Missing the old room from PHOF: Williams Collection

[Epsilon]

Does anyone remember that ill-fated Xbox 360 service called Game Room? One of the really compelling aspects of that was the ability to see the cabinets of machines you "bought" and be able to arrange them how you wanted in a virtual space. I would love to see something like that be available for TPA, especially because the artwork on pinball cabinets is pretty neat. Eventually, and ideally, I'd love to have the option to have this "virtual arcade" to stroll around through, along with the option to use traditional menus instead, along with the option to be able to use command line parameters to jump immediately into particular tables without any menu navigation at all.

But I also agree that it probably is something that shouldn't take any precedence over bug fixes, general quality, and new content generation. Maybe it's something for down the road when the releases start to get more infrequent or they're going to be winding down the project.

 

[Ark Malmeida]

I loved Game Room! Got all 1000 achievement points on it and was severely disappointed when it abruptly stopped updating. MS was the publisher so I blame them for that one!

 

[SilverBalls]

Is it just me who misses that arcade environment that we had in PHOF: Williams Collection and Gottlieb Collection? I know that using simple menus is much more practical, but it was charming to pretend to be in a real arcade and blah blah blah. I felt it was a real place that I could go and relax a bit, just around the corner.

Here it is.

(But I definetely don't miss that guy saying "Taxi... Gorrrgarrr... Space Shuttle!" )

I miss the girl.

 

[Deltaechoe]

I agree. First make the tables top class and THEN start polishing the details. Like adding authentic emulation to the solid state tables. Scripting simply doesn't cut it... if the emulation is lacking so is the overall playing experience (see Black Knight's case).

I'm pretty happy how the menus are now. No need to add extra gimmicks (imho). The demo scrolling over the tables really bring up the details and they look magnificent.

I thought farsight said that the solid state tables were emulated, but as far as emulation goes, it's not always (in fact very rarely) perfect. Some software use weird hardware based hacks to work and can be very difficult to emulate accurately without breaking something else.

 

[Blueshirt]

Personally? I'm fine without it. For me, TPA is all about the pinball - it's a hardcore pinball sim, through and through. Tight gameplay and accuracy is what I'm here for, so I'm not too much for the bells and whistles. While I understand the complaints, I know I'm not alone in this opinion either. Being able to play nearly perfect recreations of tables such as Medieval Madness, TNG, and more is worth more than the price of admission already.

 

[Flotilla]

Don't miss the old arcade room interface a bit, sorry...

Streamlined menu for table choices is best IMHO.

Timelord ...

Same. Simplicity is best.