As a fan of the original Black Knight pins I had high hopes for Black Knight Sword of Rage. After playing a handful of games on an LE I walked away disappointed. Is the game bad? No. Could it have been much better? Yes. First off I found the main music track to be extremely repetitive and coming across as always being at 100% heavy metal versus having a build up as any main track should. A track like that would have been much better suited for a specific mode (or hurry up) but as a main track it becomes mind numbing in my opinion.
As far as the layout goes I was expecting more. There's only 5 main shots on the lower playfield and 2 on the upper playfield. The layout overall feel's very generic, too safe of a design, and the upper playfield feel's uninspired compared to Black Knight 2000's large sprawling upper playfield with a motorized target bank. If the upper playfield was larger, had a couple more shots, and featured a detailed 3D mold of the Black Knight's castle versus an unappealing piece of metal with flat plastics as the ball lock then I could see BKSOR being the ultimate Black Knight pin...sadly that isn't the case here.
In terms of toys I'm impressed with the interactive Black Knight toy. The toy has a moving metal flail and a moving shield that reveals an additional shot. However, beyond that the game is a bit lacking in features. Whereas Black Knight 2000 had a larger upper playfield with a motorized drop target bank + a physical ball lock the upper playfield on BKSOR features a large piece of metal with a few plastics screwed into it to represent a ball lock. For $7,500 - $9,000k depending on model there's no reason why the ball lock shouldn't have been built around a detailed 3D mold. Besides shooting around the ball lock there isn't anything else to do on the upper playfield. The virtual kickback also hurts the game as it makes it feel less feature packed compared to the last pin in the Black Knight franchise that was released 30 years ago.
The playfield artwork on Black Knight Sword of Rage is stunning and is a throwback to Black Knight 2000. As far as the cabinet and backglass artwork goes I found it to be too busy and prefer the more simpler artwork on Black Knight and Black Knight 2000. In terms of music I just don't find the extremely heavy metal soundtrack to fit the Black Knight theme and much prefer the rock theme used in Black Knight 2000.
Finally, the heavy metal soundtrack, muffled and bass filled Black Knight callouts, and frequent insult callouts thrown at the player make the game come across as taking itself too seriously. As I said Black Knight Sword of Rage isn't a bad pin, and I'm sure a lot of people will enjoy it. I was personally just hoping for more of classic rendition of the theme with a modern twist (with some comedy tossed in) over the cyber knight + heavy metal take.
© 2001-2020 Pinside.com All rights reserved. Rendered in 1.34437s
Perth
Bay Village, OH
Woking
Paris