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- The pinball A pinball, truly one of the best scrolling pinballs for the computer. As you probably noticed it has a high place on the ranking list, not number uno but high, that means this pinball stands above the rest circling around. A shareware version of the pinball has been released (the shareware features the table Darkside, a imo good choice for the shareware). BOS has a number of features included in the game. One that many probably like is the world-scores option. After you have played a tournament game (more about that) a window appears asking you if you want to submit your hiscore. I don't mind this feature, but it is rather buggy (you only get that one chance to post for example). The table features 2 playing styles, an classic old 2D Scrolling table and a normal 2D table (fit to screen). There is four 4 different playing modes to choose (text copied from manual): Imo the could just as well have made 4 separate hiscore list on the WorldScores page.
The last neat feature is the Powerball. Instead of giving out specials when you reach a certain score you are awarded an Powerball which is a special end-of-game mode where you under time pressure (60secs) get to play with a fast powerball.
The pinball features 5 tables, in many pinballs released that feature more than one table the tables are bitewise more or less similar to each other. Well that is mostly only true when it is a quick and hastily (=lousy) pinball. Balls of Steel features 5 tables that have things common with each other, the thing you notice most is that the basic structure of the table themes has likeness even though the layout is different for each table (different modes, different side modes, targets, special effects etc). But in all I feel I can safely say that the tables in the pinball are worth calling 5 tables. Duke Nukem is of course the coolest, err meanest, err stupidest table of them all, comments like "Your ass is grass and I'm the lawnmower" can't be heard without you feeling cool, mean and stupid at the same time. Well, lets go deeper into each table...
This table has a theme based up on aliens and space to put it simple. Explaining the basics of the table is simple. You have 7 different missions to complete to reach the "wiz mode" called Final Assault. Starting a mission requires you shooting a ramp 4 times to light start mode and then shot the lit sink hole. You choose mission with the slingshots. When a mission has been started is doesn't matter if you complete it or not, that is if you only aim to reach the FA. So to reach the FA you need to have started all 7 missions. Ofcourse you should aim to complete each mission since it adds a little to the score (actually since it overall is so hard to score, score big points that is, in the table it is rather essential to complete them). The FA can be rather giving in score (depends on how many jackpots you collect). I haven't really understood the score counting in this pinball. I would want the average score of all objects to increase with each FA which I got the impression doesn't happen in any bigger way. You can ofcourse increase the values of jackpots etc as you play otherwise. The missions are rather interesting. In one mode big red alien thingies (animated plastic droids something) appear below each ramp and you shoot at them to kill them. Enjoying! The tables in general feature lot of impossible effects, somehow BOS manage to implement this without making the pinball totally silly as sierra managed to do so perfect. Other missions are: Shooting Range (hit different targets, ramps, etc for random points), Meteor Storm (in which you try to drain the ball in the sidelanes, the ball is kicked back afterwards), Rescue (shoot ramps to pick up ppl) etc... The fight to reach the FA and the missions isn't at all everything the table has to offer. What makes if more fun and playable is everything around, the FA just gives you something to fight for over and over again. There is the 3-ball multiball (lock 3 balls), the crawler attack (small crawling red alien bugs crawl over the table and you try to squash as many as you can). There is the Super Canon, big laser canon that appears between above the stdm. You try yo shooting hatching alien bug eggs with it (fun). Two vide modes (one lousy, shooting range - way to easy - and one in which you fly a spaceship, good). The table also features two kick backs which can be charged to work 3 times each. This makes playing easier and somehow makes me belive that this table was meant for you to get the feel for how to play the tables in bos (most pinballs with many tables generally has one table essentially easier than the others). The layout of the table is basic with ramps, bumpers, droptargets and sinkholes. Most noticeable is the discloop in the upper right corner (see screenshot) and the eggtube that locks the ball (the ball enters a sink hole and is sucked into the eggtube and locked. The layout works well with the theme and is in all good. The table too is good, although it has the lack that you get rather tiered of it (kind a goes for many pinball tables in the world but especially if you first had the shareware a month and then got the full version). This is also the shareware table. - Duke Nukem Describing this table is even easier than above, you just have to jot down a lot of cool comments. Actually it is the Duke that makes this table, the music, the sfx and the voice overs are just plain silly mean! I love this table. I don't know if it was primarily meant to lure ppl to buy it or what - but it is good and