Flash Gordon vs any new Stern..................
PapaJohn
question regarding its gameplay as opposed to the new pinball game
gameplay. Now, I don't care for the annoying early Bally sounds, but
I hear the Flash Gordon gameplay is very challenging even with no
mulitball.......just wondering, do the newer games need multiball to
make up for the otherwise lackluster gameplay.......so could a case be
made that older games that cost $1,000 to $3,000 be just as
challenging as the new $5,500 games? Many have painted backglasses
and individual lamps so you can customize the pin's lighting as well.
Personally, I like the older pins.....they don't try to be a video/
pinball game, just a pinball game. John
Adm56
I think you'd have to have a lot of drop targets or other toys that
the ball interacts with to make up for lack of multiball in this day
and age. And I imagine a multiball trough and the associated code is
cheaper than a ton of drop target banks.
cody chunn
totally changes the dynamics of gameplay. Also with new games feeding the
flippers on ramp shots makes them much easier.
FG's sounds are very well done. It's synthesized sounds, not the earlier
bleep-bloop-zzring. But you have to set it up for sounds in Test or else it
ding-dings on you.
FG is probably more challenging than most games, period. Having the big
upper playfield means the lower field gets cut off short, making the missed
shots and balls off the thumpers really fast.
The roving bonus multiplier and the playfield multiplier rules are just
inspired. Trying to set up a big collect bonus on the shooter lane with 5X
the playfield running is fantastic objective-based play.
I would say FG holds its own against *any* game. Comparing it to a
mode-based multiball game just doesn't work. Another single ball
objective-based game that is popular is Paragon, and I would say FG is MUCH
more intense and fun.
-cody
"PapaJohn" wrote in message
news:0c051b44-967f-4a7b...@35g2000prp.googlegroups.com...
LoveF2K
Dammit now I wanna FG
phishrace
FGY (not FG) has TV Wizard mode. A single ball mini wizard mode that's
better than 90% of all full blown wizard modes. So no, a game doesn't
'need' multiball to be good. FGY has multiballs, but if you watch the
better players, they're all going for TV wiz mode. Even when they're
just playing for fun.
Conversely, multiball doesn't guarantee a game's success. See: IJ4.
It's for reasons like this that I never judge a game before playing
it. Theme means nothing. Number of balls or multiballs means nothing.
Nothing really means anything until you play the game.
[oops]
-phish
frenchy
> I hear the Flash Gordon gameplay is very challenging even with no
> mulitball.......just wondering, do the newer games need multiball to
> make up for the otherwise lackluster gameplay.>>
You can make any game challenging if it isn't already, just put it on
3 ball, raise the replay scores, set all the rules to conservative,
open the drains all the way. Can even apply to an old EM. A game can
be simple as hell and still be challenging, sometimes even more than a
complicated one. The best games are the ones that plain kick your
butt 90+% of the time, but then every so often you'll have it on it's
heels begging for mercy.
As for multiball yeah it can be thrown in just because people have
come to expect it, but that doesn't mean they are always filler.
Sometimes the multiball modes are the best part of the game depending
on the special rules that apply while it's running.
Dr. Dave
(And a Paragon too!)
DR
seymour.shabow
There's something to like in most pins. Sometimes you need to play a
nice playing example to decide that, though. You play any early one
that's not playing right, you're gonna say it's a dog.
Flash Gordon is fun and challenging, that's for sure. Try to get both
playfields lit for multiplier.
Big12bus
and a Nineball, Stargazer, Quicksilver, ...................
Terrapin Mark
> and a Nineball, Stargazer, Quicksilver, ...................
..and a Meteor, Frontier, Skateball, EBD,
Seawitch,....................
Mark Salas
CARGPB 30
Big12bus
and a Catacomb, Fathom, Nitrogroundshaker, Embryon,................
Bill
OTTOgd
short enough as is with one ball, never mind 3. The whole experience
would probably last 5 seconds.
Catacomb has multi-ball but it's not easy to lock the balls; no direct
shots so they have to bounce off of pop bumpers to lock. Multi-ball
doesn't last long on my Catacomb anyway. Another tough game to score
well on.
New Sterns like SM, Iron Man and LotR seem to give away multi-balls
all the time.
Kev
Kingpin
You could probably say that (multi-balls given away) about any modern
game made in the past 30 years.
lluvak9
My feeling is that the phenomenom of multi-balls being given away does
not date back 30 years, but represents a trend that started in the
early to mid 1990's. In fact, many of the games in the '80's and
early '90s featured multiball as more of an ultimate goal than as
something "given away". Several examples of this include High Speed,
Pinbot, Earthshaker Back to the Future, Time Machine, Whirlwind,
Funhouse, and I could go on. Yes, a few of these had "quick
multiball" opportunities, but they were most likely there primarily
because it was difficult to get to the main multiball. The focus of
the player's goal in these games was to manage to start the main
multiball during a game and there was no focus on stacking this with
other multiballs (although some offered the strategy of timing
multiball to start when other events were active, such as starting
Frenzy then multiball in Funhouse).
BS Drac was probably one of, if not the first, modern pinball to not
only (1) offer several multiballs that could be stacked together and
(2) to "give away" the opportunity to start the mist multiball on the
third ball regardless of whether or not that opportunity was earned,
but also to feature multiball stacking as a highlighted and advertised
game strategy that led to the big payoff (ultimate goal was stacking
multiballs, not just multiball and one multiball start opportunity was
"given away" on the third ball).
It was also around this same time frame that the rule sets of many
games (BS Drac included) defaulted to allowing access to a multiball
start on the third ball rather than only lighting it if it was
earned. This was a key rule set adjustment that indeed literally led
to multiballs being "given away" and the feature seemed to be the
default setting on several of the games that came out in that time
frame, particularly because it appeared as if Data East designed their
games in that time frame to incorporate this feature plus several
games from this time frame did not allow for the multiball give away
default setting to be altered via any adjustments.
