Unfortunately, there's another company out there that is blowing Stern out of the water....and it's not JJP.

Look at the work done by the Zen Pinball guys on this very theme, and tell me with a straight face that they didn't do it better.

They used custom voice actors, but their guys actually sound good, and are delivering quotes straight from the movie. I agree with Brian....Epic Audio Fail on Stern's part.

Later,
EV

Actually, I was comparing the sound, the custom artwork, and their DMD animations. These guys were able to integrate the movie theme with custom audio/video work, and most likely had to jump through the same licensing hoops/approvals that Stern did.

Waaaayyyyyy better execution. Tell me you wouldn't prefer that work over what Stern did here.

Later,
EV

Got a chance to stop by Gameworks and play a few games of Avengers Pro. Wound up meeting a couple of Pinsiders TheKorn and Shadow (Vince and Steve), and they set me up with a bunch of free credits, so I got to play for over 2 hours without spending a dime. Thanks, guys!

Anyways, on to my thoughts. Of course, IMHO, YMMV, yada, yada, yada...

Short Version:
The Good -Beautiful looking, interesting layout, Hulk is pretty damn cool.
The Bad - Clunky shots, flimsy ramps, at least 9 inserts in 5 different places are completely blocked from view.
The Verdict - Gomez has definitely lost "it". Too much on his plate?

Long Version below

Long Version:

First off, the Avengers Pro is a very good-looking game. I really like the Pro cabinet the best, and it looks quite striking. The backglass is quite cool as well. The playfield seems well laid out, but start playing, and it all starts to unravel.

My first and major complaint about Avengers is simple visibility. If you've been reading these threads, then you already know about the Captain America inserts being different on the Pro and LE. However, those are minor compared to the train wreck of several others.

The most egregious of which are the L-O-K-I rollover lanes. Lighting them is what is neccesary to lite the locks. When standing in front of the machine in a standard, relaxed position, you literally cannot see either the "O" or the "K" in the inlanes. The plastic ramp forms completely block your vision of the inserts. During gameplay, you must literally lean forward a goot foot or so while the ball rolls down the ramp return to decide where to change the insert lamps. VERY distracting.

Also, both Cap and Hawkeye have an insert arrow above their 4 logos, and you can barely see either of them. Finally, I played over a dozen games, and it wasn't until the last few that I eventually noticed that there are *6* inserts over the top rollover lanes, not 3. It's like no one cared you could actually see half of the stuff. WTF?

Long Version continued;

Now, some of the shots are cool (orbits, drops, Hulk), but that Black Widow ramp is a bitch. Whatever George supposedly fixed last night on it didn't last long. On a positive note, Hulk was very responsive, and any ball that hung up on his arms was thrown around almost instantly. He's definitely the highlight of the game.

The code is also quite meh. Starting a hero's mode is indeed the obvious four shots. But once their mode has begun? Why, you get to hit that exact same shot a bunch more times. The only unique hero is Hulk.

Finally, I'll end with another knock on the voices. I totally agree with Brian that if you've got a game based on the #3 movie of all time, you've got to have real movie quotes in there.

All in all, I'm quite disappointed, and very, very glad I've got an X-Men waiting at home to open.

Thanks for listening,
EV

Some more thoughts now that I've slept on it....

The shots from left to right;

Thor targets - nice to see decals on these stand-ups, but there's only a tiny wedge on the "hammer" playfield inserts that lites up, making it difficult to tell when lit.

LH outer Orbit (Hawkeye) - Here's the best shot in the game, as it's butter smooth. Reminds me of ToM LH orbit.

LH inner orbit (Captain America) - not a bad shot either. Leads directly to the pops.

Hulk area - as it looks, this is where you spend a lot of time, and I did like it. Hulk seemed very sensitive, and threw any ball around him all over the place, and quite quickly.

Tesseract spinner - a fun shot that guards the RH exit of the Hulk drops. Unfortunately, once I spelled out "Cosmic" by spinning it, the game didn't indicate how to collect.

Black Widow ramp - as previously stated, she's a bitch. Many shots either rattle the entrance or only make it halfway across the bridge.

RH orbit (Ironman) - tight but smooth. This exits out Cap's orbit.

SHIELD agents - very much like Skids & Mudflap on Transformers.

I still can't get over the poor visibility on this game. Anyone who is buying one is going to want to remove the "Shrinky-Dinks" to improve line-of-sight, as the HeliCarrier on the left is what partially blocks the Hawkeye inserts, and, the Quinjet up in the RH corner is what blocks half of the rollover lane inserts. Also, I think that really bright LEDs up here are a must.

Later,
EV

Ah,hah! Figured out how to post crappy cellphone pics!

Here's what I'm talking about...

LH inlane from player perspective;

Ah,hah! Figured out how to post crappy cellphone pics!

Here's what I'm talking about...

LH inlane from player perspective;

2012-12-20_14-33-35_50.jpg

LH inlane when you lean waaaay forward;

2012-12-20_14-34-11_973.jpg

Likewise on the RH side;

2012-12-20_14-33-28_461.jpg 2012-12-20_14-34-04_636.jpg

In this shot you see the top rollover lanes (apologies for the bad backglass reflection). From the player's aspect, you can see the Hulk and IronMan inserts over the LH lane, and Cap's shield over the middle lane;

2012-12-20_14-34-44_143.jpg

Here is a closer look. There's actually a Thor hammer above Cap on the center lane, and then there's a Black Widow and a Hawkeye arrow over the right lane. You have to do some major contortion to see these during gameplay.

2012-12-20_14-34-52_762.jpg

Finally, there's a triangle insert that says "Hawkeye" waaaaay under the HeliCarrier/diverter. Can you see it? This shot it taken witht the camera down really low.

2012-12-20_14-35-12_648.jpg

Actually, I had no problems whatsoever with Hulk. Anytime a ball touched him or that flap he would go into "spazz" mode and knock the ball all over the place. I don't think a ball sat in contact with him for any longer than one second. Never went into ball search mode.

Later,
EV

P.S. I'm not that bad a player, Korn. I left 8 credits on Avengers and 18 on X-Men...

No worries. Maybe Vince and Steve warmed it up for me? Strange thing was, I definitely notcied that the slingshots got less sensitive the longer I played. Weird.

Later,
EV