Drain Monsters

[Fungi]

...What is a bit suspect is the lack of any kind of bounce in the outlane/inlane area. Most tables recently have gotten a lot better about it, but a lot of the old tables railroad to the outlane if the ball goes in that area, instead of bouncing/being able to nudge them. There's definitely some physics weirdness there.

Also I'm going to just note here that while I think the outlane/inlane areas could be more realistic I really really hope they don't make any tables in the game easier than they already are. None of the tables in the game are harder than in real life and most are way way easier. You can go look at Zen if you want to see how tedious things can get if it's literally impossible to drain no matter how hard you want to.

The railroading to the outlanes is what's really irking me lately. Especially the lack of bounce in the outlane entrances. Although I do agree that the tables should not be made easier, my issue is difficulty being raised artificially by false ball movements. And if it can't be done any other way, then I just wish it didn't look as if it is. I'd rather be ignorant than suspicious.

 

[Espy]

You can go look at Zen if you want to see how tedious things can get if it's literally impossible to drain no matter how hard you want to.

I've only really had that experience with Han Solo. The most powerful magna-save known to man, that drags balls from any location on the playfield to the magnet. Plus you get to stockpile three of them. And they're easy to collect. So... I played for three and a half hours.

 

[David T. Melnick]

It's (easily) Central Park for me.

 

[vikingerik]

I'm new here and new to Pinball, and I can only afford season 1 at the moment, but the one table I've played that jumped out at me as the most difficult in that season is, in fact, Twilight Zone.

Have you learned how to catch before you shoot? In that bit of streaming in the other thread, it looks like you simply whacked anything that came near a flipper. The trick to Twilight Zone is always hold a flipper to catch the ball from the slot machine kickout so you can make a nice controlled shot.

The key skill to move from pinball beginner to intermediate is learning when NOT to flip. Catch the ball instead by holding a flipper, or leaving a flipper down so that the ball bounces to a catch on the other side. Then shoot.

 

[Kratos3]

The key skill to move from pinball beginner to intermediate is learning when NOT to flip. Catch the ball instead by holding a flipper, or leaving a flipper down so that the ball bounces to a catch on the other side. Then shoot.

This is what got me to my next level. Setting up my next shot instead of just trying to just keep the ball in play.

Next was nudging to avoid the slings(especially on Big Shot).

By the way, if you only get one season, it's tough to beat season one.

 

[Dedpop]

DRAIN MONSTER

FROM HELL

I hate you often.

 

[Iguana]

DRAIN MONSTER

FROM HELL

I hate you often.

I used to feel the same, until I tried the following strategy: focus on shooting the ramp (to the right of the slot machine) and rack up cheat games. Everything else seems to fall into place.

Since trying that, HRC went from annoying to entertaining for me.

 

[Epsilon]

It's really weird. I didn't have any major problems with High Roller Casino or Bram Stoker's Dracula. Not nearly as many as I did with some tables in the past like Fish Tales (that seems to be universally understood as a drain monster) or Cirqus Voltaire (on the 360 for that one, PC for everything since.) I think it's partly that I've gotten used to more drains and have just been patient enough to play a few games to get in the rhythm and get used to avoiding certain shots, etc.

Tuning these tables has to be extremely tricky, because while they want to simulate real pinball as closely as they can, the reality is that most players wouldn't have much fun if they truly did that, and would be likely to get frustrated and stop buying tables, which is obviously bad for business. It has to be extremely difficult to strike a balance between making it realistic yet still practical for a home product, because after all the real machines were designed to keep ball times down to maximize profits. Taking the coin-op aspect out of the equation presents interesting design issues; we see so many people harping on how much easier these tables are than real life, but the further they go in that direction, the more the vast majority of more casual players are just going to get unduly frustrated.

 

[Nolan]

For outlanes, i cant see any serious contender to Firepower.

I played firepower months ago when I first got season 2, and recently I saw it and thought "hey, I dont have the standard goal for that one, wonder why", and fired it up.

Then I remembered why I dont have the standard goal for that table, its pretty ridiculous.

 

[Kratos3]

I played firepower months ago when I first got season 2, and recently I saw it and thought "hey, I dont have the standard goal for that one, wonder why", and fired it up.

Then I remembered why I dont have the standard goal for that table, its pretty ridiculous.

I hated that table like poison when I started clearing the goals. The thing was, I kept wanting to play it, and ended up really liking it. It has a "just one more time" quality to it.

 

[fromduc]

I played firepower months ago when I first got season 2, and recently I saw it and thought "hey, I dont have the standard goal for that one, wonder why", and fired it up.

Then I remembered why I dont have the standard goal for that table, its pretty ridiculous.

Yes it's a monster, but at least after have played it many many times i was able to decrease the risk of outlanes by avoiding many shoots (that's the game ending bug which made me finally let this table out of my games, almost broke a controller because of this destroyin a top 10). I dont feel i'll be able to do that on HRC, which is now my new #1 ^^

 

[EnergyOne]

Litz is pretty easy to get. You get those panels here and there and then the question mark. The gumball machine seems easified. My weak shots always go up there. Drains from the bumpers are normal and you have to avoid the skill shot.

Have you got BFTK? ruled the universe?

Forgive my derpness, but... BFTK? Rule the universe? Not yet on that one, I assume you are talking about Attack from Mars - got to the point where I directly attack Mars once while I was playing but lost them, and I haven't dedicated a whole lot of time to the entirety of Pinball Arcade just yet. I am streaming it often though when I stream.

 

[EnergyOne]

Have you learned how to catch before you shoot? In that bit of streaming in the other thread, it looks like you simply whacked anything that came near a flipper. The trick to Twilight Zone is always hold a flipper to catch the ball from the slot machine kickout so you can make a nice controlled shot.

