2013 texas pinball festival report

[Matt McIrvin]

Doctor who eats frodo for breakfast

Well, he is Radagast the Brown, and I suppose wizards outrank hobbits in at least some regards.

 

[Russell Bergman]

Thanks to Russell for the writeup! He had kinder words for FS than I would give. As for the Texas Pinball Fest - it was wonderful. My one and only complaint was that there was really no "dark time" which I was strongly hoping for. Also, the beer was crazy expensive, but that's expected given the venue. Some guests were more polite and considerate than others when it came to hogging machines... but that's also expected given the fans. A few machines were far too loud - particularly a wicked Dr. Who that was completely and totally drowning out the only Lord of the Rings table, unfortunately positioned right next to it. All of these things are independent of the festival's organizers, who did a superb job. I was even greeted with enthusiasm when I got my badge. The crew really was outstanding.

As for Farsight... I was happy to chat with a couple of eccentric devs. They clearly have a passion for this stuff. I'm just worried that they don't have the skillsets to keep up. One of the gentlemen talked down to me quite a bit when I told him I was most excited for the Steam and Windows 8 releases, as I'm primarily a PC gamer, but I am an IT professional and love using my Windows 8 tablet for light gaming. He didn't know that I'm intimately familiar with how Valve works, that's not his fault, but he completely blew off the Greenlight efforts and basically told me "just don't worry about it, we have a direct line with Gabe Newell" which I have a hard time believing. Maybe I'm wrong and just being pessimistic... that's fine. Just seems like fluff to me.

Also, I'm curious if anyone else thought that the 3D setup had the infamous "flipper lag"? My PS3 version of the game at home is unplayable, it's so laggy. But I have invested a TON of money into my home theater setup, and I literally do not have any trouble playing ANY other media, be it games, audio, blu-ray, or even rhythm game stuff, like Rock Band. I refuse to believe that my setup is in any way incorrect or not optimized based on one game alone. I felt a lot of lag in the 3D PS3 version they had on display, but they explained it as just non-optimized code since they had literally only gotten the 3D to work that day, or the day before or something like that. I couldn't help but notice that they were using slim PS3 units, same as mine, which also have lag. I just really wish someone would get to the bottom of the lag issue. It's not there on the 360 version.

Beyond the lag issues, I'll echo what tons of others have said - I really wish FS would take a month off of their release schedule and FIX PROBLEMS. The list of issues with existing tables is growing every month, some tables seem like they've gotten a lot more love than others, AND - most importantly IMO - mobile device technology has radically expanded over the last year. I've been using a Galaxy Nexus since they came out, alone with a Asus Transformer Prime, TF300, and Nexus 7, but my next phone will be the HTC One, which has that 1080p screen that's become so popular. It's inevitable that the iPhone will also get a huge screen resolution bump (it's pretty lackluster at this point), and many others will be upgrading to quad-core (or higher) 1080p phones this year. Android fragmentation is a big challenge for developers - we all know that. But lots of other games are handling the challenge. I want to see TPA tables on my phone and tablets that look as good as the PS3 version. That should be a top goal for FS.

.... /rant. Hopefully no one feels the need to ban me after that one.

I think what you mean by "dark time" is dimming the lights very low in the ballroom. If I'm wrong forgive me. On the first day, they dimmed the lights slightly for a few hours, then the organizers really dimmed the lights lower to test the lighting in the new venue to see how people react. During the very dimmed light time for about an hour, many vendors and pinheads complained that they couldn't see the silverball well while playing in very low light, so they lightened it up to the first dimmed setting. I respect your opinion on the developers skillset but I constructively disagree. I understand where you are coming from, but they are pumping out tables at an amazing rate, and if they didn't have the skillset to keep up (even with new technology), they wouldn't be as successful as they are. Just my .02. Of course there is room for improvement, but I think year two of The Pinball Arcade will be incredible and alot of our concerns and issues will be squashed. Just my .03. I am glad you enjoyed the show and it will be even better next year (hopefully lower alcohol prices)!