Criticism on Zen Pinball

arakno1 said:

i bought some of zen pinballs, the feeling is kind of crap in a digital way but you have to take it for what it is. I have mars, secrets of the deep,paranormal,tesla, marvel venom, marvel guardians of the galaxy,marvel world war hulk, star wars droid, star wars darth vader, south park super sweet pinball, south park butters, the walking dead and obviously sorcerers lair, both south parks are my fav, hulk is the worst ever, totaly useless you simply cant have fun with that ****, tesla is beautiful but just badly done, so much regrets on this one as the steampunk spirit is turned to a massive turd it is so sad. The only ones i keep playing is the southpark ones, as the soundtrack is fun and the missions too. But we are far, really far from what farsight pinball arcade has to offer wich is not comparable in terms of emotional factor as these are real pinball tables digitalised and in terms of realism too obviously.

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My view on the tables you bought are

Bad tables
Mars
Paranormal
Tesla
Venom
Darth Vader

Ok tables
Secrets of the Deep
World War Hulk
Scorcers Lair
Walking Dead

Good tables
Guardians of the Galaxy(must turn off preview in operators menu tho)
Droids(easy but good)
South Park
Butters

I've recently started putting more time into FX2 and I kinda agree with the 1st post.

As a beginner in this game, propably my biggest problem is that it's based entirely on completing missions. And by completing I mean that you must complete everything 100% without failure in order to get forward. On some tables it feels like playing Mega Man, but even on Mega Man you don't have to start the whole game again if you fail boss mode once. Exception are the Alien tables (maybe some others too), that are more beginner friendly because you only need to start a mission to get it checked.
Also there are a few tables where you can get large scores without going for the missions (Venom and Rome for example) but most of the tables require a lot of research and memorizing which can cause frustration.

As for the the rules, on TPA I could figure out most tables without even reading the manuals but on FX2 there are more of those mystery games where I don't really know what I'm supposed to do before looking up online manuals. At least on XB360, the ingame instructions are pretty poor. XB1 version seems to have better instructions. When it comes to the actual playing, the aim feels somewhat off or inconsistent. I have no trouble hitting most stuff on TPA but FX2 feels a lot more difficult. Maybe I'm just too used to the TPA physics. FX2 is definitely the harder of those 2 games for me. Which is weird because almost everyone says the opposite. Otherwise I don't really have any problems with the physics being different, just takes more time to learn. Graphics on FX2 are great and sharp, also cool themes and designs. Definitely a fun game and worth the time but definitely takes some work to get it going.

Wasarasormi said:

I've recently started putting more time into FX2 and I kinda agree with the 1st post.

As a beginner in this game, propably my biggest problem is that it's based entirely on completing missions. And by completing I mean that you must complete everything 100% without failure in order to get forward. On some tables it feels like playing Mega Man, but even on Mega Man you don't have to start the whole game again if you fail boss mode once.

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Zen is a shooter with a pinball theme. Complete a mission requires to master several successful shots in a row in a very short time window. Learn patterns, ball paths, predefined physics, rinse and repeat, until you find the best and sure way to complete a mission.

On most of the tables, it's tedious (mainly on those where starting the mission itself is boring as hell - shoot 5+ times the same hole? WTF?!!-), on others, it's fun as missions are hard but doable, and easy to start (e.g. Starfighter Assault)

This or nothing, because scoring is broken on most of the tables, as a simple multiball scores a lot more than any of the missions. Only the wizard mode on a table is relevant, but it requires often a lot of practice (and patience, and dedication, and cold blood) to start it.

In general, Zen is a good game, but a little too far from the true pinball spirit.

I agree with the first post as well, the goals & rule sets could be better. I find the physics of some tables very erratic, game flow is just not very enjoyable, unlike most TPA tables. I do like Darth Vader & Castlestorm, & I have had fun on Family Guy & that car-themed one, can't remember the name of it. That hell-themed one is pretty good, but has too much area where you can't see the ball as it rolls around the playfield.

Overall though, the ball movement on FX2 is herkyjerky & way too fast much of the time to make accurate shots. I still like FX2 though, mostly.

My break time between Zen tables seems to be longer than the breaks I take from TPA.

When going back to Zen, I tend to stay a couple of days and get out.
Sometimes I'm not up to the rinse and repeat with some of Zen's tables.