Tag: Marvel Pinball

Doctor Strange (Pinball FX Table Review)

Doctor Strange
First Released December 17, 2013
Main Platform: Pinball FX
Switch Platform: Pinball FX
Designed by Ivan “Mad_Boy” Nicoara
Set: Marvel Pinball Collection 1 ($23.99)
Links: Strategy Guide – Pinball FX Wiki 
One of the more life-like tables in terms of layout.. OR IS IT? Instead of using a diverter, the left ramps magically change direction, splitting apart and merging again. Neato.

Doctor Strange’s table is a strange one, indeed. Lots of conventional angles and smooth-sailing orbits make this enjoyable enough as a finesse shooter’s table. It’s too bad it can’t just give you the ball when it starts a mode. It has to violently spit the ball out so that it ricochets around, and sometimes it’ll just drop straight down the drain. Come on, enough of that. Seriously, at one point, I had a two ball multiball where both balls were shot directly from the VUKs down the drain, then I had to watch as the balls got stuck in the plunger. Absurdly, that’s not even Doctor Strange’s biggest issue. That would be the short amount of time you get to complete modes. They just don’t give you long enough for a table that has ball movement this loose, and one that deliberately eats up time before you even get your first shot. You could have as little as one shot at each ramp, and if the ball finds its way to the bumpers, you’re probably going to fail the mode. This is one of those tables where Zen desperately needs to go back and redo the rules completely from scratch. They can do an entire advertising campaign about having updated the ROMs for the tables. Nobody is saying “erase the old version forever.” We ain’t George Lucas. No, keep it up and call the reworked versions “The 2025 Builds” or something like that.

Signature Mode – Baron Mordo: One of the most fun modes on a middling table, five portals open in the middle of the midfield. When you shoot them, the ball teleports to the corresponding portal and completes the orbit at super speed, complete with sound effects right out of a 1960s Hanna-Barbera cartoon. It’s so cheesy and we all love it. We just wish it gave you another ten seconds to make each shot.

Doctor Strange features better than decent modes, mind you, and I especially enjoy how each has its own two shot driver. ONLY TWO SHOTS? Are we SURE this is a Zen table? Sure, they overvalued the modes to finish them, which feels like an over-correction so that players avoid chopping wood with combos. The layout is fine, which is why the modes need fixing. It wouldn’t require a lot of work for Zen to go in, add time to the modes (double, at least) and then cut their value by maybe 25%. There’s a marvelous table in here, and combos are such a cinch to shoot that you can veg out. I just wish the mechanics were more forgiving and/or less aggressive. On the positive side, this is easily the cheesiest table in Pinball FX. It’s so wildly cartoonish that it’s honestly more charming than most recent Marvel Cinematic Universe films and media combined, including the second Doctor Strange movie. The layout is fine. It might lean a little too heavily into defense, but with the smooth shooting combos, it’s easy to relight the kickbacks. Everything comes back to the timer and the fact that Doctor Strange is too aggressive with its multiball serves. They turn what should be one of the elite Marvel pins into a table located firmly in the middle of the pack.
Cathy: GOOD (3 out of 5)
Angela: GOOD
Oscar: GOOD
Jordi: GOOD
Sasha: GOOD
Scoring Average: 3.0 🧹CLEAN SCORECARD🧹
Some review copies were provided in this review, others were paid for.

Civil War (Pinball FX Table Review)

Civil War
First Released November 21, 2012
Main Platform: Pinball FX
Switch Platform: Unreleased
Designed by Mate Szeplaki
Set: Marvel Pinball Collection 2 ($29.99 MSRP)
Links: Strategy Guide – Pinball FX Wiki
You can tell that the designer was a big fan of the Steve Ritchie classic F-14 Tomcat. Civil War’s center shot pays tribute to the Jagov Kicker from that table. Of course, that table didn’t feel like the outlanes were total serial killers. This one has too much aggression which in turn feeds the slingshots, which feed the outlanes.

Civil War makes me sad, because this should have been one of the best of the Marvel pins. It has some of the most satisfying shots around, with two ramp flippers that completes a delightful shot sequence. God darn it, Civil War is a memorable table with fantastic shot selection. So, why is it among the worst of the Marvel pins? It’s all in the mechanics that are outside of the shots themselves. This is one of those “story-driven” tables that starts with a two ball multiball. There’s no ball save, so about oh, one in three games will end before you even get one single shot at either ball because the balls enter the playfield aggressively, takes a couple bounces or bangs off the slingshots and goes down the outlanes. That applies to every single multiball. Sure, the ball save is on every time but that opening cinematic multiball, but that just means you’ll get to witness the balls have a parade from the chute to the outlane in a way that reminded my father of people riding a water over and over. The VUKs are some of those “blast the ball like a bat out of hell” ones that are so annoying, and there’s two of them that can point at the flippers and slingshots and do that cannon-blast at them. You shouldn’t have to hold your breath for a VUK. You just shouldn’t.

