(Topic ID: 156579)

What pin squandered a potentially great theme....

By lowepg

7 years ago


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There are 94 posts in this topic. You are on page 1 of 2.
#1 7 years ago

So, while it would seem we could just say South Park, and drop the mic, what others come to mind?

personally. Im thinking:
Starship Troopers
Stern Indiana Jones
Star Wars made by (fill in the blank)

I feel like SW has a new chance for a real pin, so I don't feel as bad for those misses.... but South Park is really painful.
Love the series, it was a fantastic opportunity for a great, adult-ly funny pin.....

10
#2 7 years ago

Avengers

It's not terrible by any stretch and has some unique rules, but imagine how well this evergreen franchise could be selling with multiple Vault Editions as the movies continue to do well, if only the machine were better.

#3 7 years ago

The Rolling Stones

#4 7 years ago

Golden Eye.

Whilst not the worst game on the planet, the James Bond theme could be huge. Just give me a well done and generic James Bond game (not tied to one particular movie).

10
#5 7 years ago

GOT...but only because of the playfield art and relative lack of theme integration. Great game otherwise.

TH for exactly the opposite reasons. Great art with gameplay that leaves you wishing there had been more.

#6 7 years ago
Quoted from beelzeboob:

GOT...but only because of the playfield art and relative lack of theme integration. Great game otherwise.
TH for exactly the opposite reasons. Great art with gameplay that leaves you wishing there had been more.

I tend to agree with you *today* on both those titles.... Im hoping some time and refinement improves BOTH because they are both games i REALLY wanted to love based on the themes....

#8 7 years ago

Super Mario Bros and South Park. Would love to see a new Nintendo Licensed SMB.

#9 7 years ago
Quoted from beelzeboob:

TH for exactly the opposite reasons. Great art with gameplay that leaves you wishing there had been more.

It's the wide open playfield layout on TH that I don't like.

Rob

#10 7 years ago
Quoted from beelzeboob:

GOT...but only because of the playfield art and relative lack of theme integration. Great game otherwise.

Maybe the playfield art doesn't do much for the theme but game play has great theme integration IMO. Your constantly battling houses to get to the Iron Throne, BW multi ball, Winter is/has come, Battle for the Wall, Hand of the King, dragons to battle, actor call outs, what more do you want?

-11
#11 7 years ago

Theme Suckage.

1)Woz)-worst theme since Dolly Parton, JJP massive fail, gameplay-audio-layout absolutely horrific.

----Seriously) A bitch fight over heels? <I now know why Beezelbub likes Woz so much.

2)Avengers)-great theme. good layout, subpar coding......could have been amazing, add in random superhero attack modes on the avengers from New Avengers or Civil War type stuff. The way GOT has random rules per house, make avengers a more more civil war type, would be awesome.

3) GOT- that shit is mint, big applause.

#12 7 years ago

Read the headline and immediately thought of Bugs Bunny Birthday Ball.

#13 7 years ago

Tommy ... Mostly due to lack of The Who in the audio track.
--
Chris Hibler - CARGPB #31
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#14 7 years ago

1. Back to the Future / South Park (a tie)
Both amazingly rich and fun themes with very little of that richness and fun translated into the pins.

3. Star Wars
While the Data East version is not that bad, this theme deserves much better treatment than it has had in all of its pinball incarnations.

#15 7 years ago
Quoted from TheDrewster:

Super Mario Bros. Would love to see a new Nintendo Licensed SMB.

Man Super Mario could have been a great pin.
Also TMNT

#16 7 years ago

Star Wars, Star Wars, and Star Wars.

-1
#17 7 years ago

Hook. Great movie, underwhelming game. The extremely buggy code and incomplete rules really limit this game, but it has a nice playfield layout.

#18 7 years ago
Quoted from centerflank:

3) GOT- that shit is mint, big applause.

Better than Tron, anyway.

#19 7 years ago

I actually enjoy the gameplay in Robocop but man is that a theme in need of a 21st Century re make, I'm thinking Stern Borg/Lyman based on both Robocop 1 and 2.

#20 7 years ago

Stern's Indiana Jones. I get that it was made during a time of recession, so I can't be too hard on it, however it just lacked a certain level of having epic things that make you go "wow."

#21 7 years ago

Im seeing a pattern here:

Has Sega EVER taken a good theme and NOT destroyed it?

#23 7 years ago
Quoted from lowepg:

Has Sega EVER taken a good theme and NOT destroyed it?

Sometimes they take a bad theme and make it worse. See: Twister.

Whenever I play Twister, I just wish I was actually playing Whirlwind. I feel like Twister had the potential to be a great game, but bad sound and artwork ruined things for me.

Also, Lost in Space. Oh man, what a turd that movie was. I'd love a Lost in Space pinball machine based off of Season 1 (other seasons got weird and campy) of the original show.

