Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castle
Spooky Pinball, 2017You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider scruffypinball.
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Excited to say I’m in on 148! I’m so excited to get this game. I know the butter abs just got in, but where were we before that?
I have the same question bob c- is the rgb Kit the spider in the eye?
Thank you spooky for making such a cool game.
Quoted from Alamo_Pin:I made final payment for #141 today. It’s been quite a wait and I’m so looking forward to finally having this in my house. How long should I now expect until delivery? Two weeks?
Did you get a butter cabinet?
Quoted from DJNOEL30:This is a cool game in a lot of ways, however this game is geared more to the near-pro or higher pinball player. I feel I'm more a middle of the road player at best, however this game is a pretty tough game relative to my other games and I am including TNA in that pool. I'm probably not going to hold on to this one very long..
Co-Op mode should be fun!
Quoted from DJNOEL30:If I could have got my deposit back a long time ago I probably would have backed out when the delays got out of control. I have been giving the game the best chance though and it does not disappoint on looks, sound and lights with the new code update. Even though TNA is an unforgiving game it's not too complicated for a beginner to figure out and have an enjoyable experience. ACNC loses its joy when you struggle to get those orbits just to get the mode started and so far the feedback on the game has been "Meh".. TNA and MonsterBash LE get all the play in my house and not so much with ACNC.. I've been putting on a handful of plays every day since I got it and I still have only been able to complete 3 monsters. I also have it at the easiest possible setting hahaha. The usual Pinsiders would probably say "play Pinball better" but I'm just not that heavy into game mastery, I am more interested in game enjoyment regardless of skill. I don't want to discourage you, you might find yourself loving the game for it's complexity..
And that’s perfectly fair. I’m sure someone would love to trade you a Munsters premium for your acnc. At the end of the day, being worried about difficulty before you flip the game is silly regardless.
I snagged some art blade protectors from pinball life and opted into damn near every option available. Even getting the spooky pin gulp for acnc.
Any other recs people would make save the tape discussed above? (And anyone got a link to buy some?)
Does anyone use pinstadium? Thoughts on pinstadium for this game?
Quoted from DylanFan71:Distributor asked for final payment yesterday. Looks like end of July. Looking forward to getting ACNC. Loaded most of the options.
Only got a couple games on it at Texas but was really impressed. Can’t wait!
What number my man?!
Quoted from DJNOEL30:Well I will say that Co-Op has improved my enjoyment of the game so who ever recommended that thanks..
Such a great mode to play with family and friends! Really looking forward to it
Quoted from Medisinyl:Posted some photos in my mod thread earlier. Will release these soon. Currently printing what may be the final version of the crypt (prototype here).[quoted image][quoted image][quoted image]
Update us here! Looking good!
Not sure if this has been discussed in the thread but I haven’t really heard it discussed elsewhere:
Does ACNC have the best upper playfield in pinball?
Quoted from netman63129:TSPP is really good too
Agreed albeit TSPP is a bit simple in comparison.
Quoted from netman63129:Three targets, a loop, two flippers, a ramp and physical ball lock that is one of the most satisfying shots in pinball. Maybe not so simple
Fair play. I reckon I find it more simple due to the “fragmented” play. But you’re not wrong!!
Quoted from TheNoTrashCougar:Alice Cooper's Nightmare Castle fluorescent green plastic sling and lane guide protectors are now up on the Pinball Life website!
https://www.pinballlife.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=PBL-300-0122-00[quoted image]
Ordered today! Pinball life goes on summer break today so order before 3 pm!
Quoted from javagrind888:If anyone puts these in I'd like a picture please.
I ordered mine and will update.
I’ll be unboxing 148 this Friday!! I’ll post a vid and a link to the inaugural stream if anyone is in to that.
Hey y’all! Super pumped to have 148 as of yesterday. I’ve noticed a small ball search issue when there is one ball locked in Frankenstein. Is this a known issue?
Also, anyone getting stuck balls between the plastic and rubber to the left of the Dracula target?
Edit: two small questions to add while I dial everything in.
