Quoted from PDXGeek:Sure, it has nothing to do with the name on the box, but when you are the only one, you dont have to go far to figure out who is making it.
But then can we agree that there are Stern games that make progression really easy / obvious for new players too? Because if it truly has nothing to do with the name on the box, let's talk about how there are some games that are great at this too...
Quoted from PDXGeek:The title I chose for this OP was incorrect, and overly aggressive. The only point I am making, and one that everyone seems to mostly miss, is that we need to see more easy to understand games in the market place. Reason being is if you alienate the entire new gen of pin players, you just lost pinball, and that is something this community of players seems to be missing. Good thing John Popadiuk understands this, but when he is only making craft games, it doesnt help pinball as a whole.
The thing though is that it can't just be overly simple games. To use another route example, Whirlwind came out and was a total turd at first, but guess what happened? After about a half year, the game started taking off in it's earnings. What happened was that players, who had nothing obvious to shoot for, were initially turned off by it's overly short ball times. But... after a little while, as they started to figure out the depth and complexity of that game, they started going back to it again, and again, and again.
Whirlwind may not seem like that complex of a game right now, but if you think about it's place in time, it was the first game that really used something resembling "modes" and is often credited for having the first wizard mode. The challenges in it are really tough, and there are little things that you can do (the Tornado Siren or whatever it is called) that give you challenges that are beyond just points. It's proof that sometimes, a complex game is *exactly* what the marketplace wants.
Now, maybe there aren't the same level of pinball players out there now, but the games that combine the something easy to shoot and the depth are the games that earn really well on route for a long time. Games like MM and POTC - shoot something obvious (Castle, Ship) and then you can figure out other cool stuff beyond that.
BBH, IM, and TRS all have *really* obvious bash toys that you can tell are going to be fun to hit when you walk up. The rest of the rules... who knows? But if you're a new player, who cares until you've played a couple extra games and start figuring them out? FG and Avengers definitely have the same sort of thing. I'd call the jury out on ACDC (I don't know if the cannon is enough on a pro to make a new player drop coin on it... I'd love to see an earnings report on it though, as it may have "Whirlwind" syndrome with the rules that keep you coming back), X-Men (ditto, is bashing Wolvie interesting for a newb?), and Avatar (you don't actually bash the bash target). There are few games that I think don't start with a really obvious, cool thing to try to do.
Quoted from PDXGeek:BTW: Goatdan has been the only one that I have read that is actually thinking about this question in the right frame of mind. I cant agree that the elephant is a huge failing for IJ (it has a ball save after all so its a noop imho), but I definitely enjoy reading your thoughts.
Tell a new player that they have three balls. Watch them play ball one and two. Watch ball three drain immediately. Observe if that player stays standing at the game after the third ball drains.
I forget which designer I was talking to that said that ball save was one of the worst things that happened to pinball, because it allowed designers to design games lazily that allowed random uncontrollable drains straight down the middle. A good design can negate a ball saver.
I LOVE JP, but when the dinosaur eats the ball, and then it comes up the VUK and the player is still trying to figure out what the heck just happened, that is a design flaw for new players.