I missed it!!! (was playing X-Men Magneto).....wow!!! really didn't expect LOTR to beat JP, however many love it.

Think I will move to my AFMr now to play tonight....(it is such a fun game!!).

Suspect the final will be close as well...congrats to the winners!!!

I think I'd rather play that one.

Game is stupid fun...whole machine shakes when magneto starts spinning the balls before releasing..then slings them everywhere..doesn't get more interactive than that. Insane....

Appreciate you doing it!!! Outcome not how I expected, but in my case, that's the normal....

Smart....I'm expecting a pretty big blow out

I know. NimblePin had one. Kinda stupid fun that I like. But he could also make an Avengers play good enough to want one.

People get caught up on the new, shiny, and ones loaded with toys...but there are other incredible pins out there.

I love pins from all eras (as my collection shows). It's very hard to compare pins from different time periods, however. They are just so different.
I try to think of them in eras.

-EMs (and you can divide them even further into wood rails, small flipper, and large flipper)
-Early SS
-Late SS
-early dmd
-late dmd
-lcd

Man, I don't know what it was up against leading to this point, but LOTR is AMAZING. I get not everyone likes long ball times, but I love me a big long story driven pinball machine. And the theme? Classic. I will say, to beat JP2, that says a lot.

Just having fun

I voted! 1 of my 2 made it in the final round. Looking forward to next round.

I don't own any of the top 4, and I have strong feelings towards them all. It isn't always about what you own..... but it clearly helps

Agreed....never seem to get crazy high scores, but don't really care....just makes me smile when I play it.....

Another thing that's pretty cool about LOTR is the Gift of the Elves feature for beating modes. A vast majority of pins don't have a reward system for beating modes (or its just something rather dull like a medal) beyond wizard mode progression. The Gift of the Elves feature is a cool hook that keeps players coming back as it creates a game within a game, just like the games layered multiballs and wizard modes. The layering and multiple stages in modes combined with great choreography is something that rarely exists in other games.

Final round coming up, if you're not first you're last!

I agree. The code on LOTR is so great. I didn’t really appreciate how great a game it was until I bought one and put a lot of time on it. Yes it sucks multiplayer (and the artwork I guess), but everything else is pretty damn perfect and there’s so many little nooks and crannies in there. I’m still discovering things a year later.

Like super ring frenzy multiball. The 7th gift that’s not listed on the playfield.

In my heart of hearts, I knew LOTR would beat JP2. Yet I’m still surprised? The recency bias and the fact that JP2 is very strong had me a little doubtful. But LoTR is what got me back into Pinball after 20 years (this was 10 odd years ago) and I have yet to play a game more perfectly integrated, clever, fun, challenging and just downright jaw dropping.

2 ball Destroy the Ring is the greatest shot in pinball, ever, and beyond this the game just has no weaknesses. I’ve played many games for 10 minutes and walked away bored. Overboard. And self assured. But not LoTR. I may not always like spending 45 minutes on the game and having to leave the machine to go to dinner, but I always return happily, on the epic quest to Valinor.

So long AFM. It was nice knowing ya!

Mmmm bourbon. Love me some really good bourbon. My pins felt left out of this here contest so I conducted my own poll with just me and my wife voting. (Gotta find stuff to do during this).
CSI vs. Shrek vs. 24 vs. Indy Jones (Stern). CSI beat Shrek 2-0. Indy Jones beat 24 2-0. In the breathless finals, CSI beat Indy 2-0, despite Indy being a favorite theme of mine. We both agreed that CSI was underrated and resembles LOTR in that each features 3 main multiball modes, and in no other way do they resemble each other. Winner = csi

053D3B04-4402-441E-A496-12247718A9B0 (resized).jpeg

Bad day for me...it’s raining...and my 2 favorites are out

Congrats to the winners.

The right result for me. Very close though!

Simply can't agree that LOTR is a better pin than JP, JP is the best game I've ever played bar none, so much wood chopping on LOTR... but the majority have spoken.

If jp2 had better (dare I say even decent) art and more assets, it would be the best machine ever. The art, to me, really stinks. But that probably goes hand in hand with the lack of assets. They went more comic book art since they don't have anyone but Nedry officially usable. And we don't need a giant Newman splayed across the translite.

And lack of characters is usually something I can overlook. I'm in the minority when it comes to TWD. I not only don't mind the hillbilly announcer, but actually LIKE him. So my opinion is obviously effed up. Lol

And lastly, it's Lord of the effing Rings. Game is good.

You like the art on LOTR more? Yikes. JPs art is not the greatest ever, but it’s leagues better than LOTR.

Tough to pick between the tried and true LOTR and the new hotness JP, but from all the things that matter to me in a game (layout, rules, replay value, even toys) JP is the winner for me.

LOTR only beats JP in theme integration.

