Pinball

Name: Pinball
Year: 1985
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Nintendo
Genre:Pinball
Hours Played: One
Beaten: N/A

Before the advent of arcade games, pinball machines reigned supreme as the nation's number one non-gambling quarter muncher.  The premise of pinball machines is simple: a steel ball richoettes around a slightly elevated playing field, and you control paddles to catch, aim, and prevent the ball from falling out of bounds.  When video games hit the home market, adapting virtual pinball machines that people could play at home was a natural fit, and thus, one of the initial sixteen games released for the NES was Nintendo's own Pinball.

Of the six pinball games released for the NES, the boringly named Pinball is easily the worst.  The graphics are bland, the music is non-existent, and there's only one table, making this a game you'll grow tired of very quickly.  There's two screens (an upper level and a lower level) you can bounce in-between, and a sparse number of ramps and bumpers.  There's no real theme to the table, either; there's eggs that hatch into chicks, dancing penguins and seals, and playing cards.  It's a shame since theming is such a big part of real-life pinball machines; the real life Mario pinball game is much more interesting than anything shown here.

The only real interesting thing is a mini-game you access by hitting one of the bonus spots; it takes you to a Breakout-style mini game where Mario bounces the pinball around to rescue Pauline.  It says something about how boring the rest of the game is that the picture on the box is actually from the mini-game.  Unfortunately, the whimsy of the bonus game doesn't seem to jive with the relatively straight-forward presentation of the regular game.

While Pinball is certainly the worst pinball game for the NES, you could argue a lot of the problems (simplistic presentation, only one table) come from being one of the first games released for the system.  What I can't explain, however, is the mishmash of realism (the main tables) and surrealism (Mario-themed Breakout mini game).  There's two camps on how to approach pinball video games: create a realistic simulation (like Pin*Bot), or include video game elements such as enemies and bosses (like Pinball Quest).  Both ways are valid options, and both have their die-hard fans.  The problem comes when you try to have it both ways; you end up pleasing no one.

Graphics & Animation: 1 (Bad)
I wouldn't call the graphics awful; I mean, you can tell what everything is suppose to be.  However, I would call them about as boring and uninspired as humanly possible.

Music & Sounds: 0 (Awful)
If your not going to have any music (besides the generic black box title theme) in your pinball game, that should be because you don't want to distract from your realistic pinball table sounds.  Unfortunately, those aren't so good either.

Controls & Level Design: 1 (Bad)
The controls here are fairly average for a pinball game; with a little luck and a lot of skill, you can get the ball where you want it.  However, I'm docking a point for not having tilt, a feature in pinball video games that mimics the real life technique of shaking the machine a little bit to get the ball over a ledge or slope.

Story & Presentation: 0 (Awful)
As I stated before, every real-life pinball machine has a theme, and every obstacle and bonus mechanism in the game will be centered around that theme.  The game already has Mario in it, so why not feature him, his enemies, and warp pipes on the game's main mode?  Instead, I guess it's a pinball game about... birds and playing cards?

Length & Replayabilitiy: 0 (Awful)
You'll see everything this game has to offer you inside of five minutes.

Total: 2 (Awful)