A Nightmare on Elm Street Opinions?

[shardian]

I'll take a pin over a video game any day. There isn't a single video game I can log 10-20 straight games on, and not be burned out. 10-20 straight credits on a good pin, and you're just getting warmed up!

 

[StreetzKing]

ehh it depends on the pin. I have had 2, a Dr Dude and Lethal Weapon 3. I got bored with them after a few months. However something like the twilight zone or CFTBL has sooo much more to do, like 16 goals as opposed to hit here and here to advance this, get special. and multiple multiballs and a lot to do. I would love a Twilight Zone pin and would probably have it in my collection for a long time

 

[WadeLanham]

Like finishing a quarter-sucker continue video game, getting through all the modes or getting to the wizard mode can totally kill the interest in a pinball machine, too. Lots of people have run into that.

Pins can get boring just as easy as videogames. Most pins have about a dozen shots, and once you master that, no amount of software can make up for the fact that you're just owning the sucker. Layers of software are just extra hoops to jump through. Stern figured out that this is great for home users, and it keeps them reaching for the carrot, trying to get to the next big in-game achievement. Not to mention, you can add hours of "rules" to play through on a $10 chip, but you only have so much space under the playfield glass.

I think videos take a lot more skill and practice, and that's part of the reason pins can be a lot of fun. I don't have the patience to practice a video or dedicate much time to it. You can be a crappy pin player, but have a lucky day and get to the wizard mode. No one will "accidentally" get to a videogame kill screen or defeat Shang Suhn on MK for example. To be good at a videogame you have to be persistent. Not really true with pins, you can get to the wizard mode on many pins with a few good games.

Fun level is a personal thing. I really enjoy a lot of pinball machines, but videos are my true love. Pins come and go for me but I have true keeper videogames.

And the good pins are ridiculously expensive. You can get a room full of your favorite videos for the price of one or two nice pins. I can't imagine justifying the cash for a pin collection unless my house was paid for, kids' colleges paid for, 401 maxxed out, thousands in other investments each year, etc. That won't happen for me until I'm at least 50 years old. I just described the demographic of most of the pinball market.

Wade

 

[cysnake]

If anyone got a nice twilight zone, Ill trade my Lair with all the extras and limited edition laserdisc!

 

[jar155]

Sorry Wade, but you're just way off on your assessment of pins. There is absolutely no way that you're going to luck into a wizard mode on the vast majority of pinball machines that have them. I know plenty of highly skilled pinball players that have never seen the final wizard mode on LOTR and they've owned the game for years!

Also, you can't just master every shot, because the ball is coming to your flipper at different speeds and angles all the time unless you're shooting from a trapped ball. A ball traveling down the inlane at one speed will need to be shot at a different angle than a ball traveling at a faster or lower speed. On top of that, the way the games can mix up the ordering of shots really changes things. Sticking with the LOTR example, one mode makes you hit combo shots, which is a whole heck of a lot harder than it sounds because you have to go from specific shot to specific shot in order to complete the mode.

Beating Shang Tsung, for example, is cake compared to making it to even the easiest of wizard modes on a pinball machine. I could take 50 people who have never played a pinball or arcade machine and put them in front of Mortal Kombats and Twilight Zones. I guarantee that you'd see 50 people beat Shang Tsung before even 10 people reached Lost in the Zone mode.

 

[shardian]

You need to know - Wade owns MK and still hasn't beat Shang Tsung.

 

[Robotron Jon]

The ball is wild! It never gets boring! Even if you CAN master all the rules in a game, there are always endless approaches to strategies and scores....and spontaneous things happen that make every experience different than a vid.

You try mastering Simpsons Pinball Party or Lord of the Rings and get back to me.

Just like video games, there are people who are simply better pinball players than the rest of us and they can master any game, including Simpsons or LOTR.

You've named two pinball machines out of the thousands of machines that have been produced. What about the rest? You haven't ever sold a pinball machine that got boring?

There are videogames that I have been playing for nearly 30 years and I've never come close to mastering the game. I could get rid of most of my videogames tomorrow and I wouldn't feel bad about it. It's the 2 or so that I really love playing that I would keep. If I was totally into pins I would probably feel the same way about a few of the machines, and the rest, they would be disposable.

 

[jar155]

I'm just saying that on average, a pinball machine has far more staying power than a vid, and vids have always been my first love.

Edit: And we've only named a couple of machines because full lists are pointless. I could name literally hundreds of tough to master pinball machines going all the way back to EM games.

 

[WadeLanham]

Sorry Wade, but you're just way off on your assessment of pins. There is absolutely no way that you're going to luck into a wizard mode on the vast majority of pinball machines that have them. I know plenty of highly skilled pinball players that have never seen the final wizard mode on LOTR and they've owned the game for years!

Also, you can't just master every shot, because the ball is coming to your flipper at different speeds and angles all the time unless you're shooting from a trapped ball. A ball traveling down the inlane at one speed will need to be shot at a different angle than a ball traveling at a faster or lower speed. On top of that, the way the games can mix up the ordering of shots really changes things. Sticking with the LOTR example, one mode makes you hit combo shots, which is a whole heck of a lot harder than it sounds because you have to go from specific shot to specific shot in order to complete the mode.