I seem to get a lot of spinner rejects. Am I just not shooting it cleanly?
A significant amount of time the plunge will feed to the left sling. The game level. Any tips?
Quoted from EricHadley:What is the benefit of using a distributor? I never really understood why Spooky even has any distributors. I prefer to buy direct from them and put more money in their pockets. They are easy to communicate with and provide great support. Not sure what a distributor adds, except taking part of the profits away from Spooky.
I agree. However, the distro I bought from got me in at 148. I would have been in the high 400’s if I had gone through spooky. I didn’t wanna wait!
I’m curious: what difficulty setting is everyone setting their game to and what’s your high score? Had anyone made any playfield modifications that affected gameplay?
I set mine to the hardest and managed 140 million roughly. It’s such a rewarding thing to finish a monster mode. Really enjoying the game.
Quoted from rotordave:To clarify about the settings ... they are just adjusting how easy the modes are to start. Modes themselves appear to be the same. From Fawz:
“difficulty level simply puts you close to the monster room depending on difficulty. Easy puts you at dungeon/lab after skillshot. schools, is the default and puts you on the outside of the map. nightmare is the way the game was originally set up..have to travel the whole castle”
I put my game on Easy Action for the launch party the other night, so most people would be able to start monster modes. I did a tutorial before the event, to show people how to start a mode. Went well!
rd
Yup! And it definitely makes the game harder! I really like the level of thought put into the code. What was the high score on the night, if ya recall?
I’m hoping for another multi ball that you can “build to” that isn’t the wizard mode (like disco multiball on Deadpool pro) on top of the two two balls that exist.
Quoted from Mr_Outlane:How about a plasma button! You know, like the plasma pop bumper caps? Probably too delicate and not even possible though. But it would look cool on this game!
I’d be in
So I’ll preface this by saying I know this will likely end up in the clown puke thread, but I was messing around with my pinstadiums and liked the green. Don’t worry purists, the original GI is white and nothing hasn’t been swapped.
FAD7C9B4-F10D-4115-B16A-1C8B312B3272 (resized).jpegQuoted from gliebig:It works fine. Embarrassing to admit...but I had some ball hangups on that little piece of foam by the trough. I didn't realize at first that is what diverts the ball to the magnet.
That sub is no joke! I thought the shaker was really working hard but after unplugging the sub, I barely feel the shaker. Going to try an external sub
Is there a way to increase the shaker?
I had balls getting caught on these so they were removed. I had no clue what they were for... whoops!
Quoted from MANTO1975:The plastic protectors that spooky supply are only clear, pinball life now supply plastic protectors in fluorescent green, they would look great on that game, also spooky have target decals, just ask them for a set to be installed on your machine. In my opinion the shaker kit is great on this game,
Hope this info helps.
Cheers
I think these look great. My camera takes poor photos so forgive me.
If you don’t have pin stadiums the green pops big time. I keep my pinstadiums green or white (I think the game looks “creepier” green but it washes out the amazing art. So I switch between them. Crucify me as you wish)
I’m keeping my green plastic protectors on the game for what it’s worth.
I know some people aren’t high on pinstadiums but I love them on this game. The art is too good to not be illuminated (in whatever shade ya like )
Edit: didn’t know brakke had a vendetta against pinstadium going because he’s so upset by pinball marketing tactics. Sorry my man- just figured people would want to see the plastic protectors with different settings.
C19273B6-24E8-4DE2-9A56-C5EE0FF6229F (resized).jpegC7131A72-C5FD-4047-B6BF-D8E45972F9C3 (resized).jpegF9399BD0-AABA-4255-AE3A-EC187B1B4A43 (resized).jpeg0501E4EC-9258-4B0E-B680-456663EA93AE (resized).jpeg
Any recommendations on scoop adjustments? Mine has randomly started shooting all over the place very unpredictably
Quoted from VolunteerPin:Yes, spooky has been awesome. If life wasn’t crazy I could have had my pin months ago. That has been in me entirely. I’m a big spooky fan and still own my TNA I bought NIB.