#24 7 years ago
Quoted from centerflank:

Theme Suckage.
1)Woz)-worst theme since Dolly Parton.

Disagree. I don't personally like the WoZ theme, but, for me at least, I NEVER would have even considered that a good theme for pinball. So, that s doesn't fall into the "theme squandered" category.

#25 7 years ago
Quoted from Hazoff:

I actually enjoy the gameplay in Robocop but man is that a theme in need of a 21st Century re make, I'm thinking Stern Borg/Lyman based on both Robocop 1 and 2.

I was surprised Robocop 2 wasn't that bad. I just watched it recently and it was cool they stuck with a R rating and made a kid a murdering psychopath. It wasn't as good as the first (it was missing the many layers of social commentary), but Irvin Kershner directed a worthy sequel.

#26 7 years ago
Quoted from lowepg:

Disagree. I don't personally like the WoZ theme, but, for me at least, I NEVER would have even considered that a good theme for pinball. So, that s doesn't fall into the "theme squandered" category.

Disagree, worst theme ever, my grandma would have like it though....

Edit- oh, wait, I gotcha, sorry, speed reading and posting, my bad.......

#27 7 years ago

Back to the Future... If only Data East would have made "Time Machine" BTTF instead. Time machine is 10x the game BTTF is.

#28 7 years ago

I won't post names of games that do it poorly because I'll just get thumbs downs for mentioning them, but many of the best games have completely dropped the ball on theme integration.

An example of great theme integration is STTNG (even though I'm not really a fan of the game as a whole). It does a great job of making you really feel like you're a member of the Star Trek crew, and are participating in the actions. It's all about the speech, sound effects, and the way the game itself interacts with the ball and integrates all those things into what you're doing as a player. Many newer games seem to forget about those details and they just program a game that occasionally has voice calls and clips from the theme thrown in.

#29 7 years ago

I still love the game, but when you read about the plans they had and see what they actually got to make, Doctor Who had way more potential.

http://pfutz.us/UnofficialDoctorWhoPinballHistory/

#30 7 years ago
Quoted from dmbjunky:

I was surprised Robocop 2 wasn't that bad. I just watched it recently and it was cool they stuck with a R rating and made a kid a murdering psychopath. It wasn't as good as the first (it was missing the many layers of social commentary), but Irvin Kershner directed a worthy sequel.

Nah. It's a pretty terrible movie.

Robocop is in a class by itself, and really, the DE pin did it justice by cramming all the catchphrases in the game along with cool music. The art ain't so hot but I'd certainly buy a Robocop for a dollar if I had a chance. And it's in PAPA B bank this year!

#31 7 years ago
Quoted from Lethal_Inc:

Maybe the playfield art doesn't do much for the theme but game play has great theme integration IMO. Your constantly battling houses to get to the Iron Throne, BW multi ball, Winter is/has come, Battle for the Wall, Hand of the King, dragons to battle, actor call outs, what more do you want?

I want something that looks like it came from the show when I'm looking at the playfield. It just looks like an updated (and not as exciting) MM playfield. That's where the theme integration drops the ball. I agree that the gameplay is integrated well, but that's just one reason the game play rocks. I think most people were disappointed during the GOT reveal because of the reasons stated above.

DISCLAIMER: I own the LE and love it. Just keeping it real.

-1
#33 7 years ago

Dirty Harry. Cool art with uninspired playfield layout and rules.

#34 7 years ago

Austin Powers

#35 7 years ago

GOT. My favorite Stern of the past few years, I love the game, but they still totally botched the overall package and theme.

#36 7 years ago
Quoted from CrazyLevi:

Nah. It's a pretty terrible movie.
Robocop is in a class by itself, and really, the DE pin did it justice by cramming all the catchphrases in the game along with cool music. The art ain't so hot but I'd certainly buy a Robocop for a dollar if I had a chance. And it's in PAPA B bank this year!

Well it wasn't as bad as three. At times, Robocop 2 felt like it was made for TV with the set design, lighting and camera work but with a layer of violence and language to make it R rated. Maybe I thought it wasn't too bad because I watched 3 before 2 and 3 was just awful.

GOT is the game that squandered it's potential for me. It feels like generic medieval game with tacked on elements from the show. It's a great shooting game (pro>prem/LE).

I'm curious why South Park didn't live up to it's potential. I've watched a few episodes but by no means am I a fan. I played a few games for the first time last night and it was interesting. Does it have the same layout as SWT? I noticed that same gigantic whole on the right side.

#37 7 years ago
Quoted from dmbjunky:

Well it wasn't as bad as three. At times, Robocop 2 felt like it was made for TV with the set design, lighting and camera work but with a layer of violence and language to make it R rated.

