A stylish looking cyberpunk pinball game with bullet hell mechanics and a ton of style - not a great place for beginners but fun and engaging for those with experience if you like Wiznwar's over-the-top visuals and mechanical complexity.

While Demon's Tilt goes in a gothic horror direction, Xenotilt goes for an 80's neon cyberpunk aesthetic. With smaller paddles and more intricate mechanics I found XT much harder to get to grips with than DT, and generally more difficult to follow. The camera is zoomed out more to accommodate the large board and it's many elements which can make tracking the ball a bit trickier and makes shots all the more precise.

I've only played this a little as a beginner but it feels like there's a lot of potential awaiting those with the skill to master it. The ability to shoots guns by cradling the ball and then upgrading those guns like a shoot-em-up is wild and leans into the experimental / non-traditional pinball gameplay I'm here for. Hope to return to it once I'm a bit stronger at the basics.

FX's schtick is that their tables are fully digital original creations allowing for some unusual ball movement, rendered characters to wander around the table, and the table itself to transform with elaborate animations and pieces adding to the usual pinball experience. The tables aren't for everyone, but they are a lot more engaging and dynamic - albeit in obvious and unimaginative ways.

I picked up a handful of different tables to try out and while the default FX ones are serviceable, the real effort has clearly gone into the licensed tables. I was surprised just how intricate some were - such as the Fallout table that lets you make a character, has an inventory and currency, and features a variety of missions and faction quests to explore as you play. Similarly the Back to the Future table's parts and mini-games adjust depending on which time you end up playing in. It isn't a perfect formula however as there were many tables (the Balls of Glory pack especially) that just didn't work for me - just a lot of lazy references and generic gameplay.

As much as I do enjoy the gimmicks and mechanics on these tables, my feeling is that they are aimed more at pinball lovers than fans of any given IP. They could go way further with these ideas, have the table itself morph and change, add more layers and depth, but they clearly want this to be pinball+. The old game with sci-fi looking tables. It works for what it is and makes for a different style of play compared to old school boards, but being aimed at a niche audience makes the result an acquired taste.

It's hard to say what's going on with this one. It uses the same engine as Pinball Arcade but likely exists as a separate entry in steam to renew their lost table licenses? It has a much worse UI and lots more bugs than PBA so most of the fan base is pissed at its existence - especially since many think it implies that they'll make you re-buy all the tables you already bought as DLC for PBA (though DLC for PBA worked on SPA).

Right now just seems like a terrible time to get into simulated pinball. Licenses are being negotiated, the software is up in the air, and there's no telling which big brand will launch the standard platform for the next 10 years.

This title at least seems like an objective downgrade to PBA. If you play both you at least get access to 2 sets of free tables, but that's the only benefit atm.

Stern is one of the biggest pinball machine manufacturers and the idea of this is to let you play simulated tables, sold in packs as DLC. The issue is that it launched in 2013 and many licenses have run out. There's a couple decent tables worth picking up but you're just picking at scraps at this point.

The simulation itself is mostly high quality. If you're familiar with Visual Pinball it's along the same lines just with a professional UI and high quality assets. The tables are re-created in complete detail and the physics work very well. The tables left however are quite hit and miss. I grabbed Stern pack 1 and 2 which provided 11 tables total, but I only really enjoyed 2 of them - the Ghostbusters table and Frankenstein.

The Ghostbusters (2016) table is my favourite as it has a lot of simple functions, a lot of cute gimmicks, the DMD animations are great, and all the sound effects mix nicely. It's easy to pick up and hard to master but very replayable since there's a lot of features to explore, and lets you 're-enact' scenes from the film in so far as shooting targets lets you. The whole experience has a lot of charm.

Frankenstein, Flight 2000, and Phantom of the Opera were interesting boards, not too difficult but fun to play. I had bought pack 2 for Starship Troopers and Star Trek but found both very underwhelming and overly simple. Last Action Hero was also disappointing as the game has very low quality audio clips and featured lines that weren't memorable at all - just seemed to totally miss the mark.

Since the base game is free there's a couple of tables you can play for free that change each week. It's hard to encourage people to buy in when the game is at the end of its life cycle but there are tables you aren't going to find legally elsewhere. The DLC is compatible with the new release 'Stern's Pinball Arcade' (way worse UI, and alternate free games from the same small list). It's possible SPA will replace PBA going forward but it has the exact same licenses so it's basically the worst time to get into pinball simulation.

A fully simulated table akin to FX style tables, but with a demonic pixel art theme that looks stunning. A fun and engaging introduction to video pinball making use of an elaborate 3-tier board.

At first glance Demon's Tilt looks overwhelming and while there's a ton of intricate moving parts, once broken down it's simple to follow. There's 3 sections: top, middle, and bottom each with their own boss to fight by striking it with the ball. Each section also has a lane to shoot which activates a challenge (aka ritual) and for each challenge you're granted a letter that spells out the section's word (hermit, arcane, and zodiak). Completing a word is big points but beyond the core mechanics there's also a multiball, various jackpots, the anvil multipliers, and lots of little enemies to mow down. You also generate magic which can trigger the ball to move along automated paths that assist play.