- Brian B.
Steven
Too easily is indeed not always fun and there need to be enough other
things to do too. Or else it should indeed be like getting a multiball
as a sort of end-goal.
In programming my Road Kings with p-roc I have now 3 multiballs, 2 of
the 5 main modes are multiballs and 1 of the 10 achievements next to
the mode is a hurry-up that starts multiball. I'm intending to make
some more 'other' modes (that you can start by trading gasoline
(stolen from Stargate, collecting and trading Quartz), but I don't
think I'll add more multiballmodes, for I think 3 multiballs against
all the other modes and achievements is well balanced now.
So I've commented on the use of multiballs, but I must admit that I
haven't played Flash Gordon. In most games, I miss multiball when it
cannot be reached. I often play more for things I can 'achieve' than
for points, and not being able to get to multiball, is a shame for
most games I've played without one.
Stevebo
stuff to hit and a 3 ball multi-ball to boot. The dude sounds a little
bit like a guy with a van under a bridge with "Free Candy" painted on
the side though. Ahhhhh, ahhhhh yes, etc. I laugh every time I hear
that guy. Good contrasting colors too. Blue for Fathom and Red for
Flash Gordon.
stevebo
Stevebo
break a game. I played fellow pinhead Tim's EM games at the Rocky
Mountain Pinball Showdown and it was like playing a completely
different game when compared to my own versions of the same game. He
had the incline tweaked just right which made the games play much
better than mine.
stevebo
On Tue, 24 May 2011 15:07:27 -0700 (PDT), frenchy <mf10...@msn.com>
wrote:
350z
A fun game is a fun game, a turd is a turd-new or old. What I love
about my Theatre of magic is the beauty, sound, toys and gameplay.
What I don't like about it is I can play a game on it for 15 minutes-
Like most dmd-era games, a little too easy. Now, I've had a Flash
Gordon, in near-perfect condition for longer than any game I've owned
(but for my first one). I've owned around 40 clean running games since
I've been doing this as a hobby including Black Knight, etc. and the
reason this game has stayed with me is its stunning art, good sound
package, and very challenging gameplay. I can honestly say that if
only one game was allowed, it would be this one. Its a very
interesting game because there are a number of different ways to
achieve individual scoring goals. An example would be 2 diferent ways
to achieve an extra ball besides just getting a high score in add a
ball mode. 2 bonus systems, a bonus multiplier that only climbs higher
when the player moves the ball all around the playfield knocking down
drop targets. Another would be the sequentially-lit individual drops
that when hit, allow you to sink the ball in the outhole for a 15 or
30 second reward of increased total playfield scoring. Two-way kickout
hole. They did a hell of a lot with a single ball game. And the cherry
on top is its just a hard game to play. I have multi ball games of
this era, they don't compare to this purity of pinball. Flash Gordon's
are still relatively reasonable and they built a bunch, but really
nice ones are tricky to find.
Get a clean one and you won't regret it. 1500.00 should do it.
frenchy
> And Frenchy don't forget the game's incline since that can make or
> break a game. I played fellow pinhead Tim's EM games at the Rocky
> Mountain Pinball Showdown and it was like playing a completely
> different game when compared to my own versions of the same game. He
> had the incline tweaked just right which made the games play much
> better than mine.>>
I know that slant can be changed, but I don't really like including
that with the list of those other things, since incline is supposed to
be set to a certain factory setting no matter what. Which games do
you think were set closer to factory, yours or the ones at the
Showdown?
It's not that I'm super picky about the incline on my games either
unless they have a level bubble. I sorta just set them up with the
leg levelers even, and crank the level up if the game plays so slow it
doesn't look right : ) But I'll always fiddle with all those other
factory options before I'd consider making the game play much faster
than normal.
Stevebo
Yes, his ball moved around a little slower, but the games were
actually more fun to play than mine.
stevebo
On Thu, 26 May 2011 04:29:08 -0700 (PDT), frenchy <mf10...@msn.com>
wrote:
>On May 25, 7:31 pm, Stevebo <st...@stevechannel.com> wrote:
MHS
You're bringing up a lot of different points at once.
The answer to one of your questions depends solely on how the word
"challenging" is used in this context. The EM game miss-o can be
challenging because keeping the ball in play for any length of time
requires significant nudging skills and the ability to foresee
dangerous angles. The game LOTR can be extremely challenging because
if you want to reach Valinor, success has a lot to do with playing
certain areas of the game in the correct order, having good aim, and
having the patience / skill to keep going for the necessary length of
time. Whether or not someone "likes" a game more or less is
completely personal. Some people would rather drive a 57 Chevy; some
people want a Prius - they both have appeal for different reasons.
Also, you can't put a price tag on nostalgia.
In regards to your comments on multiball: having a multiball doesn't
preclude kick-ass single ball play. There's a lot of games with both,
take shadow for instance as being particularly challenging and having
solid single ball play. It also has multiballs, but if they were
removed, the game would still be good. Multiball also offers
opportunities to display a different set of skills that are never on
display during single-ball play.
Personally, I don't feel the addition of multiballs on recent games is
the reason the single-ball play feels lacking. I think the single-
ball play is lacking because the time wasn't spent to develop that
area. Blaming the multiballs for poor single-ball play feels a bit
cheap to me. It's kind of like blaming the dots for being bad because
there's a lot of sound calls. One can be good, both can be good, or
neither can be good.
jackofdiamonds
I sold my LOTR to finance a Fathom restoration.'Nuff said! Scott