Game:

The Pinball (1999)

Category:

Review

Duration: 3:28

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Earlier this year “Yoku’s Island Express” reignited the fire in the Adventure Pinball genre long thought lost to classic such as Sonic Spinball and Kirby’s Pinball. Momonga Pinball Adventures tries to continue this but sadly falls very short of the mark.

Firstly, the game was very obviously designed for mobile and while this is not a problem it definitely comes across in the very familiar levels where you earn up to 3 stars layout of the game.

The game sees you take on the role of Momo a flying squirrel on a quest to find his family who are kidnapped by owl bandits at the start of the game. Story is light but fun and for the younger audience this game is clearly aimed at I can see it working well.

The issue however with the game being aimed at a younger audience is that it is fairly hard and not for the right reasons. There are 9 story levels and the game can be completed in about an hour depending on a reasonable amount of luck mixed with a little skill.

I have played a lot of pinball games over the years and nailing the feel of the ball physics is integral and sadly Momonga Pinball Adventures does not really manage this. The ball feels far too heavy and your flippers rarely feel like they propel the ball with any real force. Equally predicting where the ball is going to go based on its location on the flipper feels very off. After years of playing pinball I feel I am pretty good at aiming a ball with a flipper and in Momonga Pinball Adventures I felt that luck more than skill usually guided my ball. Equally it is night on impossible to perform any advanced pinball techniques due to the physics being too weak.

As you play the game you essentially have 3 lives that are lost every time you lose a ball. While this makes obvious sense, there are some issues with the way in the latter stages the game deals with multiple balls.

During the game the pinball levels are broken up with bizarre flying panda stages which see you fly through clouds picking up donuts and pizzas. Oddly these are controlled by the L & R buttons rather than the analogue stick or the d-pad and the movement on these levels is very clunky and awkward. This same mechanic appears during the regularly levels occasionally and challenges to collect stars. Controls are equally awkward here as well.

After the game’s relatively short story is over there are other challenges to complete throughout the games levels but if I am honest by this point I was a little jaded and the thought of playing through the levels again didn’t exactly fill me with enthusiasm.

I was desperate to like Momonga Pinball Adventures but sadly it is a good idea let down by bad controls and a weak physics engine.

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