This was my first real introduction to pinball and between the art style and the intricate gameplay it was a lot of fun. You start out just playing, taking in all the lighting effects and points racking up, learning to just reactively hit the ball. But it isn't long before you're learning how to shoot at specific things, how to use the tilt, and reading on the board mechanics. After a week my score went from less than a million to over 50 mil - small numbers compared to the billions on the leader boards but it's nice to go back to a genre which lets you measure your progress.

If you're new I think this makes a fun introduction to pinball. A lot of machines are over-simple for modern gamers but DT gives you plenty to do and it looks great doing it. The 3-tier board certainly makes it stand out with some unique mechanics and effects, but there's no attempt at realism (for better or worse).

A very simple and short point and click that suffers from the usual problems of nonsensical puzzle solutions and a couple of pixel perfect objects that are easy to miss.

The plot is like a children's version of Alien but it has some big words and intricate puzzles. There's some death scenes with implied violence but you don't see anything and the xenomorph inspired creatures look like they're made with balloons. There's something almost charming to the 90's pre-rendered backgrounds but even for its time the quality here is a bit janky (Final Fantasy 7 came out 2 years after this).

The gameplay is a bit clunky just because there's a lot of filler rooms and a massive number of red herring items. The world is a decent size to explore but since most of it is padding there's not much value in what you find. The puzzles are also hit and miss, both the times I ran into dead ends it was due to unusual object interactions and poor communication.

This was one of the very first PC games I ever played and it was only for a few minutes at school. It was nice to finally go through it but a shame it ended up being nothing special. It is freeware you can download publicly, but I'd say save your time and just watch a playthrough on youtube.

There's a lot of Ghostbusters games but this one stands apart for it's authenticity - a return of the original cast, the 3rd film script on hand, and gameplay that lets you live the fantasy the movies sell.

Almost all of the original cast are back (minus Rick Moranis and Sigourney Weaver) along with you playing a new recruit. You're lead through a variety of call-backs and scenes from the original film mixed into the new plot. The original voices add a lot to the story but the trainee you play feels shoe-horned into the script. The story ends up being fun in parts and functional overall, but the environments feel very phoned in. They clearly had original ideas but it's like they built them from cheap pre-made parts. The biggest effort went into re-creating locations, objects, and effects from the films.

The entire thing plays out very cinematically and gameplay is very straightforward - you zap the ghost until it gets tired while dodging attacks, then you deploy a trap and pull it in. There's a few different beams and tools you'll get as you go, but it's really just 'zapping mode' or 'scanning mode' throughout. The scanning will let you find your way and unlock some achievements but that's about it. The combat can be brutal at times as ghosts do a lot of damage which makes you focus on dodging, that combined with health-sponge enemies results in some very drawn out sections.

I'd say it's worth a play if you're looking for that 3rd movie experience or if you're a fan of the original films. It's hard to recommend this to newcomers because it's so closely tied to what came already. The gameplay feels like the films, you play scenes from the films, there's a lot of catchphrases. Lacking all that context you're walking into some very simplistic gameplay and a story-heavy experience.

If you loved New Vegas for it's deep and interesting characters, well designed open world, strong writing, and versatile game design - expect absolutely none of that in this DLC which answers the question: What if FONV was a corridor shooter with dick and fart jokes?

Old Wolrd Blues is in every way the exact opposite of the base game. It kicks off with a 20 minute non-stop exposition fest from a group of badly written unfunny characters who make at least 3 dick and fart jokes before you even start the DLC proper. Your objective is to travel 3 paths, find 3 items, and beat the cartoonishly evil bad guy.

As I've mentioned in the main game review, Fallout's shooting is the weakest aspect of its design. There's no mobility, the vats is clunky and interrupts, and shooting is more RPG than simulational making it feel like you're trading numbers with bullet sponges. So treating FONV as any other FPS game of its time and inserting a bunch of shooting corridors is one of the worst directions to take the game. It's laborious, slow, and un-fun.

Meanwhile all the content that made FONV is entirely absent. The open world is replaced with a small domed city with 3 main paths and a few extra labs to explore. The extra areas are themselves incredibly mundane and have little to discover. The characters are incredibly shallow, unfunny, and cartoonish so there's no depth to explore there. You have no companions. Your skills do not factor into the mission design. But you do get a new gimmicky sound gun which does nothing to spice up the awful combat.

I get that whoever made this wanted to produce a light-hearted silly low-stakes story that gave players a break from the bleak serious tone of the base game but it gave me whiplash coming into this off the ending. It actively erodes the nuance, seriousness, and depth of the game - entirely evaporated by the end of the opening monologue. It nosedives into the most banal and generic FPS action imaginable of its time, discards every strength of the core game and wallows in it's weakest design aspects. It actively undermines the creativity and effort that went into avoiding that with the base game. It feels lazy, uninspired, and tonally divorced from the core game.

I couldn't stomach even finishing this DLC and, since I can't go back to the main game without finishing it, if I ever play the other DLC it will be on a new play through of the core game. I hated this experience and it actively harmed my appreciation for the base game. Do not recommend.