Warning *** - Long Post Ahead ->
Game code for Hot Wheels is complete and it feels quite elegant. It works extremely well with the layout and allows for many ways to explore the game. Rules are logical and straight forward, making them easy to understand. Keeping in mind the purpose for this particular themed pinball is having fun, it is not about scoring nor kicking the player’s butt. But scoring is important too because it reflects how your actions resulted and it can be used to try out different strategies. The following items could be tweaked further.
High Score Screen -
Allows you to enter 8 characters. In this day you should be able to enter at least 30 characters. Also where are the numbers and symbols? I wanna create some crazy names and so letters alone do not allow me express myself.
Main Screen -
The symbols are hard to decipher what they are. Sure I need 2 hits on something that looks like an industrial fan, but that represents the pops. So if you don’t want to pick different symbols, at least label each with a single word. So that symbol would have POPS written under it or beside it. Then when I see a number, I’ll know what it refers.
EPIC battles -
EPIC battles are underrepresented in this game, where there is a choice of ramps, loops, cars or pops. Once you start epic, there is NO feedback from the game until the mode completes and can be collected. This is a problem because if you don’t notice that you’ve started EPIC, you might not notice it running or even know what shots to hit because of a lack of prompts.
If you picked ramps, there are no blinking arrows for ramp shots to indicate shoot here. If you picked loops, there are no blinking arrows for loop shots to indicate shoot here. If you picked pops, there are no blinking pops to indicate shoot here. If you picked cars, there are no blinking car standup inserts. These items all need to blink with lighting to match the active epic battle. Might need to add a light strip in each pop bumper.
As for Epic battles, there also are no progress indicators. Main screen should have an icon to show how many hits are made towards completion - like 3 of 5. Progress on EPIC is currently not shown. The proposed indicator should be added on the main screen.
Skill Shots –
This game is most notably about revving the tachometer to start redline mania. You can collect hero cards too, but the one thing someone will remember once going home is the tachometer and did they start redline and shift a gear. As such the game should use the skill shots to prelight the tach and the reverse is true too, progress towards revving the engine should be the reason to try the skill shots. The game currently has 2 skills shots. Shot 1 involves the 1-2-3 in shooter lane. Plunge ball near x and earn 1+x on the tach. Whereby 1 gives you 2 and 2 gives you 3 and 3 gives you 4 on the tach. Now the second skill shot is screwy, and in a bad way. You rev tach with flippers and when ball leaves launch spring, whatever is # is on the tach awards points and a multiplier. These are generally values between 300k and 600k and the multiplier varies from 1 to 4. So the second skill shot awards a few million points. Big Deal, Nobody wants points here, we want tachometer progress. What is interesting about the skill shot is you can try for both shots at once and you’ll get some tach progress and some points. But if you’ve ever score 1B+ on this pin, and that is possible on a good game, a few million points aren’t worth your time. Onto the proposed changes.
The first skill shot will now be considered the safe one. There is little danger in anything going awry and if you land on x, you are awarded x on the tach. The only difference in current skill shot 1 is that you are now awarded 1+x, so get rid of the 1. You also currently start each ball at a differing point. Initially you have zero progress, but by ball 2 you may start the tach on a value of 3 or 4 before plunging the ball. I propose you eliminate carried over progress and always start from zero. The reason is you have a fresh engine and new attempt at skill shot.
The second shot will now become the risky one. It has great reward but also great risk. When you plunge the ball, if the ball leaves the switch at tach values 1-8, you get nothing. Reason is we want to land it exactly on 10 but not blow the engine, and a value of 8 is horrible. Not that it is easy but the result is bad so you shouldn’t be awarded for bad play. Go back to skill shot 1 if you want to succeed. If you land the tach on 9, that is pretty hard and you would receive 2 hits on the tach. If you land on 10, you are very good and should be awarded 3 hits. If you blow the engine by holding onto flippers for a fraction too long, you get zero for the skill shot and zero on skill shot 1, even if you qualified for it. That’s right, you get nothing on the tach if you blow an engine. Makes sense, right?
Both skill shots 1 and 2 are fun to try at once, because it test your ability to manage two physical inputs at once, yet it can cause you to be less than optimal on either shot. If you hit shot 1 perfectly you earn a 3. If you hit shot 2 perfectly you’d earn a 3. Hit both shots perfectly, you’d have 3 + 3 = 6 on the tach. Blow the engine on skill shot 2 and get a 0. Therefore the starting value of the tach is consistently 0 and initial progress is earned entirely by the skill shots. Getting a large value of 5 or 6 on the tach is a big advantage to reaching redline and to shifting gears.
Number of Balls per Game-
The default is 3 and this can be adjusted in the menu. However we know that most people at home and all people on location will not adjust from default. I find the game to be most enjoyable on 5 balls and have easily reset mine. I am finding that I have achieved some progress and experienced some moments by ball 3. But if I chose 5 balls, my score will be double and I will have had many moments and might achieve a score of 1B. The game awards extra balls at various scoring levels so having two extra balls from the beginning ensures you can earn an extra ball. It is way more fun on this game by having balls 4 and 5 and remember that was the intent of this theme, to have fun. Because of this, I suggest AP consider making 5 balls the default setting on HW and allow users to change it to 3 balls manually or in competition setting. Imagine the excitement of discovering a pinball game on location that gives you 5 balls. It gives you something extra for nothing and that is good.
Without any of these changes the game rocks. Any improvements will be considered - extra icing on the cake.
JeffS