NCAA Pinball Table Tournament

[Bonzo]

Sleeper alert: Revenge of the 'Gator. Dat music!

 

[CC13]

Sleeper alert: Revenge of the 'Gator. Dat music!

I got a chance to see a longplay of it on the YouTubes a few days ago. It has good music and the physics are about as good as could be expected for a Game Boy video pin, but the gameplay looks a little bit on the shallow side and I can see the lack of scrolling getting on peoples' nerves in a hurry. Still, AR isn't the strongest conference on offer, so who knows?

In any event, we'll take a look at one of the weakest conferences assembled for the tournament:

Tsunami Nova (Sega):
Apollo 13
Batman Forever
Baywatch
Frankenstein
Godzilla
Goldeneye
Harley-Davidson
Independence Day
Lost In Space
The Lost World
South Park
Space Jam
Star Wars Trilogy
Starship Troopers
Twister
The X Files

I'll be blunt here: this is not a strong conference. Harley-Davidson routinely gets bashed by TPA fans (I even saw one post that explicitly called it "the pin that nobody asked for"), while South Park is often called the worst pin ever released. Still, not all the news is bad—Frankenstein usually gets a warm reception amongst pinheads, as do ID4, Goldeneye and Batman Forever. I call Frankenstein, ID4 and Batman Forever for auto-bids and Goldeneye for an at-large berth, with Harley-Davidson plus one out of Apollo 13, Lost In Space and Starship Troopers as outside possibilities.

 

[Kolchak357]

For me the Sega group is all about the themes. They have some table themes that I really love. That will get me to overlook a lot of flaws on a pin. I will often play a table just because I love the theme. Plus some of these pins have great music like X-Files and Goldeneye. Apollo 13 has the gimmicky 13 ball multiball, but who doesn't want to try that at least once? Southpark has great call outs from the show, which are fun even if the layout is not to your liking. I would be happy to see X-Files, Twister, or Goldeneye on TPA. Do I think these tables will take down a classic Bally/Williams pin? No, but I will be curious to see how this division shakes out.

 

[CC13]

For me the Sega group is all about the themes. They have some table themes that I really love. That will get me to overlook a lot of flaws on a pin. I will often play a table just because I love the theme. Plus some of these pins have great music like X-Files and Goldeneye. Apollo 13 has the gimmicky 13 ball multiball, but who doesn't want to try that at least once? Southpark has great call outs from the show, which are fun even if the layout is not to your liking. I would be happy to see X-Files, Twister, or Goldeneye on TPA. Do I think these tables will take down a classic Bally/Williams pin? No, but I will be curious to see how this division shakes out.

I strongly considered adding Godzilla to the "outside possibilities" category for just that reason, but then it occurred to me that the pin was based on American Godzilla, so I opted against it. Still, the best thing one can say about Sega Pinball is that it was a step up from Data East Pinball, which really isn't saying much. Appropriately, Unknown Empire is next on the docket:

Unknown Empire (Data East):
Back to the Future
Batman
Checkpoint
Guns 'N Roses
Hook
Jurassic Park
Last Action Hero
Lethal Weapon 3
Phantom of the Opera
Rocky & Bullwinkle
The Simpsons
Star Wars
Tales From The Crypt
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Time Machine
Tommy

Dear God, this conference is awful! Like Kolchak said about Tsunami Nova, this conference will mostly be dominated by licenses (pace Checkpoint and Time Machine). However, Batman & The Simpsons, two of the better license draws, have been done better justice by more recent efforts, so their drawing power may be blunted. Last Action Hero & Tales From The Crypt are the ones to beat here, but don't sleep on Tommy or Jurassic Park, either. Give me Jurassic Park, Last Action Hero and Tales From The Crypt for auto-bids and Tommy as the sole at-large berth here.

P.S. I'd be very interested in your take on Avenging Revenant, Kolchak. Video pinball's inclusion is something I knew would be controversial, but I think it's legitimate, especially with how much better the physics have gotten since the days of Pinball on the Atari 2600 and Zen's legitimization of the entire video pinball genre.

 

[Kolchak357]

The 4 you mentioned TFTC, LAH, JP, Tommy, along with GnR & Star Wars would probably be the favorites. Maybe even Back To The Future, which seems to be popular with many. A surprising underdog may be Phantom Of The Opera. It's sounds like a dog theme, but that table is down right beautiful, and I hear the gameplay is good too.