Darin
I know a fella who will let ya get some games in 
Not sure if this has been mentioned:
If you shoot the castle scoop while “light mystery” is lit, the rgb on the scoop indicating such doesn’t activate always. Anyone else noticed?
Quoted from 27dnast:I did. I took pliers and bent (downward... gently) the left edge of the scoop. Shoots to the right flipper 100% of the time now
“Down”- towards the floor/bottom of cabinet? The coin door? What way directionally as I’m having issues with this as well.
I have no fear about the code- the game seems to have a ton of opportunity to incorporate rooms/items in some way.
Quoted from VolunteerPin:I use those guards on a lot of pins. Cheap and effective.
My Alice does not have the speaker lights. In fact, my Alice is bare bones. I honestly don't feel like I'm missing anything. It is a great pin and just the playfield is attention grabbing enough I think.
Get your ass on over to the house and make that decision in person!
I posted some photos of pinstadiums earlier during “pinstadium marketing gate” in this thread. I personally think they add a lot
Quoted from trilogybeer:He also linked his product to my custom game . And when products are linked to games here it is worded something like “ products relevant to this game “ . When he links to a game like that it seems like he is taking credit for something he or his product has nothing to do with and contributed nothing to . It is kind of annoying that he leached off my hard work and therefore I will never use or support his product.
Are you still on about this? Jesus dude, move on.
Quoted from TheNoTrashCougar:Yeah, looks like pinside quoting messes up the link. It is supposed to look like this:
https://www.pinballlife.com/mm5/merchant.mvc?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=PBL-300-0148-00
Anyway, people were asking how this makes it more reliable... What this does is it puts a tiny gap between the metal of the magnet core and the pinball. This allows the ball to float more freely above the core and not be completely stuck to the core in a random location in 100% magnetic contact. Think of how The Shadow works. There is a gap between the center of the magnet and the ball filled with playfield. This allows the ball to not smash to the metal core, but instead the ball is touching the wood. It definitely works really well on my game and Terry's game here at Pinball Life.
--Scott
Ordered. Thanks for the heads up!
Quoted from javagrind888:SMH, $5 shipping on a $.95 item. Ugh.
Get those awesome green plastic protectors and make it worth it
Replaced the titan rubber posts with some stern thick rubber posts. It has changed the feeds off the ramps that I may swap for some thins but the center scoop post I’ll keep thick. Less than 300 plays and the center post rubber had worn through! I’m off the titan post rubbers. It’s a bit of a pain to get to the center post to change as well as the plastic has two nuts underneath the guillotine.
Got her waxed up and looking pretty tho. Tell me pinstadiums don’t look good
D384868E-24E0-45D3-8B60-122B747E175A (resized).jpegB8DEF08A-4C03-4BC1-9E24-4DF8C808D74E (resized).jpegDA188956-0743-4D10-BFEA-174251B7A771 (resized).jpegQuoted from KingHebes:Did you swap out the factory installed rubber with titans? They don't come with titans.
Excuse my ignorance! I thought they were. But yes, I replaced the factory rubbers.
Quoted from Mr_Outlane:I lit my playfield with a 25 watt clamp light above and off to the side and it works great! $5.00
Cool- glad you enjoy your game!
Quoted from thirdedition:Number 407 arrived yesterday. Setup and running well. Thanks Spooky![quoted image][quoted image]
How’s the coin door latch situation on that bad boy?
Quoted from GuiitarMan:They are going to have the Spooky Fang Club where you can get upgraded armor and such. I don't think there are any plans for multi-tier games aside from getting the upgrades through the Fang Club.
Emailed Katie about the fang club- an announcement is coming soon apparently. Something tells me it will be in tandem with Scott’s release or right before it.
Quoted from GuiitarMan:I'm getting a set of Pinstadiums for ACNC for Christmas. A couple of questions:
1. Will I need the auxiliary power board from PinballLife or will it be ok connecting directly to the game? christhepintern - maybe you could answer this for me.
2. Will installing them void the warranty? spookyluke
Connect directly! You’re gonna love em. I love mine.
