Initial Iron Man Review

The local operator emailed to let me know they just put this in the local theater. I rushed right out and was likely one of the first to play on that machine. When I got there the machine was standing there alone as most pins are here in Alaska. I don't complain though as that means I will have the machine all to myself.

The first thing I notice is the volume is set so low as to be barely audible over the dancing game next to it so I can't really rate the music at this time. Shame, as I heard it is supposed to be good. I could hear a guy announcing directions on which shots to make but it didn't sound like MDjr. The Playfield artwork is good and very bright. You would have no problems playing this in a dark room. I love the cabinet and backglass artwork, even if it is straight from the movie poster but hey, if it works, use it. Someone said it looked like a bunch of Pokiman cards for the characters but I'm not sure how else thy could have done it. The DMD animations are good and rendered from the movie cut scenes but suffer a bit like Spiderman in that they are a little blurry at because of the crappy resolution. The ramps seem to be the same ones as Auston Powers and they look really flimsy. The left one has metal protectors on both sides of the entrance and the right ramp has one on the left side but not on the right. Time will tell if this is a problem.

Now for game play. Even on a new game the ball had difficulty getting up the right ramp. I've read that Stern will provide a more powerful left flipper coil. To make matters worse, when the ball doesn't, it will roll back SDTM. This is on both ramps so start nudging the heck out of the ball while it is still on the ramp. The ball would routinely get stuck in the Iron Monger loop and would have to be nudged out. The Iron Monger target and both magnets stick above the playfield just enough to change the trajectory when the ball rolls over them. Surprisingly, even though Iron Monger is so close to the center of the flippers I don't remember ever having a drain off him. There are two targets on his sides so you can aim glancing shots off him and still have it count. The rightmost drone target is like the Palintir shot in LOTR and shots off the left flipper almost always sends the ball SDTM at a high rate of speed. The War Machine kickback is heinously fast, I recommend hitting the right flipper as soon as the ball comes off the ram. It's way faster than Jurasic Park's. The top of the left slingshot is angled to direct the ball into outlane but the right one is the nornal single post. The inlanes are shaped so smooth that catching a fast ball just might have the it roll up the inlane and into the outlane. The magnet randomly throwing the ball is cool and only once did I have it shoot down the right drain. Scoring is relatively low for a modern game. This isn't like Elvis or Indiana Jones in which you sneeze and you get a million.

The playfield is simple and seems almost empty. But don't let this fool you into thinking this is an easy game. This game is FAST. The ball is always moving at a high rate of speed. Play is AFM-like; simple, fast and unforgiving. If you don't have good aim you will have very short ball times. At $1 a game I only played for a short while but I don't think it is as good a game as Spiderman. Maybe a top 50 machine but I don't see this in the top 20 unless they really add some funny quotes and cool features in the software upgrades.