 

[Kolchak357]

I've never even heard of Avenging Revenant, so I can't give you my thoughts on that one. I'm not a huge video pinball guy. I grew up with real pinball in arcades, which is why I love TPA. I'm buying back memories from Farsight. I do play some others like Zen, Art of Pinball, Pinball HD once in awhile, but not for very long.

 

[CC13]

I've never even heard of Avenging Revenant, so I can't give you my thoughts on that one. I'm not a huge video pinball guy. I grew up with real pinball in arcades, which is why I love TPA. I'm buying back memories from Farsight. I do play some others like Zen, Art of Pinball, Pinball HD once in awhile, but not for very long.

Avenging Revenant is the conference dedicated to handheld & mobile pinball. I suspected you might not have the greatest affection for video pinball, so I'll see if somebody else can look at those conferences instead (paging Dr. Bonzo...). Myself, I adore video pinball–it was what got me into pinball to begin, so I owe most of my pinball memories to it in the first place. I know that nothing trumps the real thing, but the real thing is hard to find and expensive to own, so I'll take what I can get.

Moving on, here's our next conference to go under the microscope:

Starlight's Wing (Old Stern):
Ali
Big Game
Catacomb
Flight 2000
Galaxy
Hot Hand
Iron Maiden
Lightning
Magic
Meteor
Nine Ball
Orbitor 1
Seawitch
Stars
Stingray
Wild Fyre

Would you look at THIS mess of a conference? This could well be the weakest group in the whole tournament–Stern never could quite catch up to Bally, Gottlieb and Williams and the results here will bear that out. That's actually kind of a shame, actually, because some of these machines really look ahead of their time to me. The only ones here that will at least hold their own are Catacomb (difficulty seems to equate to popularity with pinball and Catacomb puts pretty much any other digital pin to shame there from what I've seen), Flight 2000 (which seems to have a relatively warm reception around these parts), Nine Ball (for its complexity and ridiculously awesome backglass art), Orbitor 1 (for its general notoriety) and Stars. I think we'll see Stars, Nine Ball and Catacomb for the auto-bids and Flight 2000 scraping together a good enough season for an at-large bid.

EDIT: Whoops, I forgot to add the People's Choice info! Just nominate up to 10 pins, either real or virtual, that aren't already in the tournament in order of preference. Your top pick will receive 10 points, your second 9, your third 8 and so on. The 16 tables with the most points will make up Argent Defender in the tournament. Now get out there and vote for your favorites!

 

[CC13]

As the final hours until Christmas wind down, we look at a conference I've wanted to break down for you all for a long time:

Wild Roller (PC pinball):
3-D Ultra Pinball
Android (Epic Pinball 1)
Crystal Caliburn
Desert Run (Obsession)
Duke Nukem (Balls of Steel)
Enigma (Epic Pinball 2)
Pangaea (Epic Pinball 3)
Party Land (Pinball Fantasies)
Pro Pinball: Timeshock!
Revenge of the Robot Monsters (Pinball Dreams 2)
Rollerball
Space Cadet (Full Tilt! Pinball)
Steel Wheel (Pinball Dreams)
Tarantula (Pinball Mania)
Tristan Pinball
Worms (Addiction Pinball)

This is probably the most balanced of the four video pinball conferences. Epic Pinball is probably the most well-known name in PC pinball, while LittleWing are one of the most respected names in video pinball, Space Cadet was ubiquitous in the past two decades (thanks to its being bundled with Windows 9x and Windows XP) and the Pro Pinball series is, of course, untouchable (not to mention the 21st Century Entertainment tables). The rest are pretty strong as well, but lack the star power to compete with the big boys. Count on Crystal Caliburn, Pro Pinball: Timeshock! and Space Cadet for auto-bids and Android, Steel Wheel & Tristan Pinball for at-large bids.

P.S. When I referred to getting somebody else to look at "those conferences", I only meant the ones dedicated to video pinball. I apologize for any confusion and patiently await your take on Starlight's Wing, Kolchak. Happy Holidays!