The key skill to move from pinball beginner to intermediate is learning when NOT to flip. Catch the ball instead by holding a flipper, or leaving a flipper down so that the ball bounces to a catch on the other side. Then shoot.

JUST starting to do that after watching Pinballwiz45b's footage. Haven't got a good grip on nudging yet either but I think I may have to reassign keys to do that properly also.

 

[soundwave106]

BFTK = Battle For the Kingdom, the final mode on Medieval Madness. That actually still is a pretty difficult mode to complete even on TPA, I've only managed to complete it once so far.

 

[Tann]

the reality is that most players wouldn't have much fun if they truly did that, and would be likely to get frustrated and stop buying tables, which is obviously bad for business. [...]; we see so many people harping on how much easier these tables are than real life, but the further they go in that direction, the more the vast majority of more casual players are just going to get unduly frustrated.

True.

And FS has stated at the beginning of TPA that the tables are made willingly easier than IRL:

- to allow players to see all the features/modes of a table
- because the table manufacturers want the tables to be easier in TPA (I still don't understand why they stipulate this in the license agreement, what's the reason for them?)

 

[EldarOfSuburbia]

True.

And FS has stated at the beginning of TPA that the tables are made willingly easier than IRL:

- to allow players to see all the features/modes of a table
- because the table manufacturers want the tables to be easier in TPA (I still don't understand why they stipulate this in the license agreement, what's the reason for them?)

IRL, tables go out to locations like arcades, bowling alleys, cinemas, and the like, where people feed money in to them. Everyone wants a slice of every quarter pumped in: the location, the owner of the table (often not the same as the location), the distributor, the manufacturer. The more money going in, the better. Hence tables have to be "difficult" otherwise everyone would play too long and not put enough money in.

In TPA, the table is bought and paid for. They're on eternal "free play". No need to make them as difficult as they are in the wild - otherwise people will get frustrated, and not buy more or not rank the app highly enough and so on.

 

[Captain B. Zarre]

It's really weird. I didn't have any major problems with High Roller Casino or Bram Stoker's Dracula. Not nearly as many as I did with some tables in the past like Fish Tales (that seems to be universally understood as a drain monster) or Cirqus Voltaire (on the 360 for that one, PC for everything since.) I think it's partly that I've gotten used to more drains and have just been patient enough to play a few games to get in the rhythm and get used to avoiding certain shots, etc.

Tuning these tables has to be extremely tricky, because while they want to simulate real pinball as closely as they can, the reality is that most players wouldn't have much fun if they truly did that, and would be likely to get frustrated and stop buying tables, which is obviously bad for business. It has to be extremely difficult to strike a balance between making it realistic yet still practical for a home product, because after all the real machines were designed to keep ball times down to maximize profits. Taking the coin-op aspect out of the equation presents interesting design issues; we see so many people harping on how much easier these tables are than real life, but the further they go in that direction, the more the vast majority of more casual players are just going to get unduly frustrated.

Both HRC and BSD are in my top 10 Pinball Arcade tables because of the realistic emulation of the tables, although HRC is mostly because of the deep ruleset.

I would love it if there was some patch for Fish Tales that put the table's difficulty on par with BSD or Phantom of the Opera. I played FT a lot upon it's original release, but because of the extremely difficult nature of it, I almost never play the table nowadays.

 

[WhiteChocolate]

the two black knights and firepower, and many of the older tables in general seem to have the "drain monster" aspect to them - i usually pass them up for a random play for that reason. space shuttle is probably my favorite out of all the pre-ninties/digital style tables; i practice that one sometimes - tough to improve my game on it, but slowly getting better! much easier to play on PS3 for nudging. pretty essential for the older tables...

of course it's usually how wide apart they used to place flippers, but also it's in those uppermost loop designs; they get aimed straight right down the middle between the flippers, if the ball is past a certain "topmost" speed. so any aiming going towards 'em needs to be a bit weak on the flip, if at all possible. usually seems with tables like that, ya gotta learn to control your plunger! lol! like mst3k's "mr. b natural" quip - "ya gotta know your horn, boy!" ("and wash it every day!")

i've kind of always suspected too that fish tales, no good gofers and tee'd off were also designed that way because (maybe?) they're designs targeted towards golf club lounges that install pb tables. (do they? i've never been to one, lol!) i'm not much for fishing/golfing-themed things anyway. (annoyed me immensely that in GTAV, the only really effective way to improve a character's strength stat was by -playing golf,- who the hell thought -that- rule up?) anyhow, NGG isn't too hard, i seem to remember. fish tales may be my "worst" table for drains; seems like -every- shoot on that one is designed to drain!

although the updated HH design for ghostbusters improves the tableplay by quite a bit, it also still has that aspect to it - feels very steep, and those flippers still feel a bit too far apart for "satisfying" play. but, it was an improvement!

 

[EldarOfSuburbia]

When you miss a shot just to the left or right and the ball hits a post and ricochets STDM or into an outlane, chances are that's not random. It was designed to do that. Pinball is meant to reward accurate shooting with better* results, and punish poor shooting with drains.

* Yes, an accurate shot that feeds an inherently random area such as bumpers can result in power drains - for example the ramp on Pin*Bot. But you get something for that ramp shot, and nothing for bricking the shot and draining. Hence it's still a better result.

 

[9u1d0]

BFTK = Battle For the Kingdom, the final mode on Medieval Madness. That actually still is a pretty difficult mode to complete even on TPA, I've only managed to complete it once so far.

Played it a dozen times, but never with any trollbombs, due to the bug on ios (troll bombs are auto fired evry time the trolls popup). Almost made it though, missed one or two last shots at the castle.