I've spent quite a bit of time with my Black Knight (Pro) since buying it. I hope there are more code changes in the works and thought I'd post a few things I see as bugs or feature improvements.
Bugs
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- Extra Ball lit / Extra Ball awarded play out of sequence. If you get the ball into the lock behind the shield before the extra ball is lit animation plays, it will play the extra ball awarded screen first. In this scenario it doesn't make sense to play the extra ball is lit animation at all, but at a minimum they should play in the correct order.
- On occasions the game will add a second player on a single press of either the start or lockdown bar buttons.
- On occasions during multiball, the ball can drain on the left side while the ball save insert is lit and not serve up a ball (despite the insert lamp then switching off).
- Lights off for mystery award during multiball. Not sure if this is a bug or something to be improved, but the lights off for collecting mystery during multiball makes it very easy to lose track of the balls in play. You could argue it adds some challenge, but it feels more like a punishment for collecting mystery during multiball - especially when you're potentially only getting 250K or 750K in some cases.
- On occasions the auto launch coil will fire to launch the ball moments after I've lanched it by plunger. I haven't seen anyone else mention this, so maybe it's specific to my machine.
- Average Scores audit value continues to show 00, so this is never updated.
Improvements
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- Soft call outs drastically minimised and/or ability to switch off completely. These happen way to much. They start at only the third realm. I almost want to list it as a bug since they are so frequent at this point. It's still a few boses away from the castle yet the Black Knight becomes incredibly soft only mid way through the journey. I don't mind the idea of them as a bit of an easter egg or joke right at the end. But it completely kills the bad ass image of the Black Knight to be cracking so early and so fast.
- Better awards for mystery. The 250K and 750K awards feel worthless and need to be boosted. Some additional ideas: Advance Triple Knights ball lock, fill sword power, extra ball.
- Two monsters per realm to increase variety. This is a big ask as it means additional graphical and audio assets along with additional monster "behvaiour" during the mode. But since the playfield inserts only reference the realm name, an extra monster could be added per realm and have it choose one at random to face without it feeling out of place.
- Open up some forgiveness on the left/right drains straight off the central and light lock targets. If I drain from a missed shot off a post, then that's my fault. But so many times I hit the central knight target or the light lock target only to see the ball drain down the left/right side within half a second, I've got no chance to counter it. You could say "get better", but it happens so fast I feel punished for playing the shots to advance the game. Give me a health bar or something that to help counter those immediate drains off the targets.
- The point reward for a sucessful magna save is only around 550K I think. I'd like to see this bumped up. Maybe even a high score screen for number of saves per game.
- Display the Triple Knights Challenge lock status on the main screen. I think you can view it within the instant info pages, but it would be nice to see it on screen in a small section somewhere the can be viewed at any point. It would only need to display 2 small orbs for the lock status (no need for a third since that starts multiball).
- A smaller 2 ball multiball mode. Something where you're encouraged to go all out attack on the Black Knight for 30 - 60 seconds. Unlimited balls. Attack the flail, Knight and shield as much as possible in the time limit. Orbits / spinners to increase hit value, etc. Perhaps a shot to extra boost sword power for the next monster.
There are probably a few more things that don't come to mind at the moment. I haven't reached the second Knight retro mode or faced off against the black knight, so can't comment on improvements for those modes. I would like to see a little more done with the first retro mode in terms of scoring / rules. Not sure what exactly though. Spelling Knight twice feels like a huge ask (I think my best was 1 letter short). I think there is more that can be done with the game. It's a lot of fun though and has me coming back for more punishment almost daily. I hope Stern are willing to continue making it better