Pinball Arcade "Coming Soon to PS4" Trailer on PSN

[pseudokings]

At this point I'm going with that it will look better than any current version, but not as good, or as real as any of us hoped... and I will still buy it Day 1 on PS4, hoping that not only will it at least look better, but that most of the major issues with the PS3 versions, many of which have been fixed on mobile platforms already will not be present, and it will instantly represent the most competent console version, and the most "complete" representation of their vision for the game to date.

The video is disappointing... I think most will agree on that, but it will still be a lot better than what we've got, and I really think this time (either via the construction of the software, or more reasonable rules from Sony) that they will be able to more quickly and easily fix and improve the game going forward.

 

[Jeff Strong]

At this point I'm going with that it will look better than any current version, but not as good, or as real as any of us hoped... and I will still buy it Day 1 on PS4, hoping that not only will it at least look better, but that most of the major issues with the PS3 versions, many of which have been fixed on mobile platforms already will not be present, and it will instantly represent the most competent console version, and the most "complete" representation of their vision for the game to date.

The video is disappointing... I think most will agree on that, but it will still be a lot better than what we've got, and I really think this time (either via the construction of the software, or more reasonable rules from Sony) that they will be able to more quickly and easily fix and improve the game going forward.

In some ways, it is better, but the lighting around the inserts is actually worse than what we currently have. :/

If they at least improve that, it will make a significant difference. We'll have to wait and see.

 

[pseudokings]

Here's hoping that fan feedback and the time between now and launch still available to them will see some significant improvement.

 

[kimkom]

Oh dear

MB and TOM look terrible, clear plastics don't look much better than current gen, ball shadow and reflection still disappears over certain table elements (eg CFTBL). Lighting just looks off.

A broad brush of realism is required!

I'm starting to wonder if the original TPA artistic talent has left FarSight.

 

[Carl Spiby]

Hire some Visual Pinball guys...

 

[Kolchak357]

Wonder how this compares to the PC beta artwork? TOM, MB, and NGG look almost hazy in places to me on the PS4. Maybe my expectations were too high.

 

[Daniel Osborne]

Give groni a job!
I'm sure I've said that before.

 

[warh0g]

Well that was not what I was expecting. Will bide my time until release though (not buying a PS4 exclusively for TPA) and I will probably be sticking to the PC version preliminary.
I am worried that the release quality will be quite low and that nothing will be fixed after it is released.

 

[Tann]

Oh my... Except CV (mainly because it was awful on PS3) and ST:TNG (say goodbye to the pinkness), the result is more than disappointing for the rest of the tables.

Come on, what have they done to ToM????

PS: thanks Netizen for the Gifs.

 

[SKILL_SHOT]

I dont want to pile on Im just suprised to here so much agreement in disapproval. Just because they can add all the flashing and blinking doesnt mean they should.

 

[netizen]

Rather than just beating on these table clips I am going to try an find as much good as bad in each one. Hopefully this will be as easy as it sounds:

Name of Table	Positive:	Negative
Circus Voltaire	ROM controlled lights, Reflections!,	Hot Spots on playfield DMD, Lower L Flasher not Flashing,
Monster Bash	Frank, Gil sign, Ramp apron metal, ROM controlled lights	Insert lighting, and GI lighting is "Bloomed", Drac Coffin too big?,
ST:TNG	Shield Lights aren't deformed, Borg Ship and Cannons look great. Habitrails show reflections.	Mutliplier and Mission inserts have "Bloom",
CFtBL	Ramps look great, Creature is like Wow!, refections	Inserts show "Bloom", there's a red "leakage" on the R of the Creature when it turns L,
Theatre of Magic	Ramps and Chest look great, reflections	inserts and GI lighting closer to the flippers have more "Bloom", captive balls appear untextured,
No Good Gofers	relections, clear ramps,	the bumpers look odd, the captive balls are transparent, spinners look "small",

 

[dtown8532]

CV: Very happy to finally see ROM controlled GI which does illuminate and darken the table fairly well. Neon looks great. No problem with inserts. Left side flasher seems to be stuck on though. Nonetheless, FarSight has absolutely no valid excuse for not implementing a proper Strobe Multiball in AFM.

CFTBL: Blown out inserts. Yuk. Now this a dark table to begin with so, maybe, FarSight is doing this to make it flashier to the masses. Positives? Creature hologram looks good but I don't think anyone's had a problem with that. The color temp of the incandescent lighting is well done. It's warm without looking pink or overdone. Table colors are good as well.