Signature Element – Auto-Shooting: Years and years before Zen’s Knight Rider wowed players with automatic shooting, Civil War was already doing it. When you build up a combo, the CPU takes control and makes a series of shots for you. It hits every shot too. It almost feels like one of those moments in a Sonic game where the character goes off a series of launchers and springs and you, the player, don’t have to touch anything to make it happen. It actually works really well, but everything comes back to those VUKs and slingshots ruining all the fun.

If not for those VUKs, plus overly hostile slingshots, I think this would be hands-down the best of the “Avengers” series of pins. The layout is so good and every shot so rewarding to hit. The modes are great too. Civil War has a fairly ambitious concept of choosing between Iron Man and Captain America and then recruiting 8 other heroes to join your side. You’ll want to play this one using the vertical table view, because sometimes the Iron Man and Captain America digital figures block the view of which shot is lit. This does everything you need to be fun, but on a table with VUKs and slingshots as hostile as Civil War has, it’s all for naught. The slingshots are aimed right out the outlanes, and since the VUKs fire the ball so fast and so violently at the flippers, it’s inevitable the slingshots will come into play. Civil War is one of those pins where it feels like lucky bounces factor in so much more than any amount of skill. Someone should have stepped in and told the designer “the way you’re doing this isn’t better for the table. It just makes it worse with no benefit.” So Civil War is actually pretty crappy, and it didn’t have to be. Instead of being the best Avengers pin, it’s the poster child for Zen needing to go back and redo the mechanics of the old pins. No bad pin has a clearer path towards winning a Certificate of Excellence quite like it.
Cathy: BAD
Angela: BAD
Oscar: BAD
Jordi: BAD
Sasha: BAD
Overall Scoring Average: 2.0 – BAD
Some review copies were provided in this review, others were paid for.

Captain America (Pinball FX Table Review)

Captain America
First Released June 28, 2011
Main Platform: Pinball FX
Switch Platform: Pinball FX
Designed by Viktor Gyorei
Set: Marvel Pinball Collection 1 ($23.99)
Links: Strategy Guide – Pinball FX Wiki
Kickback – Sasha (Before Cathy changed her vote to GOOD): Of the two World War II-themed tables in Pinball FX, I like Captain America a lot more than I like Brothers in Arms. Cap isn’t as difficult and better mimics a table that feels like you’re sneaking around a battlefield. The knock-about capture ball is perfectly used in the Sparring mode, and while I might be alone, I think the Adhesive X mode is unique and fun. The bumpers probably shouldn’t be as hard to get to as they are and the skill shot is confusing and weak, but I like Captain America. Why wasn’t this in the Arcade1Up?

I wanted to love Captain America. I love the comics. I love the movies. I’m a pro Superman and Captain America weirdo who likes an unambiguous goodie two shoes in comics. Eventually I grew to tolerate Zen’s pinball take on Cap, but it took a couple years and a niece who likes this pin a lot more than I do to convince me I was wrong about it. It just feels haphazard. I can only think of one table that I valleyed more balls while trying to shoot a loop and that’s Ripley’s Believe it or Not! for Pinball Arcade (Dead by Daylight on Pinball M has since joined those ranks). The giant ramp on the left side of the table is one of the most rejection heavy in Pinball FX, and that sucks because it looks so cool. Captain America is also one of the most damning offenders of Zen going overboard on animations and “screwing around” as sometimes the wait to start shooting again when you start a mode is agonizing. Even worse: when you get the ball back, every single table light ripples for a brief moment while you’re trying to figure out what the actual, lit targets are, and frankly there’s too many modes that take too many shots.

Signature Mode – Ambush: Reminding me of an old boardwalk type of mechanical novelty game, the object of this is to use your shield to block the balls. The incoming one is lit, and it might actually be the easiest mini-game among the Marvel pins.

It’s not a total wash, as the idea of rescuing the Howling Commandos, each of whom adds a unique buff to the gameplay, is one I’d like to see more of. Unlike the buffs in Blade, only one is equipped at time, and even better, these ones are actually very well balanced. Even one that does a 30x score multiplier isn’t over-powered because it only applies to target shots and not mode points. The buffs are that good kind of maddening, because each is enticing enough that it’s actually something you have to weigh risk/reward instead of the choice being so self-evident that you’d be a fool to choose anything else. I also like that you have to shoot the knock-about capture ball to shuffle through the Commandos you’ve earned. That’s the best shot on the table. It never gets old. The buff system, along with a few genuinely fun shots, carried Captain America over the finish line for me. Even with kickbacks literally aimed at the slingshots, which themselves are aimed at the drain. Cap features a couple pretty decent modes, like shooting the knock-about to simulate a fist fight with Red Skull. It actually does feel like the pinball version of punching a lot more than Champion Pub. Yea, Captain America is pretty janky, but it’s almost endearing for it. Which isn’t to say they should try for jank in the future. If not for the jank, Captain might be the best Marvel pin instead of being near the bottom of my GOOD pile.
Cathy: GOOD (3 out of 5)
Angela: BAD (2 out of 5)
Oscar: BAD
Jordi: BAD
Sasha: GOOD
Overall Scoring Average: 2.4 – BAD
Some review copies were provided in this review, others were paid for.