interesting. The layout is a bit more graphical and animated than the Darkside table. Many ramps and loops. In the top left corner stand 3 barrels you explode by hitting with the ball, these clear a path to a little halfcircular arena where you have one flipper that you use to hit an alien walking around in there. Killing the alien enables lock ball. Do this 3 times for multiball. You start different modes by shooting a ramp a couple of times then you shoot the ball into a lock vent. Same thing as in darkside, this time complete 6 modes to get to Final Duke. The modes is different from darkside and are quite fun. The mode "Nukem 'til they glove" (then shoot them in the dark) is rather stationary (except for the name) with flying pigs appearing on different ramps in the table and you shoot the ramp to glove em up. Actually most of the Duke modes are about destroying, humiliating and splattering alines, great fun! :) Unique for this table is the the pickups. You shoot some targets which results in a random object (scuba gear, night vision goggles, jetpacks, etc, sound familiar?) appearing on a random place on the table. After successfully having rolled the ball over the object it is collected and you have to shoot the pickup vent (lock hole). You can collect many objects if you want before you shot the pickup vent. When in the vent hole you choose an object and are awarded a mode. Jetpacks for example starts a mode in which you have to shoot different ramps with the help of a jetpack boost. That means that the ball can enter the ramp in slow speed and then be speeded up the ramp. Atomic health awards an extra ball. Nightvision starts a mode with a gloving ball (the table is darkened a little to make it glow). Another table feature is Key cards that unlock certain ramps etc. that makes it easier to travel around the table. One key unlocks a ramp that feeds the ball to the middle flipper so you can shoot it into a spin loop (one that goes round and round and round. Another card is vital if you want to light a certain lock hole feature. In all a table highly enjoyable if not only for the extremely mean Duke comments. It is sort of a moody table and somehow you get the fix idea you must buy the real duke nukem 3d and play it (hmmm). Anyway it is a good table making justice for the publicity the pinball might get for this table. - Barbarian Ah, this table differs a little from the rest since there is sort of two wiz modes to reach. Die by the sword, uhm, Blade of Power I mean and the Skull Portal Mode. Blade of Power (which I got on my second try on this table) is reached by collecting 5 diamonds (well I belive you here too don't have to actually collect them). The blade of Power is a multiball in which you try to score as many jackpots you can while you have more than one ball left. The other one is a wiz modes based up on the four elements. You complete (well you only have to start them) different element modes (fire, earth, air, water) and then you will be able to start the Skull Portal Mode. A rather challenging and interesting mode that gives you access to a Super Jackpot (which you can get several times during the mode). A fun implement is the Citadel. Spell C I T A D E L to open the gate to it. The citadel is a square area almost in the upper left of the table. The mode begins with 6 guards appearing along the citadels walls. You have 30 magic axes to throw at them to kill them, when they are dead you try to get the ball into the citadels vault and collect the treasure. The axes are just symbolic, you use "magnetic flippers" (the lower left and right part of the table has a magnet each that repels the ball when activated, it thus "throws" axes at the ball which then hit the guards if you aim correctly). When the guards are dead you have unlimited magnetic impulses to use to steer the ball in to the vault which is a lock hole in the middle upper wall of the citadel. (see screenshot if I confuse you). This table has lots of lights and ramps and ideas, I really like it. The best part of it is the big red dragon statue on the table which you lock balls in (but don't forget the end of game comment, "I'll be back")! This table and Duke Nukem is almost the best of the 5 tables. - Firestorm This table is somehow more firm and serious than the others, not that the table layout is especially ordinary, houses, airports, docks, police hq and some atomic power place (all represented by model houses). The table is very mode based, and the modes are implemented good with this table. To start a mode you dial 911 (droptargets ofcourse) and then you usually choose mode with the slingshots and shoot a sinkhole to activate the mode. What makes the modes so fun is the layout of the table. It is of the style with 4 flippers which divide the table into a lower and an upper playing half. Ramps are cleverly placed making access to the upper half possible (you don't have to shoot the ball up between the upper two flippers). See the screenshot for a better understanding. The modes take advantage of the table dividing, though the modes are ordinary in the basics they are fun to play. In one mode you put out burning buildings, and since this is BOS there are buildings on the table that burn. You enter them to put them out. Another mode is find the hidden bomb (all modes are more or less based on bombs since you are out to stop a mad bomber), you then must first enter the dock which is in the upper half of the table. Then you get search different places, the hq, airport etc to find it. Some modes require you to only be in the upper table half which is yet a little challenge. In