 

[Kolchak357]

The Old Stern category should be interesting. I don't know how many on this forum have played many of them. I've only played a few of them. One thing I do like about the old Stern's is that the ones I've played have a great spinner shot. I've played Galaxy and its fun but nothing really memorable about it to me. My friend's sister has a Meteor and its a fun table with a good top flipper and lots of drop targets. Never played Flight 2000, but it is pretty popular. Orbitor 1 is just too weird for me. Catacomb looks fantastic and has one of the best back-glasses of all time, but I've never seen one in real life. My favorite of this bunch is Seawitch. It has 4 well placed flippers and a layout that just fits perfectly. And it has beautiful artwork. There is one for sale near me that I am still considering (it's that cool).

 

[CC13]

It's been a while, hasn't it? We kick off the new year with a conference whose very inclusion will probaly be a source of controversy:

Paladin's Blade (Marvel Pinball/Pinball FX/Zen Pinball):
Buccaneer (Pinball FX Classic Pack)
Captain America (Marvel Pinball)
Epic Quest (Zen Pinball)
Excalibur (Pinball FX)
Fantastic Four (Marvel Pinball)
Fear Itself (Marvel Pinball: Avengers Chronicles)
Mars (Zen Pinball)
Moon Knight (Marvel Pinball: Vengeance & Virtue)
Pasha (Pinball FX 2 Core Pack)
Plants Vs. Zombies (Pinball FX/Zen Pinball)
Sorcerer's Lair (Zen Pinball)
Spider-Man (Marvel Pinball Core Pack)
Street Fighter II Tribute (Zen Pinball)
Tesla (Zen Pinball Classics Pack)
Thor (Marvel Pinball: Vengeance & Virtue)
World War Hulk (Marvel Pinball: Avengers Chronicles)

I'm really not sure what to make of this one. In most corners of the game-o-sphere, Zen Pinball has been well-received, AFAIK; the trouble is that PinballArcadeFans.com is not most corners of the game-o-sphere. The conference's viability will depend on how well it can rebuff anti-votes and rally the core fans around it. I like Mars, Sorcerer's Lair and Tesla to win the auto-bids here, with potential at-large candidates including Epic Quest, Fear Itself, Moon Knight and Plants Vs. Zombies.

P.S. As our resident Zen ambassador, I'd love to hear what you think of this lineup, Rafie...

 

[Fungi]

Fwiw, I own all but 3 of those listed.

 

[Kolchak357]

I've only played 4 of these and have the same Luke warm feeling about all four. I like them but don't really crave playing them.

 

[Kolchak357]

Hey CC13, do you have your field of 64 yet? Were you planning on doing it for March?

PinballPodcast is doing one also.
http://www.thepinballpodcast.com/

 

[CC13]

Hey CC13, do you have your field of 64 yet? Were you planning on doing it for March?

PinballPodcast is doing one also.
http://www.thepinballpodcast.com/

Actually, I was planning to run a whole "season" on these very forums prior to a field of 96, but I need to get back up on the horse with scheduling. Still, this is as good an excuse an any to pick up with the conference previews:

League of Thunder (Best of the rest):
The Avengers
Civil War (Marvel Pinball)
Da Vinci Pinball (Pinball HD)
Demolition Man
Doctor Who
Freddy: A Nightmare On Elm Street
Ghost Rider (Marvel Pinball: Vengeance & Virtue)
Lights...Camera...Action!
Monday Night Football
NBA
No Fear: Dangerous Sports
Operation: Thunder
Pro Pinball: The Web
Rocky
Who Dunnit?
WWF Royal Rumble

This is a tough conference to pin down due to its inherently patchwork nature, so let's look at each group of 4 within the conference:

Gottlieb (Freddy, Lights, Operation: Thunder & Rocky): First of all, I just want to explain why there are 4 Gottliebs in the conference. There was supposed to be a four-way split between Williams/Bally, the many faces of Stern, virtual pinball tables and others, but since there weren't enough high-profile oddities to use and People's Choice would have just been strange to implement, it was easiest to handle the representation like this. Anyway, I'm not expecting much from either Operation: Thunder or Rocky, but both Freddy and Lights have their partisans here, so I'm not ready to count them out just yet. Still, the big guns in the other three quarters of the conference will make it an uphill battle for both of them.

Stern (Avengers, MNF, NBA & WWF): Two Data Easts and two modern Sterns are the order of the day here, since Sega and Stern Electronics both have very thin lineups. Avengers & WWF will be dangerous—the former is part of the recent revival of Stern Pinball, while the latter is one of the most popular Data East decks. I don't have the same confidence about MNF or NBA, though, since the former has largely been forgotten and the latter is one of the weakest Stern designs by most pinheads' lights. Expect Avengers to grab an auto-bid and WWF to be in the mix for an at-large berth.

