one of the greatest pinball tables of all time (in fact it’s currently #1 in user rankings on the Internet Pinball Database!) We’ve finally succeeded in negotiating all of the licenses we’d need to bring the Twilight Zone to the Pinball Arcade. Unfortunately when we add up the costs of each required license and calculate what we’d have to charge for the table, we’ve realized that the Twilight Zone is just not commercially viable. So we’ve decided to try crowd-funding the cost of the licenses.
We’ve set up a Kickstarter project for the Twilight Zone (just the licenses, not the development costs- we’ll cover all of those ourselves). If we can raise enough money through Kickstarter we’ll be able to digitize the Twilight Zone and preserve one of the greatest pinball tables of all time. If we don’t reach our goal no credit cards will be charged, but if we raise more than our goal we’ll be able to digitize other licensed tables as well (like Star Trek: The Next Generation!) We’ve put together a tempting list of rewards to say “thank you” for helping out. Plus the top five contributors will get their initials featured as the default high scores for the table, immortalizing them as true pinball fanatics! Check out our Kickstarter site and video using the link below. Please join us!
Another PSN update yet still no new tables. I am bored to death playing the same four tables over and over and over..... again so I have not played the game for nearly two weeks now.
guess it is BS that they are going to release two new tables a month. May ends next week. I don't count the mobile devices as I rather play on my big TV.
"Add-on pack #1: Medieval Madness and Bride of PinBot as well as add-on pack #2: Circus Voltaire and Funhouse are currently in submission and will be released in June in North America for PS3, PS Vita and Xbox 360. "
Has anyone had a problem where the digital scoreboard in the upper left corner disappears from time to time. I've seen that happen on more than one occasion on "Tales" and "Magic." I don't know if I'm doing something to trigger it or it's a glitch. It has ruined more than one good game for me on those tables.
"Add-on pack #1: Medieval Madness and Bride of PinBot as well as add-on pack #2: Circus Voltaire and Funhouse are currently in submission and will be released in June in North America for PS3, PS Vita and Xbox 360. "
FunHouse is my fav too, and based on the iPad version, the PA console version is going to be even better than the excellent Pinball Hall of Fame version.
Also, the second table in the Funhouse pack is Cirqus Voltaire, which I had never heard of, and it's also quite excellent too!
Are you checking the leaderboards to see what scores people on your friends list, possibly in this thread, are achieving? That's a strong encouragement to keep playing and beating those scores. I wish these leaderboards were better integrated into the game - Zen Studios seems to have a much better grasp on this than FarSight.
Also finishing all the table goals is another motivator. But still - if you are sick of the 4 tables, it's a tough couple weeks' wait until the next pack(s) are released.
Well no new tables this week. When in June it better be the first or second week and not the last week of June. Next week there will be more worthless RockBand and LBP2 add-on content instead as usual.
^^^ No, it isn't available in digital form anywhere. Maybe it will be added sometime down the line. That's also one of my favorite machines - back in the day it was so easy to hit those two ramps over and over and over...
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It looks like the kickstarter campaign will be a success for Twilight Zone. They are halfway through the allowed time frame and have raised 86% of the funds. TZ is my all-time favorite TV show, so I chipped in $10. The machine is rated near the top all time in gamer ratings, so I look forward to playing it for the first time.
Because they are near the goal, they hope to double their contributions by the deadline so that they can license Star Trek: The Next Generation. That table is also ranked highly so maybe it'll get enough backers.
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