Timeshock is alive (sort of)

No, we are not talking about Barnstorm's Timeshock, which by now, I am convinced, is dead and buried. I am talking about the real pinball machine based on Timeshock which was being developed by a company called Silver Castle. I have written about the Silver Castle Timeshock here and here.

Having had no news for over a year I was thinking that this project had gone the way of the dodo like the ProPinball revival project  I was wrong. My friend Marco chimed in to let me know that the project is advancing. The team behind the project has started building the first prototype. Here's a view of the playfield.

I must say that I like a lot the graphics with their cartoonish look. You can catch a short fly-over of the table at YouTube.

If you wait till the end of the video the next video YouTube is proposing is the announcement of the ProPinball Kickstarter by Adrian Barritt. What a waste, my God!

FarSight is saving my bacon

Let’s face it: pinball simulations have never been particularly popular. They have always been confined to a niche gaming activity and the arrival of iPhones/iPads did not improve the situation in any appreciable way. Things got rather worse in fact, since the milieu was polluted by a slew of crappy games. Recently there is a notable downturn as the few remaining pinball developers have slowed-down their production. Only FarSight keeps cranking out new pinballs with clockwork regularity. For a pinball blogger like myself this is priceless.

So, this month’s new pinball is here. Wipe Out

is a ski-themed table. A rather easy table but unfortunately a not very interesting one. The slalom track is definitely an original feature (but on the other hand I was unable to figure out how to guide the ball in an efficient way, in particular in a multiball situation). A thing that i did like is the fact that the ball does not drain too easily. Choosing the proper colour for the ball is always a challenge in Pinball Arcade. This time I opted for the white ball, a choice appropriate for a snow-themed table.