The Pinball Arcade (Nintendo Switch) Review

The base mechanics of The Pinball Arcade serves to authentically replicate the feeling of playing on a real pinball table. Unlike some of the pinball offerings by Zen Studios, this experience does not have the powerups or absurdity of animation or effects that take place on the tables. In its place, is a faithful adaptation of playing real-life pinball tables, from the dated sound effects that ring out when bumpers are hit, to the poorly-spliced sound-bytes from the tables affiliated entertainment product.

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein pinball table was designed by John Borg in 1995, though it was while he was at Sega. The table artwork on the table and the backboard is as genuine to the real table as possible, while Robert De Niro's Frankenstein's head resides looming over the table itself. Though FarSight Studios have made his head movements a little smoother, instead of opting to keep the head's rickety head turns from the physical table, for authenticity's sake.

…But all the sound bites still seem to remain, as well as the option to select either of the film's soundtrack, or Edgar Winter's Frankenstein edited riff music to play over the gameplay, which was also included in the physical table. The best sound-grab the table offers is in the opening seconds of starting the game, as the growl of "FRANKENSTEIN" rings out across the table. The aim of the table is to complete eight 'Creation' scenes from the 1994 film, initiate three different multi-balls, and reach the highest score possible for pure bragging rights in the online leader boards.

Unfortunately, FarSight studios doesn't offer anything else to beef up the package offering aside from the tables and leader boards. It would have been nice to have a series of achievements to try and knock off with some extra titbits to unlock such as table schematics, behind-the-scene documentary videos, or quite simply some animated models of the characters from the table like Pinball FX3. Other minor grievances is that from the four different cameras that are offered, there is no static camera that can zoom out to feature the table, without constantly needing to follow the ball to the back of the table.

One neat feature to the Switch version of The Pinball Arcade, is that when the console is undocked, the table view can be switched to a vertical scale. That way, the tables can be played with a longer but slimmer screen instead, which further mimics the feel of playing a real-life pinball table, minimising the somewhat annoying camera movements that take place in the game.