Isn't This Just Pinball?

In my boyhood, the only place I remember seeing pinball machines was in cramped corners of bowling alleys and a little annex of a skating rink. The machines didn’t take tokens. You were allowed to play five steel balls for a quarter and I never saw anyone win a free game by matching or anything else. There were grooves in the boards and, sometimes, the flippers were so sticky that they would barely nudge the balls rather than sending them rebounding back for mega-points.

I blame those worn-out pinball machines of my youth (and the fact that I could never afford to spend more than one quarter (if that) on a pinball experience) on the fact that I am a horrible pinball player. I can dance to Tommy’s “Pinball Wizard” better than I can play pinball and I’m not a very good dancer. But, I can’t blame my inadequacy on Fastlane Pinball from Frameworks Studios/Merscom). In fact, my septuagenarian father humiliated me at the game when we played via hot seat.

SPEEDBALL

There are no “worn channels” or preconceived ball behaviors in Fastlane Pinball. The action, however, is so fast that, at times, you can barely see the ball.

Though Fastlane Pinball only features one board on which you can play, the game allows you to change the feel of play by shifting the camera angles slightly. You can focus on the spring-loaded trigger, site in on the bottom two flippers, or feast your eyes on two long-angle shots of the entire board. Since the developers realized that it is difficult to see the action at the top of the board whenever the ball is at the top of the screen, a pop-up camera view lets you see the ball action whenever the ball is obscured from the long-angle view.

PINBALL BEARINGS

As with analog pinball machines, there are a variety of games within the game. At one point, your ball may trigger a “jailbreak” in which you have to hit the right targets in order to round up the escapees. At another point, you need to be able to enter the fast lane chute in order to score extra points.

PIZZA JOINT

One of the internal games for extra points in Fastlane Pinball requires you to hit the pizza lane.

Since most modern machines in the pizza joints and bowling alleys of today have message boards where mini-games, prizes and high scores are posted, Fastlane Pinball also has such message boards. As with the cutaway camera views you see when the ball is obscured, the game provides a pop-up screen whenever a message appears so that you can read the screen more clearly. For example, when the slots game appears on-screen, you see a digital version of a slot machine appearing on-screen.

FRUIT CAKED

You have to be lucky to begin with in order to see this screen. Once it pops up, though, you get five spins to hit the jackpot.

Most of the play in Fastlane Pinball is just straight, fast play. You control four flippers from the keyboard or gamepad (we found the gamepad works much better) and have keys (or buttons) assigned to tilt the game left or right. The tilting is important to getting high scores, but even a crummy player like me does better with body language on the analog machines than I do with the keys/buttons for this game. It is nice to have them there, however.

Up to four players can compete (hot-seat fashion) at the same computer by switching positions after each ball has been put into play. Or, in a more interesting fashion, players can compete on the internet with other players using the game’s “ghost ball” method. The game searches the network automatically for active players and will establish match-making transparently. Unfortunately, there does not exist enough of a critical mass at the current time to guarantee that you can find an opponent. That could change with the popularity of the game.

Naturally, the game has a built-in “High Score” list for local players. However, the game also has an interesting feature where, should you score better than I do, you can send your score to the internet. When you do, you receive a confirmation email and become eligible for prizes.

Total Score (Reviewer’s Summary)

Fastlane Pinball has enough speed and stamina to keep players addicted for hours. Where I can remember past pinball games where the emphasis was on a variety of boards, Fastlane Pinball’s primary focus is challenge and performance, both in solitaire and multiplayer modes.

Reviewer’s Snapshot: 7 (on scale of 10)

Replayability 9
Graphics 6 (needs variety)
Responsiveness 7 (controls sticky at times)
Flexibility 6 (in playing mode, not boards)
Price/Performance 9

Reviewer’s Bias: 5 (figured if I’d seen one pinball game, I’d seen ‘em all)