Virtual (Civil War, Da Vinci, Ghost Rider & Pro Pinball: The Web): Outside of Zen Studios, console pinball gets very thin on the ground, so I couldn't find a good one for the conference. In any event, the gap between the two haves (Ghost Rider & The Web) and the have-nots (Civil War & Da Vinci) is the widest out of the four quarters of the conference, in my opinion. Civil War catches flak for its spammability, while Da Vinci Pinball will feel the brunt of the masses having turned on Gameprom. However, Ghost Rider & The Web will more than hold their own, with the latter getting an auto-bid and the former being an at-large lock.

Williams/Bally (Demolition Man, Doctor Who, No Fear & Who Dunnit?): As expected, Williams dominates all pinball, even in a conference with competitors as tough as this one. Demolition Man and Who Dunnit? will duke it out for the last auto-bid, while both Doctor Who and No Fear should cruise to at-large berths along with the odd table out between Demolition Man and Who Dunnit?

P.S. That bracket looks really awesome! Give me LOTR, STTNG, Cirqus Voltaire and BK2000 for the Final Four. As a matter of fact, I just might do a match-by-match prediction for that bracket...

 

[CC13]

Has it really been four months since I last updated this? Anyhow, we now turn our attention to the powerhouse conference that is Golden Engine:

Golden Engine (New Stern):
AC/DC
Batman (The Dark Knight)
Elvis
Family Guy
Iron Man
Lord of the Rings
Metallica
Monopoly
Pirates of the Caribbean
Ripley's Believe It Or Not!
Roller Coaster Tycoon
The Simpsons Pinball Party
Spider-Man
Transformers
TRON: Legacy
X-Men

Now THIS is a conference! AC/DC, Lord of the Rings & TSPP can probably trounce anything this side of AFM or MM, with the rest of the conference being pretty solid, too. In particular, TRON: Legacy and Family Guy are going to be extremely dynamic. AC/DC, LOTR & TSPP are the obvious front-runners for auto-bids here, with Family Guy, TRON: Legacy and 1-3 others making it in as well.

 

[Bonzo]

Thanks to TPA Rbion seems to be capable of some huge underdog setups...

 

[CC13]

Thanks to TPA Rbion seems to be capable of some huge underdog setups...

I completely agree. I also wouldn't count out RCT, either–it seems to have some strong support here, especially after Gary Stern's Freudian slip concerning that table. The road to Pinball Power won't be an easy one for it, though–almost any table here could hold its own in the field of 96.

Moving on, we come to one of my favorite conferences:

Cosmos' Heart (Non-Big-Six solid-states & other oddities):
Airborne (Capcom)
Big Bang Bar (Capcom)
Breakshot (Capcom)
Cactus Canyon (Bally)
Champion Pub (Bally)
Devil Riders (Zaccaria)
Farfalla (Zaccaria)
Full Throttle (Heighway)
Joust (Williams)
Kingpin (Capcom)
Pinball Magic (Capcom)
Predator (Skit-B)
Revenge From Mars (Bally)
Safe Cracker (Bally)
Superman (Atari)
The Wizard of Oz (Jersey Jack)

Cosmos' Heart is a tough conference to get a read on. All of these tables have some impressive upsides, but could also find themselves laid low by some pretty hairy downsides (Full Throttle & Predator haven't even been released yet, AFAIK). Still, the balance of probabilities does point in certain directions and my quick read is that Big Bang Bar (for its rarity), Cactus Canyon (rarity plus Cactus Canyon Continued) and The Wizard of Oz (for all the hype that Jack Guarnieri and his crew have built up around the machine) will be very difficult to stop (particularly the latter, once JJP sort out their issues with distribution). Others also have the potential to make a run, with the ones I favor most being Breakshot (just for the idea of a DMD update to EM-era design philosophy), Champion Pub (which seems to have been relatively well-received in TPA), Revenge From Mars (Tilt! helped to soften attitudes towards this one significantly, from what I've heard & seen) and Safe Cracker (NEVER underestimate Pat Lawlor). Still, like I said, I have much less confidence in my calls here than I have had in my looks at previous conferences, so I'd be interested in hearing what you guys think of this one...

 

[Captain B. Zarre]

Bump