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Today there are a few genres that developers have seemed to have lost a bit of interest in. The 2d point-and-click adventure genre is one with many titles, however it seems like new pinball game releases are rare. Many of my greatest gaming memories are from nights hanging out at the arcade, spending whatever money I could spend on those huge, fascinating machines. Throughout the nineties we saw some awesome pinball games from Epic Megagames and some other companies, but later developers seemed to focus even more on generic action games. Iridon Interactive wanted to create the most realistic pinball simulation to date, and with today’s competition that might just be what it is.
Creating a perfect replica of real-life pinball is impossible, because much of the fun comes from the physical aspect, but it can still be a fun way to waste time on the PC too. Some of the earlier pinball games, like Psycho and Epic Pinball sported a large number of tables, each with a more or less unique, and weird design. Pure Pinball lets you choose between three tables, which in my opinion isn’t very much, but luckily quality seems to have been more highly respected than quantity.
From the start menu the obvious choice for a lot of people is to check out the options. Here you can specify numerous video settings, resolution, table detail, texture size, room scenery, glass overlay, metallic shine, and glass reflection. In the audio settings you can only alter the volume, and whether or not you’d like 3D sound. There’s even less to alter in the control overview because as the name implies you can only look at how the controls are set, without being able to change them one bit. I personally hoped the game supported game pads, however it doesn’t. The actual controls are, as they tend to be in pinball games, very easy to learn. The flippers are moved using the left and right shift button, but you can also tilt the table, and change camera. The latter might just be one of the more interesting features in this game. By default you use the typical pinball view that’s usual in computer games, which gives you the best overview of the table, but by using the F1-F12 keys you can choose between several levels of zoom, in and out. Some may like to see the surroundings around the table, while others might want to zoom close to the flippers, just to get that extra adrenaline rush, and added sense of speed.
The first table you can choose from is named Excessive Speed, which has a certain racing / modified car theme. The second is called World War, which has an action packed theme. Finally, Runaway Train - which is suprisingly about a train. Describing the layouts isn’t very easy, so take a peek at the screenshots, it should show you how they work. Ramps, bumpers and tunnels of sorts are used, so pretty much everything should be familiar to those who have played pinball games before. Getting really good scores isn’t easy, but there are several ways to choose from. Bonuses and combos are accumulated by hitting certain ramps at certain times, and by hitting hard to reach locations may start lights, which when repeated can yield huge scores. If you’re lucky then you might also unlock multi-ball, which is definitely a hectic experience, and for added safety you can also start a “shoot again” light, which automatically rescues a lost ball.
Also, when starting a game you can specify up to four players, so if you’ve got a few pinball fans over at your house, then firing up a small tournament isn’t much of a problem.
Graphically Pure Pinball looks quite good. The texturing is nearly photo realistic, especially if you turn on anti-aliasing and anisotropic filtering. The tables are nicely varied, but offer only what’s normal in typical pinball boards, so to my regret there are no “exaggerated” effects, like in a miniature golf course. The graphical options I mentioned earlier actually do help the visual appearance quite a bit, because the especially the reflections and shiny surfaces aren’t commonplace in the previously released pinball games.
The music and sound effects are also nicely executed, each of the three tables has unique background music, and sound effects to liven things up.
Conclusion:
After having played the game for a few hours I do get the feeling that even though the gameplay is addictive and fast-paced, it also gets repetitive to the point where you really could use a few more tables. With more tables, more equally diverse graphics and audio this game could’ve been even more memorable.
Pure Pinball might just be the prettiest, most accurate pinball simulation, but I’m just not sure if it’s the most fun one out.
