CONTEST: Predict Season 5 & Table Packs 39 & 40!

[Tarek Oberdieck]

Banzai Run's backbox game is very repetitive, it's the exact same sequence of stop-and-go shots every time. Extra playfields just aren't nearly as viscerally impressive on a screen as in a real machine. Nobody really cares about Black Hole's extra playfield and that has more to do than does Banzai Run's. Heck, even the Powerfield or Victory's upper area is more interesting.

Yes, the backbox combos are always the same few shots. but I would say this table should be in every good pinball collection. It's an historical milestone like Revenge from Mars. That table design was one of the poorest without the video screen. And at least the King of the Hill music is one of the best S11 sounds.

 

[shutyertrap]

Your comparable is Safecracker. Check out the hate for that one around here. Unique doesn't mean interesting or fun. It's even bad if the uniqueness raises expectations that go unmet.

Banzai Run's backbox game is very repetitive, it's the exact same sequence of stop-and-go shots every time. Extra playfields just aren't nearly as viscerally impressive on a screen as in a real machine. Nobody really cares about Black Hole's extra playfield and that has more to do than does Banzai Run's. Heck, even the Powerfield or Victory's upper area is more interesting.

Yep. Sometimes the toys and features that make a table interesting in real life just don't translate to digital. While I like Safecracker a lot, you simply don't get the sense of how small it really is in TPA. Same thing goes for the wide bodies of a Genie or Twilight Zone. Every time Rescue: 911 was brought up, it was all about how awesome the helicopter was. When I finally got to play it in the game, my first experience with the table, it was a total shoulder shrug.

Based on my experience with the vertical backbox in Zen's Paranormal and my actual experience with it on Bonzai Run, I think it will be another shoulder shrug table. Still, it's one of 'those' tables that people rarely see in person and yet holds a major appeal. We'll see if FarSight thinks it's worth the trouble.

 

[invitro]

Banzai Run's backbox game is very repetitive, it's the exact same sequence of stop-and-go shots every time. Extra playfields just aren't nearly as viscerally impressive on a screen as in a real machine. Nobody really cares about Black Hole's extra playfield and that has more to do than does Banzai Run's. Heck, even the Powerfield or Victory's upper area is more interesting.

I like extra playfields; I like BH's a lot, Victory's a little, and the Powerfield is classic.

I still like SC quite a bit in small doses. I don't think anyone has completely figured it out yet, either the regular game or AotV, although I think AotV may require a stuck ball or two to reach the top 30 scores.

I played Banzai Run a bunch at a 1996 show in Phoenix (with Bowen Kerins), but I was really freaking drunk (or hung over) at the time and don't remember much other than "wooooowwww"...

 

[invitro]

It's an historical milestone like Revenge from Mars. That table design was one of the poorest without the video screen.

RFM was a negative milestone. I was so depressed in 1999 worrying that it was the future of pinball. Thank God it wasn't, and the greatest tragedy in pinball history is WMS thinking that it would be. And thus ceding pinball to Sega/Stern, and going out of business. (I'm still depressed about that.)

 

[Tarek Oberdieck]

RFM was a negative milestone. I was so depressed in 1999 worrying that it was the future of pinball. Thank God it wasn't, and the greatest tragedy in pinball history is WMS thinking that it would be. And thus ceding pinball to Sega/Stern, and going out of business. (I'm still depressed about that.)

Same for me. Pinball 2000 was the beginning of the end.

 

[David Pannozzo]

Alright here's my Season 6 list.

1) Congo
2) Mousin' Around
3) Eight Ball Deluxe/ Sorcerer bundle pack
4) Tales From The Crypt for Halloween
5) AG Soccer Ball
6) Doctor Who/ Regenerate version also
7) Swords Of Fury
8) Paragon
9) Radical
10) The Shadow

These are my prediction, I would love to have that line up. People who want Paragon, Eight Ball Deluxe, Sorcerer, and AG Soccer Ball can have them, me I'm not interested in those 4 games, but I'm willing to give them a try, and they might actually grow on me you never know.

 

[AKrumbach]

Does anybody else think that maybe starting a new thread for Season 6 predictions might increase the visibility a little? In any case, here's my predictions / wishlist:

1) Indy 500
2) Mousin' Around
3) Al's Garage Band
4) Dr Who
5) Tales from the Crypt
6) Genesis
7) AG Soccer
8) Congo
9) The Shadow
10) Flash Gordon

If (and I recognize this isn't officially confirmed) the release of the Stern game slows down table releases for "Classic" TPA, I'd prefer this season be a little heavy on bang-for-buck.