Super Pinball Adventure

TheAwakening
Jan 4
3 min read

Overview

Super Pinball Adventure is a 3D lite pinball game with all the classical elements of a pinball arcade with its own gadgets. It features six levels with their own biome, props, and creatures, which function as extra bumpers. For as long as the ball hits anything your score will increase in proportion with the current combo. There is a main objective to complete before moving to the next level, as well as additional challenges for extra completion.

Gameplay

The game is a small pinball board, which usually features the current biome’s props and creatures (such as trees and mushrooms) and additional buttons and triggers at both sides, with the bottom being occupied by the lateral bumpers and the two flippers guarding the hole. You have several lives in which the ball will get back up if it ever falls off down the board; otherwise, you must restart the level. To complete the level, the main objective involves hitting the featured prop several times without losing all lives first. In every level you must follow the ball’s movements and predict whether it maintains the upper area of the board or plummets to the bottom.

Controls are fairly simple. You can only flip the bottom flippers and hold them with the ball as long as you want. We also can nudge the board so the ball slightly moves to our input. This can be done three times, but it recharges with time. You will notice that enemies spawn on the board as obstacles as well. These can throw projectiles that launch the ball randomly if hit. They don’t pose much of a threat, and they will be eliminated with one or two hits. However, if the ball fails to kill any enemy, they can easily overwhelm the board.

The final level of the six-pack level features a boss, which will take lots of hits before it goes down. Not a real challenge, as all it takes is for the ball to never fall down the board and proper control of the bottom flippers. If the ball does enter the hole, it will pop up upwards for as long as you have lives. There’s at least one level that will use three balls instead of one; these ones still count individually to your lives, and so completing the objective plus challenges can become overwhelming. To get a very high score, the ball must hit obstacles very fast in a short time so our combo doesn’t drop.

You may notice coins being dropped by enemies or hitting the jackpot. These are used to upgrade our nudge limit and recharging speed, plus the number of lives we can have. Power-ups to double our combo and have one extra life can be bought for a level. Not many coins will be obtained, so this compensates for the extra time we take to complete a level 100%. Naturally we can play any level for as long as we want to, but once the objective is completed, the level will end as soon as the ball goes down the hole.

Audio & Graphics

For a 3D pinball, it has very good graphics and animations, even if the design is simplistic. It should run on any PC, as I have noticed the fps hasn’t dropped on any level. Don’t expect a good soundtrack, though, but it gets the job done.