All four of these pins are amazing. They wouldn’t be in the final four if they weren’t. However, the big difference maker for me with respect to JP is the lack of assets. It’s a great layout, shooter and the code is already excellent. However, it is sorely lacking in assets - the art, the lack of Jeep, the lack of character integration and arguably one toy. I think LOTR has some of the best asset integration of any pin with everything you would expect from the movies. It also has a jam packed playfield with toys. In my opinion, it’s more of a complete package than JP. For that reason, I agree with the outcome. I say that making it clear that JP is an amazing pin!

Thanks afm for doing this!

Finals poll coming!!!

After this thread is over can we do a “worst pinball game of all time”?

Hmm. Nowhere did I say anything about LOTR's artwork. But yeah, I do. Do I love LOTR art? God no. But the translight is way better than JP2's translites. Also the cabinet art looks way better, albeit that shitty Stern era dot matrix looking print.

You also have to keep in mind this game came out when Stern machine art was all just god god awful (not counting Simpson's). That doesn't excuse it one bit, but look at what stern can do now, art wise. They've done a 180 on what artwork looks like in their machines now. So who was out taking a whizz when jurrasic park came though?

But yeah, no... don't put words in my mouth. LOTRs art isn't great. I'm simply saying that jurrasic park dropped the ball in two spots to keep it from being the best pin ever.... and that's not too bad!

That's right. For you. Because it didn't win the majority vote. However, it would be interesting to see these two go against each other in a few years to see if JP2s newness wears off or makes it even better.

I asked a question. Haha. Thanks for answering. LOTR art loses to JP by a wide margin. It might be the weakest aspect of the LOTR package.

But I think JP is only going to gain ground with time. It almost made it to the final two and hasn’t even been out a year yet. That’s crazy.

LOTR and AFM. To WAAAARRRRR!!!

Could go either way. I think ACDC won one year or was at least in the finals when it was newish

I dunno, Iron Maiden came out with both barrels blazing too, and then faded. I suspect JP2 will end up more like that as well.

Let's regroup in 15 years and see if it maintained its popularity the way LoTR did today.

Exactly. Do it for 5 years, let alone 10 or 20 and we’ll talk. EHoH is in the Pinside top ten for god sake. ACDC was the flavor of the year for like 2 years. Now it’s an after thought. SM was considered an all time great once (still is to me), but after a decade of brand new pin enthusiasts entering the hobby and buying all the new games, the ratings are skewed.

Which is fine. We all know, deep down, what‘s good and what has staying power.

Tell you what, I am stunned at how good XMEN LE is. So much hate for so long, but now finished and mostly forgotten, the games shines. Been playing it nonstop lately. Can’t believe how much I like it.

Didn’t realize this was a running thread for so long. Are the past winners listed somewhere?

There was a really invoked, multi stage battle royale that someone staged a couple years ago. Took like weeks to complete. Can’t remember the format, but it was well done and fun. Be interesting to compare those results to now.

PS, LoTR art better than JP2.

I guess I’m an art newb. LOTR looks like I did it and JP looks like it was done by a professional.

TZ, MM, AFM won the first 3 years I believe(?). when Jar155 was doing it he switched to offsite which I was not a fan of (Shocking I know ) because now the results can't be looked up But then again, there was no poll option back then so it's not easy like now.

Modern and classics bracket is cool.

It’s the whole package man. Frankly, I don’t get the complaints about LOTR art. For a cut and paste it’s well done IMO. I loved the way the game looked in my home. It was warm and earthy and moody and gave you everything you needed to capture the spirit of the movies and the depth of the game.

JP art is just kinda ugly to me. Nothing special about it at all. Borderline Data East in style. Not my cup of tea.

Not even a dong on the LOTR LE translite could get in the way of victory!

On to the next round!

Full stop. I’m sorry I just hate art that looks phoned in. Everything from cut and paste to how horribly the art transferred to printing to the playfield. Everything else in the game is great so you really don’t really notice it while playing thankfully.

I like JP layout too.

FYI we will see where JP lands over time.
Think about Iron Maiden release - everyone thought that was the best machine ever at the time and it has slowly faded including the price.

Time will tell !!

For those that have played a good amount of JP and LOTR does JP offer similar objective based main modes, layered multiballs and wizard modes or is the game more points focused versus being on a journey? I'm curious as I've been considering picking up a JP Premium but haven't played a lot of games on it. In LOTR there are the 6 or so main modes that use the entire playfield well, the 3 movie multiballs that each have various the stages, there's a reward system for beating modes (Gift of the Elves), and of course multiple layered wizard modes. I've read that JP has multiple wizard modes which is great to hear.

Thanks!

It’s more of a choose your own adventure for the main modes. They are similar in the objectives but varied in that the requirements change for each Dino you’re going after. After each captured Dino it gives you an advantage for the rest of the game. Then there’s all the Trex modes, control room modes, side quests for dna combos, fossils, etc. and probably 2-3 wizard modes you’ll never see. Haha

No truer statement....I absolutely have a blast on this game. Have no idea what was wrong w it prior, but zero complaints here!!!!

Added Newton ball for Wolvy...great shots,mb, and alot of ways to play... just fun!!!!.. a gem...

Thanks!