OK, B_R, I got a good chance to really get onto BDK tonight. It is deeper than it gets credit for. I had to stop and look up the latest rule sheet to figure a few things out. If you get all the rules straight, this is a pretty awesome game. Stack, stack, stack. You can run almost every mode and Multiball on top of one another, and score mega points. You have to pay attention to the shot multipliers, which are the mines at the Scarecrow Crane stop points. They correspond to the main shots, and the two Gordon targets alternate giving you a countdown to a multiplier, with each shot. Once lit, you hit the shot you want multiplied x2 or x3 for the rest of that ball. You can get massive points if you multiply a shot that awards a Jackpot or Super Jackpot during one of the Multiball modes.
Once you get the Joker Multiball, the Scarecrow Multiball and the Batmobile Hurry Up, you hit the bat signal loop shot for Bat Signal Challenge. Then you hit the Joker, Scarecrow and Batmobile shots to light Batsignal Multiball, which awards Jackpots at each of those shots. But, you can take the risk of hitting all those shots again before starting the Batsignal Multiball, and double the Jackpot amounts, repeat x3, etc... But if you drain, you only get the points for hitting those shots and you lose the chance for the Multiball. High risk, high reward all over this machine.
The Scarecrow Crane is a cool toy, no doubt. I see how the Joker can be repetitious, but seeing as the Joker is probably my favorite literary character of all time, I love it. Getting every character lit is tough. Lucious takes a buttload of hits up the center Batmobile ramp to get lit. Joker and Scarecrow take starting each of their Multiballs 3 separate times, which isn't al, that easy. You want to try and stack Joker and Scarecrow, and have the Joker shot lit for multipliers during Multiball.
There is a Wizard Mode called GothaM City Multiball on BDK now, but I didn't get to it. I had everything but the Scarecrow lit, and biffed it 3 times shooting that damned crane and rebounding SDTM. Then I couldn't get anywhere close again.
My respect for this machine is much higher now than it was just earlier today. There are plenty of modes to get through, but the scoring opportunities have to be hit right in order to end up with a decent game. I am pretty stoked about the machine now.