I think a major code update could have a ghost busters level effect on the game and interest from the community which would hopefully lead to a sellout of ACNC as it deserves
Quoted from GvikenL:Take your unit off easy mode and it will be a mystery.
Hardest mode here- yep, it’s not random
On “slap save pinball podcast” Scott mentioned that they upgraded the computer in Rick and Morty from
ACNC. It makes it easier to change visual effects apparently. I wonder if this will indeed be the last code update given the extra work required and the game run complete
Quoted from Silkenone:I love the Spooky peeps and I know they’re stupidly busy on R&M - but it wouldn’t be a bad idea, PR-wise, to still pop up in here every now and then.
I reckon the brand new manual and constant help from KingPinGames is more than enough “spooky” representation. What do you want them to say? “We’re creating a new code” every 2 weeks? Enjoy your game and it’ll be here before ya know it
Quoted from JustEverett:My GF hates Alice solely because of the difficulty. By comparison her favorite game is Theatre of Magic, which is super easy to shoot. The Nightmare Castle isn't for the faint of heart for sure. Scott said he lives off the tears of pinball players, but Charlie seems to be fueled by them as well. For me the difficulty makes it that much sweeter when you get in a groove with it. It feels great to hit 2-3 orbits in a row when you're dialed in.</blockquote
Alice Cooper makes you a better pinball player for sure
Quoted from rotordave:Not speaking for anyone - but the focus has been creating a stable platform, to ensure no more memory resets.
Expect that.
I know how hyped everyone gets about new things - then they get disappointed when it’s not what they imagined (key word - imagined) it was going to be.rd
Sounds like it ain’t gonna be that big after all. I like the game regardless
Quoted from rotordave:Like Chris said. It’s huge.
Whole new system. Doesn’t crash. Looks better. Winner.
You can’t have your icing without the cake.
rd
Y’all must not have Duncan Hines down there
I think I’ve been a bit spoiled as I haven’t had issues that KingPinGames couldn’t help me fix.
Looking forward to the future! I hope my post didn’t come off as unappreciative. I don’t know a lick about the issues the team faced outside of “it wasn’t easy”. It’s already one of my favorite games and think it could be one of the best made in a long time when the code is “finished”
Quoted from tbutler6:Honest question....So...if my Alice is running bulletproof on 1.07 (i think) should i just let it be??
I think I’m going to hold off as well. My
Game plays really well and I’m nervous of the “muted” excitement from others in the thread.
Quoted from VolunteerPin:NO DOUBT!
We loved hosting RotoDave and Danni a few years ago on one of their tours. Awesome people generally and excellent at pinball.
You’re a good dude- but one day I’m coming over to take that GC!
Updated the new code and its definitely worth it. Foolish of me to imply sticking with the old one.
Im looking forward to further development and my rick and morty coming this summer!
Quoted from Tuna_Delight:It is. Or can be at least.
And it's not just you and me who think so.
I’m hoping scoring balance and some new game features after they defeated the evil data dumping bug last month
Quoted from rotordave:Welcome to pinball.
I got a Jurassic Park last week ... second game in:
[quoted image]
Then this:
[quoted image]
Lol!!
rd
JP has been out for 5+ months and still having these issues. What BS
Quoted from pingod:I bent the top of the lane guide in just a bit.
Goes to the right flipper every time now.
I think it was just clipping the post rubber before.
This- also I’ve had to mess with the lane guide on the left and spinner position as well. Pretty finnicky
Curious of everyone’s opinion:
Considering how often crypt multi ball happens would anyone want accompanying music? Or sounds? Or a different “jackpot” noise?
It’s a little anti climactic in its current state imo
Also, if there isn’t a damn spinner mode/super spinner/etc coming up I’m gonna cry
Quoted from Coyote:I'd prefer there to be LESS 'Crypt Multiballs'. Make the jackpots score more, but make it harder to achieve. Honestly, I try to stay away from Crypt as much as possible, unless I have a mode coming up where I know I can use it. (Frankenstein Multiball, Zombie, Insects, etc.)