MB: Like CFTBL, another dark table that is suffering from blown out inserts. Went a little overboard with the GI light on the right side, half way up artwork plastic. Colors are looking over saturated, especially on the illuminated inserts. Flashing effects are good though.

TOM: One word: RED! Too red. I don't mind the inserts because the bright, overly saturated red tone is piercing my eyes. Seriously, the combination of large amounts of red in the table artwork and warm tones of the incandescents are too much. Also, what's up with the glow? It's like they applied an Orton effect to the graphics which only amplifies how "bloomy" this one looks.

ST:TNG: Not bad. Lighting is pretty good. The blue in the multiplier inserts illuminate a bit weird though. At least the shield lights are correct now.

NGG: Pretty much anything is better than the desaturated PS3 version. Rear of the table is lit by five spotlights. Three on a center post and one on each side. I don't see the left one though. The table looks a little too dark, but, if that's to amplify the effect of the multiball start light show, I'm fine with that. Where's the sling lights? I see the plastics are illuminated but just empty black holes underneath. Oops!

I can say for all the tables that everything looks smooth and more realistic as far as texture goes. Plastic ramps look fairly realistic as does the metal on the wireforms. I'm still gonna keep my preorder for now because, for the most part, they do look better and, hopefully, play better than the PS3 version which is my go to system when at home.

One other thing. I slowly went through the intro to see the included titles. I hope that it's just a list of launch titles because most of the spring/summer packs are missing. No PinBot, Centaur, WH2O, Space Shuttle, WW or CP. But, Flight 2000 is included? Whaaah!

 

[Tabe]

Overall, I was disappointed with the video. Really, other than STTNG, I didn't think any of the tables looked all that good. Sure, they look "better" but definitely not "good". Well, except Theater of Magic. That just looks awful. A big orange glowing blob of light over the entire screen. It looks completely unrecognizable next to the version we currently have.

That video may not stop me from buying TPA on the PS4 but it sure might stop me from buying it on day 1.

 

[smbhax]

I think one problem they're up against with this dynamic lighting system is a technical one: while they now have dynamic lights that can illuminate the table around them, they don't seem to have developed the important corollary: dynamic shadows. Without the ability to have these lights cast shadows, they cannot, for instance, have general illumination lighting across a large area, at least not if it's from lights that may switch off in certain modes, because the unshadowed lighting would just cast itself in a big circle, lighting everything nearby, even stuff on the other side of barriers and so forth--massive lighting bleed-through, in other words. And without shadows, large bright lighting will produce a flattening effect--you can't cast shadows beneath things, for instance, so there's no easy way for the eye to see elevation; you can see this happen beneath the neon strip when it lights up on CV, for instance. You can see very faint pre-rendered, PS3-style lightmapped shadows here and there, but those are fixed shadows that don't respond to the dynamic lights, so they can't do too much with those or it will look weird.

It looks like they've tried to constrain themselves to small spot illumination, for the most part, to avoid horrible dynamic lighting bleed-through, but that can easily leave large unlit areas, so maybe the spotlights above the playfield inserts are their attempt to jazz up areas that would otherwise be left weirdly dark by the small general illumination lights.

I don't know if that's the right way to go--in any case, the result is pretty garish and unrealistic in action. The lack of dynamic shadows, if they do indeed lack them, is a very significant shortcoming, visually (just think how important those pre-rendered animated shadows stretching across the playfield are to the look of those Pro Pinball lighting demo shots), but you could probably still make a decent-looking dynamically lit table without dynamic shadows, if you were careful and subtle about it. But it doesn't look like they're taking a subtle approach.

 

[DrainoBraino]

Give groni a job!
I'm sure I've said that before.

Agree, they need to get these vp guys on board, at least in some capacity.

 

[brakel]

I am generally impressed. I do hope they can tone down the spotlight effect before release. I do like that the video is available in the Day One section of the PS4 area!

 

[SKILL_SHOT]

some screen grabs from the video, theyre photos off my tv since I have no way to get them from my PS3.

is somebody playing with the lights in the room?

 

[SKILL_SHOT]

some of the DMD's notice the hot spots on the DMD on the table. I dont think its the flashers reflecting as theyre always there.

 

[netizen]

some screen grabs from the video, theyre photos off my tv since I have no way to get them from my PS3.

Did you want me to grab still from the 720p vid i made this gif from?

 

[SKILL_SHOT]

I noticed on CFTBL as the ball goes across the hologram the ball looses its reflection also it gets really dark in the middle.
Left to Right.