Alien Pinball

[winkdot]

I just love pinball. I currently have eight pins at the house and enjoy everything about them. So I thought.. humm I need to try out the DCP+ Kernel for the next 2600 project and pinball should be easy.. (yea right).

 

After much work and compromise Alien Pinball is what came out. Now I've come to the conclusion that this will never play like a real pinball. I tried all sorts of ball physics. Some were more realistic but the game play was no fun at all. Anyway this is what I ended up with. Please let me know what you think.

 

Game Info:

Starting in version 0.4 switch difficulty is active.

Left Switch on B = Easy game

Left Switch on A = Harder Game

 

SWITCH A:

Gravity is more of a factor

Ball behavior is different

Joystick up for both flippers is disabled.

Wall hits are slightly different.

The tilt is more sensitive.

 

From title screen press fire to start.

 

Version .9 I think I have fixed the scan line issues. If you have a harmony cart, please test it

 

Pull back on joystick to pull spring back and press fire to launch the ball.

 

Push left on the joystick to fire the left flipper

 

Push right on the joystick to fire the right flipper

 

Push up on the joystick to fire both flippers (in version 0.5 and up, this is only true if left difficulty switch set to Switch B.)

 

Nudging the pinball can be done (version 0.4 and up). To nudge hold the fire button + up, down, left, or right.

It is possible to tilt and lose your ball and bonus points. If you nudge too often it will tilt.

 

At the end of game press fire to begin a new game.

 

Scoring:

 

Space Ship bumper point values - 100 - 200 - 300 (depending on their level).

The moving space ship bumper when stationary - 5000

Hitting the right button will freeze the moving space ship for a time. While the ship is stationary the value is 5000.

Spinner value - 50 - 100 - 150 - 300 (score depends on the level)

Top rollover button value 500 per hit + 1000 bonus points

After going over the rollover button at the top of the play field it will award a bonus point of 1000. The maximum bonus points held are 10. There is an indicator for the number of bonus points displayed. Bonus points are awarded at the end of a ball.

The rollover button when hit will disappear but can be put back in play by hitting the right wall button.

Once you get 5 bonus points, bonus values are doubled. Once you get 10, bonus points are tripled.

Mother Ship pylon value - 1000

Space ship bumper and spinner values are increased by hitting both pylons on the middle space ship. When both are hit a ship is dispatched to protect the pylons from additional hits. This ship must be destroyed in order to hit additional pylons. For every successful completion of the pylon destruction an indicator will appear below the ship. Up to four indicators will be shown. On the fifth destruction of the pylons all bumper and spinner values increase, the play field will slightly change and the ship bumper colors will change.

I have not placed a way to earn an extra ball yet. I'm thinking around 200k points but will see why you folks think would be a fair point value is.

Let me know of any issues. I do not have a harmony cart but have put the code in for it to run on one. If anyone out there tries it, let me know. It's current form is NTSC only (sorry PAL).

version .09 posted. I think I have fixed the scan line issues. See more information at

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/235009-alien-pinball/