I like the strategic component. I also believe the “ease” is to make multiplayer games more “fun” for casual players. Stealing locked balls and such.
Maybe “nightmare” level hard could change the rules more?
Played 3 games with new code. Had a hard reset on a replay during bug mode in the middle of a ball. Also trapping a ball on the left flipper during multi ball brought up the status report which was interesting.
New shaker motor integration is awesome. Love the idea of the timed tools but I don’t believe they “mean” much more than one time points. Fun game but I expect another Code iteration pretty quickly
I also believe that the ball launch after a lock is counting as a “traveled room” but I could be wrong.
I guess I don’t understand why the difficulty settings were changed. The ability to set the game up to my desired difficulty was appealing, even if it kicked my ass around sometimes.
I streamed it for an hour or so the other day and had a lot of fun. I even pointed out even with the current difficulty changes I probably still won’t get to B$B haha
Quoted from 27dnast:Right, but an announcement on the screen really should be a callout. An excited callout when you pick up the item... a callout when you use the item. Would give it more of a vibe, but would actually make everything make more sense. As it sits, these are fairly major to the game, but their existence and use minimally acknowledged.
The lack of the game indicating where a weapon is after a monster Is selected by advancing a room is kind of a nightmare. I have no desire to memorize 15+ locations of weapons dependent on the monster that is started. Nor do I want to consult a chart.
The map should indicate weapon room locations and there should be an animation when it is collected.
Quoted from Mr_Outlane:I did a full Titan install (all rubbers) and did not have to remove all of those parts. But it's been too long to recall the procedure now.
I put a stern thick post rubber there. Won’t have to worry about it for thousands of plays
Quoted from GuiitarMan:Did you decide to keep ACNC? If I recall correctly you had yours posted for sell a few months back.
I have it currently. I’m moving to Chicago however and may need to sell it.
Pretty bummed
Quoted from punkin:Sometimes pinball people remind me of ten year old girls. Just entitled and want it, want it now.
Oh, sorry, meant this for the confessions thread.
The game was announced in like 2017 or 2018. I think people have been patient in waiting for the code to be finished
Can anyone from spooky comment on the decision to remove difficulty settings?
It effectively forces you to play Igor, ethyl or zombie for the first 3 monsters if you want to use a weapon. I don’t quite understand why the rules were implemented this way?
Quoted from Mr_Outlane:Ya, we asked and were hoping they would implement the option to choose this or not in settings, on a future code update (before last two updates).
It was available before and subsequently removed.
Quoted from rotordave:Just play all the monsters with no weapons ... way more points. And way more fun.
Well, for me anyway.
Some of you in the northern hemisphere probably heard me “exclaiming loudly” last night in NZ. Lol
I got all the way to the last monster on one ball and then had two crappy drains on that last monster and didn’t make the wizard mode. I was not happy. Lol.
I gotta remember to turn the extra balls back on!! Grrrr.
rd.
Its fine if you dont like or care for the weapons but it doesnt make any sense for a "rules guru" like Bowen to implement in a way that takes away player choice in this way. It seems half baked at best by a programmer who is slower than molasses and a company thats looking forward. It is what it is I suppose! Still like the game almost 2 years later.
Quoted from rotordave:I guess the problem is, will it (or any game) be how someone wants it?
Everyone has different ideas ...
Could you make things an option without screwing up the rest of the code? Dunno!
For example ... GOT Pro used to be unbalanced to two houses. Then the code was changed, now it’s unbalanced to other houses. Lol!! Other people seem to love it, I thought that was a dumb update so I sold the game.
For me, I like Alice the way it is now (progressive mode start difficulty) and having tournaments at my house frequently, I watch people playing it and can see that setup suits the majority of players (from all different skill levels)
If you can’t start a mode on Alice, you’re not going anywhere, points wise. That was my big thing with the game when it was released, starting a mode was pretty difficult for a novice player. No mode = no good
YMMV - but that’s my 10c.
rd.
That would make sense if that’s how the game started code wise but it’s not. This doesn’t have anything to do with game of thrones or stern.
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