Computer Graphics Memory Disk Space
Minimum 286/16 320x240 530K 3.6 MB
Max/Rec. 360x350 +30K for sound
Control: Keyboard
Sound: Speaker, DA converter, Sound Blaster, SB Pro, SB 16, Pro Audio
Spectrum, PAS 16, Gravis Ultrasound, Speech Thing, Thunderboard,
Voicemaster, Soundmaster 2
PINBALL FANTASIES gives you four fun, feature-rich tables and pinball action that feels more realistic to me than anything this side of Amtex' one-table EIGHT-BALL DELUXE. Pinball fans should definitely buy this one, and others should give it a serious look as an excellent "Okay, 15-minute diversion time" coffee-break game. Certainly it's helped my procrastination immensely this past month or two...
Anyway, you all know how to play pinball, right? Even on the computer it's not much more complicated. Left arrow = left flippers. Right arrow = right flippers. Space bar = tilt. Down arrow = plunger. Set a few options from the main menu -- three balls or five, steep angle or shallow, 360x350 hi-res graphics or 320x240 standard. Pick one of the four tables, and let's play!
As with SILVERBALL (aka EPIC PINBALL) and others, Pinball Fantasies only shows you a third of the table on screen at a time, scrolling it up and down with the ball -- except with the very nice hi-resolution mode, that increases to half. Once you know the table you don't actually need to see the much of the screen to make shots, but the hi-res mode is still a big plus for good looks.
A more important strength of Pinball Fantasies is the pinball realism. For example, I found Silverball's pinball would gently slide without the rolling-over-surface behavior of a real pinball. In Pinball Fantasies your ball has spin, it rolls differently over different surfaces, it bounces differently off a bumper than a flipper than a wall or ramp, and so on. I'm no seasoned pinball pro, but it felt realistic to me. It makes the game much more enjoyable when the ball rolls like a metallic sphere instead of a generic onscreen circle, and Pinball Fantasies does it well.
Pinball Fantasies' third strong point is good table design. A lot of the computer pinball games out there have five or six basically separate scoring features on a table. When you have an infinite supply of quarters, this gets old real fast... Pinball Fantasies' tables not only have lots of features, but they all interact with each other, so that you want to shoot ramp A then slot B then tunnel C to light bonus feature X. This sort of thing makes racking up high scores in Pinball Fantasies a much livelier feat than shooting the same targets over and over again, and keeps it entertaining even after dozens of hours on a table. I still find some features just out of my reach...
For example, my personal favorite is the Stones 'n' Bones table. Here you can light nine targets to light up a ghost; then you shoot the left ramp to collect the ghost; then the ghost enables a feature on some other ramp. There are eight of these ghosts, so that lasts a looong time, especially since there are several other multiple-shot features on this table.
The other three tables are Partyland, an amusement-park theme, with a small group of high-value targets; Billion Dollar Gameshow, with complicated combinations for large amounts of points; and Off-Road, with scores of lights to trigger by careful shooting of ramp combinations. Everyone I know with this game has different table preferences, which says further good things about 21st Century's design.
There's not much more to say: it's a pinball game with good looks, fun tables and very good realism. Okay, it won't blow your mind the way Ultima 8 might, but if you like pinball at all and if you've ever wanted a good game for instant 15-minute diversions, PINBALL FANTASIES fits the bill.
This review Copyright (C) 1994 by Daniel Starr for Game Bytes Magazine. All rights reserved.