all this table is good, I like the way the modes go together with the table layout. Since this is more of a pinball game than a sim it is nice to see that they use the unreal special effects (rather seriously) to make the playing more moody! - Mutation! Yet another good or ok table, it is rather fascinating how there is always common things between the 5 tables but how the tables still feel different. This is no exception. Somehow the table has the most different layout. The middle is totally covered by a big area that doesn't serve much more purpose than contain the bumpers and the classic three bonus rollovers. Look at it this way, in the middle to the right is a loop that loops the ball around the upper half of the table and out on the left side of the table at the same height it entered on the right side (!). This circles an area (if you picture it in your mind you should have a up-and-down U shaped area). Beneath this area lies droptargets and lots a stuff. This table has as the rest a mode (mission) based part where you complete various mission to get to a final mode here called Outbreak (seen the movie?). This is all interesting but there is also other things. Above the right slingshot is a disc shaped object with a hole in the middle. If you get the ball into it the ball will spin around and around until it finally reaches the middle and rolls out to the flipper. To access the disc you must hit a sinkhole (control center) which will make a moveable ramp change giving you access to the ramp leading to the disc. Kind a fun, if you get the ball to do a total of ten spins you will get an random award. There is, as in the other tables, a number of different multiball modes not connected to the mission modes. Toxic Spores is one. In it balls will be launched out from the upper half and send out in the big loop. You will then try to get them into the waste chute before they dissolve (about 30 balls in total will be launched out, 3-5 at the same time.
In all this table has it interesting part in the layout which makes it a little different. It is fun to play the table and it is good in all.
The feeling is unfortunately not perfect. It is smooth, yes, soft... but it is a bit to strict. Many pinballs have the problem the ball seems to move in predefined patters in certain situations. This is ok when it is more or less randomly. When you for example in Darkside catch the ball and shoot at a the middle kickback light and the ball makes a perfect bounce series and end up back caught on the flipper you don't say anything, when it does that 5 times in a row you get annoyed. This is what I call the ball moving in a predefined pattern, it is hardly something the programmers meant to be but now exist. It is nothing that always occur in the pinball but you notice it and that is enough for me to mention it here. Shooting the ball with the flippers and aiming is good, I feel like I'm the one playing and sometimes the ball goes like I meant it to go, which is all realistic since the ball seldom go exactly like you want it ;). You can't do any fanzy death catches, well with lot of luck you might partly succeed sometime, but it isn't as much skill involved as there is luck (in timeshock! I really felt like I did the death catch). As I mentioned the ball moves smooth and soft, it certainly beats much, it looks fine and it act good although it sometimes bounce a little to much back from some place when it shouldn't. Tilting is ok, sidetilt and upwards as it should be, I found the tilting to be of quite some use. In all the feeling is good, hardly perfect but nothing you barely get around with. It is as good as you expect it to be in this pinball (which is meant as a positive thing). You play and you don't sit and think, should I aim there so it goes there instead of there, or anything stupid like that.
A side thing that I found annoying (v1.1) was that if you shoot the ball up some loops and it doesn't even go halfway, nor half the halfway it is still detected as a loop, and when the ball rolls back, since it didn't do a full loop, that is counted as two loops.
A good pinball, about as good as 2d scrolling pinballs gets (that can ofcourse be discussed). I certainly recommend it if you are looking for a fun pinball that aim a little bit more wide at all pinball fans (the difficult level is varying but stays around medium). The tournament option ofcourse offers more challenge but it is still no where near as complex as timeshock! (which is nothing I demand, but a little more challenge somewhere would have been appreciate, maybe that you should complete the different modes or something). Some scores like jackpots and table specific bonuses increase as you play which is good (this is partly something you would take for granted). I like this pinball. The duke nukem table is mean and the others are all fun and enjoyable in their own way (as I explained above). This is a pinball that stands somewhere between the line of pinball game and simulation, but it does it good and never becomes too silly or boring and mediocre (you can take the pinball seriously). You might look at the grade and wonder over it, but I feel that is the correct grade to give it, I wouldn't be fair to myself if I rated it higher. If you want a descent pinball that in the overall is good and enjoyable (with cool, fun, unrealistic parts). One that you easily get into even though you aren't an "hardcore" addict. Well this is certainly worth a look. It stands over the mass at least, that is for sure.
system requirements
CPU: Pentium 100 Mhz (133mhz recommended)
Also available for: - Screenshots: ![]() |