Beating Shang Tsung, for example, is cake compared to making it to even the easiest of wizard modes on a pinball machine. I could take 50 people who have never played a pinball or arcade machine and put them in front of Mortal Kombats and Twilight Zones. I guarantee that you'd see 50 people beat Shang Tsung before even 10 people reached Lost in the Zone mode.

First, LOTR is one of the examples of late model Sterns where they've layered the rules in to make it harder to complete and better for home use. Not a representation of pinballs in general, at all!

When I say 12 shots, I mean 12 targets to shoot for. If you can handle the ball with the flippers and make the shots, you've got it made. Yeah, there is an infinite combination of ball speeds and angles, but are you really computing that when you play, or do you just learn how to catch a ball and shoot it where you want it? All you have is 2 flipper buttons and timing, and it's almost the same for every pin.

I guess I and some of my buddies just must be a pinball wizards then! We've killed several wizard modes on pins and had many marathon games, but I've never beat Shang Tsung, and I even know the moves for the player I use. No one could luck into that without practice and prior knowledge of moves/tricks/etc. That's funny that you mention Lost in the Zone because I've seen it done by accident. Are you saying you haven't had a guest whose never played pinball before thrash your TZ? I used to have guests have killer games on my pins, even take my high scores on games I played every day. And sometimes they hadn't even played pinball before.

I would say the exact same thing you do about 50 inexperienced people beating pins/vids, except the pin and vid would be reversed. Guess we just look at it differently.

Wade

 

[WadeLanham]

I'm just saying that on average, a pinball machine has far more staying power than a vid, and vids have always been my first love.

That's just your opinion. Obviously, pinball is your thing now.

Wade

 

[Robotron Jon]

I'n not saying vids are better or that pins are better.

It's all personal opinion. When it comes to collecting stuff, regardless of what it is, it's all up to the collector as to why they have it.

 

[jar155]

So how do you set up the rules on your pins? 3 ball? 5 ball? Anything less than factory settings is cheapening the experience.

I have to call foul on the fact that you've never beat Shang Tsung. You want to know the first time I played that game I was 11 years old and I had just watched someone play for about 20 minutes. He quit on a loss to Goro and I gave the game a try by continuing where he left off. I picked Lui Kang because I picked up on his special moves watching and I beat both Goro and Shang Tsung first try. There's no way you've never beat that game unless you're only playing with one hand. I've never found that game to be particularly hard.

Oh, and for what it's worth, Goro is MUCH more challenging than Shang Tsung.

 

[shardian]

So how do you set up the rules on your pins? 3 ball? 5 ball? Anything less than factory settings is cheapening the experience.

I have to call foul on the fact that you've never beat Shang Tsung. You want to know the first time I played that game I was 11 years old and I had just watched someone play for about 20 minutes. He quit on a loss to Goro and I gave the game a try by continuing where he left off. I picked Lui Kang because I picked up on his special moves watching and I beat both Goro and Shang Tsung first try. There's no way you've never beat that game unless you're only playing with one hand. I've never found that game to be particularly hard.

Oh, and for what it's worth, Goro is MUCH more challenging than Shang Tsung.

I don't know about the arcade, but I could beat Shang Tsung with every character - sometimes with double flawless on Sega Genesis. My memory is flaky, but he is susceptible to either jump kicks, or uppercuts.

 

[WadeLanham]

So how do you set up the rules on your pins? 3 ball? 5 ball? Anything less than factory settings is cheapening the experience.

I have to call foul on the fact that you've never beat Shang Tsung. You want to know the first time I played that game I was 11 years old and I had just watched someone play for about 20 minutes. He quit on a loss to Goro and I gave the game a try by continuing where he left off. I picked Lui Kang because I picked up on his special moves watching and I beat both Goro and Shang Tsung first try. There's no way you've never beat that game unless you're only playing with one hand. I've never found that game to be particularly hard.

Oh, and for what it's worth, Goro is MUCH more challenging than Shang Tsung.

I'm with you on that, 3 ball and normal difficulty, etc. Anything else is just making it too easy, especially at home where you can make as many attempts as you want.

Maybe you're just an awesome videogame player and I'm a horrible one. Or maybe my version 5 boards are harder, or the one you played was set on easiest, or something else. Who knows. But it's true, I've never beat Shang Tsung, in fact, I've struggled to get past Goro. To get there I usually have to put several dollars worth of quarters in the game. I played MK quite a bit when I was a teenager, too. Nowadays I don't have the benefit of much practice or getting to watch other people's strategies. I do usually beat Shardian though. Explain that one.

A buddy of mine who hadn't played since he was a teenager recently played me for a while on MK and he won the vast majority of the matches. It was fun, a lot more fun than beating the tar out of someone who has no idea how to play it. There are a couple of guys in our game club that fall into that category, and they just get thrashed.

Wade

 

[Steverd]

I think what you need to know is less about the pin and more about pins in general. Pins WILL break. They just are going to. Those are heavy balls flying around in there. You will need to do some basic maintenance to them that vids don't require. Changing bulbs, rubbers, balls and the occasional thing that just breaks is key. The pin is okay, nothing to scream about. A good pin for a starter such as yourself.

Very, Very True, But it is fun fixing them.
With that said, if you LOVE the theme then get the machine!

Steve