Your thoughts on The Champion Pub (PS3 & Vita)

[spoonman]

I think the sound in this is excellent. I wish they could all sound this good.
Scott Joplin's music sounds crystal clear as do the sound effects.

The table looks nice too, with only a hint of pink.

Does anyone else notice that none of the cameras seem to zoom into the top area of the table? It seems like they are all set to fixed.

I think the flippers act a little erratic at times. I notice it mostly during 3 ball multi play. It seems like instead of going though the flipper the ball is pushed unnaturally in a random direction. Luckily it doesn't happen too much.

The right lane seemed a little unforgiving at first too, but I'm learning when to nudge it.

**I haven't played the Vita version, but would like to know how it is.**

 

[Lord Boron]

I notice that it doesn't zoom on the upper play field, but it doesn't on iOS either, except for the jump rope, and punching bag. I think it's because there's so much stuff in the way, there isn't anything to see when you zoom in.

 

[Kemetman72]

I really think the table is well done myself as well. The sounds, the graphics are sharrp (Punching bag could be better) and is an overall excellent pin. I agree the right lane can be a little troublesome, but not like some tables! I don't have a Vita. Until they lower the cost of the memroy sticks to something more palatable, I will never own one even with the price drop in the unit itself.

 

[MonkeyGrass]

I am pleasantly suprised by CP. Had no idea what to expect since I've never played a real one, and I have to say, it's a mighty fun play!

I like the game play, the sound and FX are good, what's not to like?! I did however, notice the flippers behaving a bit strangely, and then the game locked up my entire PS3 after my first round. Other than that, it's a winner.

 

[ScotchYeti]

The table looks much better than Whirlwind and plays really well. I didn't like it when I sampled it on iOS but on the PS3 it's somehow different. A nice addition to our collection!

 

[Vyrastas]

Love The Champion Pub, it's one of my favorite tables now. Not exactly like a real one, the ball doesn't go flying everywhere from the green ramps in the middle, but they did a good job on it. One of the better tables in Season 2.

It plays fine on the Vita, though the resolution on the playfield is crap as usual.

 

[Espy]

Not sold on this one yet. It seems to focus too much time on the jump rope and the video mode, which kind of becomes a bore and breaks up the flow of the game. I'm not giving up on it yet though. I'm waiting on that magic game where everything clicks.

 

[Mechanix77]

Having never played it, let alone heard of it, I was super stoked when I saw the Promo for it from TPA. However, when I actually got down to playing it, I just didn't find it that fun. I mean, the concept of the game is genius, but for some reason, I just don't enjoy it that much.

I actually had more fun with "Whirlwind".

 

[Mechanix77]

Oh, and the ball save is a joke. That's probably my biggest complaint of the game. It almost never saves the ball for me.

 

[Espy]

Yeah, I don't see myself coming back to it very often, which is unusual as all the other Bally DMDs I love. The shots are too precise to get a groove, the jump rope and video mode kill it even more, and hitting the boxer just isn't as satisfying as the UFO in AFM. I expected to really like this one but afraid that wasn't the case.

 

[brakel]

If I got to pick the tables that go into each pack I probably wouldn't have picked this one until about pack 100. But it's pinball so it's fun!

 

[Espy]

After a game where I multiplied my previous score by 20 and got 600 million, #19 on the leaderboards... I think I get it. Very unique set of rules, but once you get the hang of it, it works.

 

[ScotchYeti]

So what's your strategy, Espy?

 

[Espy]

So what's your strategy, Espy?

Mainly the realisation that you can take out even the final fighter pretty easily by letting the ball rest on the centre plug and shooting for the jabs with 100% accuracy. Aside from that I took every chance to collect smart punches as they're helpful to quickly turn things around if they get hairy. once you get to Jackpot Deluxe (the final jackpot level), a good deal of shots give you 1.5M whether you are in a multiball mode or not, which inflates things quite nicely, but that should happen naturally over the game. And once you get through the four fighters, you can decide which difficulty of fighter to fight for a varying reward, which is up to 200M! And that is still quite easy to achieve using the centre plug trick and smart punches. Not sure how many fighters you can do this for, I did it for 2, but it could be unlimted. I'll need to check.

Now don't go beating my score

 

[Vyrastas]

Yeah you need to get a bunch of smart punches, especially for the 4th fighter. I can't beat him without using 2-3 smart punches right away, he hits you too fast.

 

[Espy]

I think in the long run you're much better getting smart punches than increasing the purse value in the skill shot as the pro tips say. The hurry-up rewards a smart punch (and is quite easy to raise to the maximum 5M thanks to the plug), and you can get one from the skill shot every time you lock a ball. Once you get through the initial fighters you can easily double your score (up to an extra 200m) just by spamming smart punches. The "betting" rounds make you wager your points so if you lose, you lose that many points, but with a reserve of smart punches you can quite easily beat one or two fighters on the highest wager. Actually you can probably do it on one smart punch each just by getting the jab combo and going for the knockout. Just be sure to keep track of how many smart punches you have, because I haven't found a way that the game tells you. It might be on the status report, actually, I'll need to check that.

Still haven't beaten the wizard mode. That I'm sitting in the top 20 and haven't beaten it says a lot about its difficulty.

 

[zastian]

I was obsessed with this game for weeks, but I'm starting to tire of it now. I'll list what I like and dislike about the table below.

Pros: The theme, sound, and gameplay are quite unique! Whenever I play this game, it almost feels like I'm playing Punch-Out on the Nintendo rather than a game of pinball. It's fun and quite unlike any other pinball table I've ever played!

Cons: After its novelty wears off, it starts to feel a bit gimmicky, to be honest. The jump-rope and punching bag aren't much fun after a while. Also, Champion Pub is very much a start/stop kind of game. If you like smooth flowing gameplay, then look elsewhere.

All-in-all, I like the game, but it's far from my favorite.