You know I get excited anytime I get to post this. Robo 2 is a classic. Robo 3 is way bad, but the overall idea of cheap import Japanese robots is kind of amusing. At least the TV show was interesting.

Quoted from dmbjunky:

I'm curious why South Park didn't live up to it's potential.

It's simple, Sega made it.

EDIT: For me really thinking back over the years I might have to agree with X-Files. Came out at the right time, X-files was still hot, and splat. But again...Sega.
EDIT 2: I was not a JM movie fan at all, but the whole cyberpunk aspect had a lot of possibilities...unforturnently that game was garbage out of the box.

#38 7 years ago

Another way to pose this question might be "what pin has a great theme but poor game play or poor theme integration?". Games with bad themes (Wizard of Oz or Johnny Mnemonic are often considered bad themes, for example) are by definition disqualified from this discussion.

-5
#39 7 years ago

Wizard of Oz is a great theme, they just didn't know what to do with it. It's such a literal, specific table, there's no room for the player's imagination, which can be a real fun-killer. GOT is the opposite, it's so vague the theme is essentially nonexistent. Shoot the ramp! Why? You know, whatever, that one character or something. Here's a blurry clip from the show and a boring, nondescript callout. Snooze.

#40 7 years ago
Quoted from MikeS:

Back to the Future... If only Data East would have made "Time Machine" BTTF instead. Time machine is 10x the game BTTF is.

I agree, Time Machine is a great machine. Could have been a very nice BTTF.

I'd much rather like to see the Back to the Future theme get the Superpin treatment à la Indiana Jones and STtNG, though. Even now, if a manufacturer like Jersey Jack would make one, that would probably be my first NIB.

#41 7 years ago
Quoted from trunchbull:

Wizard of Oz is a great theme, they just didn't know what to do with it. It's such a literal, specific table, there's no room for the player's imagination, which can be a real fun-killer.

I guess that's different strokes for different folks. I love the fact that the Wizard of Oz table is so specific to the theme. For example, the set of rainbow targets mounted on a curve makes sense for Wizard of Oz, but would be quite contrived to work into a Star Trek theme. Meanwhile, Stern Star Trek has such a generic layout that if you changed the art, music, sounds, and rules, it could be ANYTHING: Star Wars, Game of Thrones, Back to the Future, Hobbit, Indiana Jones, Twilight Saga (shoot left ramp for team Jacob, shoot right ramp for team Edward).

#42 7 years ago
Quoted from CrazyLevi:

Nah. It's a pretty terrible movie.

Robocop 2 is great.

robocop2-03_(resized).jpgrobocop2-03_(resized).jpg

#43 7 years ago
Quoted from lowepg:

Im seeing a pattern here:
Has Sega EVER taken a good theme and NOT destroyed it?

I want to hear about your problems with Starship Troopers. I think that theme integration is fantastic and the gameplay is great. It's totally over the top with the animations, gore, flashers, bugs everywhere and the screeching when you kill one. I love that game. One of my favorite guilty pleasure movies too. Love the coding of the third flipper too.

#44 7 years ago

Hardbody.

It really should have covered the whole movie not just the weightlifting women.

-1
#46 7 years ago
Quoted from chuckwurt:

I want to hear about your problems with Starship Troopers.

I think SST is a pretty good game.
I tried to watch the movie, but it was just too campy.
The game though, I enjoy. I sold mine to replace it with a Sopranos, but I miss it now.
--
Chris Hibler - CARGPB #31
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#47 7 years ago
Quoted from ChrisHibler:

I think SST is a pretty good game.
I tried to watch the movie, but it was just too campy.
The game though, I enjoy. I sold mine to replace it with a Sopranos, but I miss it now.
--
Chris Hibler - CARGPB #31
http://ChrisHiblerPinball.com/contact
http://webpages.charter.net/chibler/Pinball/index.htm
http://www.PinWiki.com - The Place to go for Pinball Repair Info

Can't be mad about Sopranos though. I love that game too. Hope to have both someday. They are also games you don't see in every collection which I like.

#48 7 years ago
Quoted from lowepg:

Im seeing a pattern here:
Has Sega EVER taken a good theme and NOT destroyed it?

Baywatch. I'm not saying that it is a great theme, but Sega made a very good pinball machine around that theme.

#49 7 years ago

Sopranos is kind of the opposite of what we are talking about. A game where the theme makes up for the game play. There are ledgions about it, but I have yet to see a sopranos where the safe closes to a point where it doesn't look broken.

#50 7 years ago

I'd say Popeye. Python was in a "Save the Planet" mode and wrote a draft for a movie script that accompanied the game. I love his creativity, but I like classic Popeye (1930's) a lot more. It would have been better if it was based on the awesome Sinbad the Sailor cartoon.

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