Seconded. I’m not 100% against buying some of my favorites provided the app is good. If they try to pull any in-game currency nonsense like with Williams, though, it won’t last more than 10 seconds on my phone.
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From Zen Studio’s discord:
@everyone or Dear Pinball Fans 
We have an exciting invitation for you! You probably saw that we are working on a new mobile game called Zen Pinball World in our Pinball Bites episode in May. 
https://youtu.be/tEOrT1rkAUc?t=193
We will reveal more about this wonderful project soon, but first, we are opening a closed beta session (for Android and iOS) where you can try out the game and give us valuable feedback.
If you are interested in our new mobile adventure (and you have time to fill out a wonderful feedback form during the test), send us your application using the link below!
Thank you! 
Wait, has it been a year since Zen asked everyone to rebuy all of their tables in a new app? Boy does time fly.
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I’m torn. I loved the original Zen and own all the tables so I know that I can love what they do, but I despise their business model.
I agree their monetization schemes have been pretty shady. Especially the Williams app. Supposedly, the new app will not have any shady FtP shenanigans. Wait and see. By the way, I just updated the Netflix/Zen app Pinball Masters. It has a new Stranger Things table.
I’ve been reluctant to play on any other system after I spent so much on the iOS tables and they’ve seemingly abandoned the app. If they release a new app with no monetization schemes other than simply buying tables I might give it a look but I’m a bitter customer.
Fingers crossed that this isn’t a FtP mess.
I 100% expect it to be. Hoping to be pleasantly surprised. I’ll definitely give it a go when it drops and report back.
On the plus side, outside of the the two South Park tables and the Williams tables, I think this is the first time most of the others (20 or so) have been on iOS, so if the game isn’t an abomination I will have plenty of content to dive in to. It also means I won’t have to double dip and re-buy the same tables I’ve already bought on iOS, at least for now.
I am downloading the new app as we speak. Looking at the store page, all IAP is listed as single tables with some bundles - so no in-app currencies. That is promising. Tables are a bit expensive at $10 a piece, so it looks like I’ll be taking my time picking these up.
Edit: There are plenty of $5 tables. The app also mentions purchasing tables to play ad-free, so maybe all are available for free with adds? I can’t try it out at the moment.
Edit 2: I don’t see much here to justify a new app. There is no tournament support and aside from collecting start for scored to customize your profile, it’s closer to the original Zen app than what we’ve seen more recently on consoles.
And what’s with letting me watch an ad to get an extra ball? That nonsense has no place in pinball.
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Link to the app. Overall the app seems great except for one huge problem. The graphics look awful on my iPad like all the other recent Zen apps like Pinball Party and Pinball Masters. Looks like low res assets and no option to download better graphics. I tried the Star Trek and Princess Bride tables. I can’t really read anything on the playfield. The pinball itself is hard to follow.
Pros:
- No monetization gimmicks. Watch ads for free play or buy the table with real currency for reasonable prices. Option to buy tables individually or in packs (for a discount). No micro-transactions for things like realistic physics and no multiple currency gimmicks.
- Portrait and landscape support.
- Controller support.
- Brief look at the table guides, seem pretty good.
Cons:
- Muddy looking graphics
- Like Mirefox mentioned the ability to watch an ad for an extra ball is ridiculous. I’m not really sure how the global leaderboards work but it’s totally unacceptable if the paid and ad version share a leaderboard with the ability ti get a free ball.
I believe the main justification for the new app was because all the new tables were built using the Unreal engine over their old in-house game engine. And I think tables like South Park that are in both apps were remade with the new engine.
So it isn’t just me with the graphics. I only tried the game on my phone and chalked it up to a non-optimal platform, but it didn’t look clean.
I miss local top scores. In the original app I would make a point of playing until I had all 10 scores, which forced me to play some tables many, many times. This guaranteed that I got my money’s worth and that I gave each table a chance, even if I didn’t like it. The only board I failed to do this on was Deadpool because he’s a troll…
The star system has replaced this, but now I can theoretically “finish” a table by my standards in one play if I play well.
Global leaderboards don’t excite me much because I will never be near the top no matter how well I play.
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Every day, virtual pinball strays further from the light.
Pinballs all about local high scores! Different versions of the same machine play subtly differently, so local scores are the only ones that make sense
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My cities pinball tournament had a new venue this year, and it worked out perfectly. We are hoping to host the southern hemisphere pinball championship next year.
I placed pretty well. Middle of the pack (as expected) in a couple of the tournaments. But I got a 5th in the classics and a 9th in the fair strikes comp. Im now a top 100 player nationally, no doubt soon to be surpassed by my son who is quite good too
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Stern is making a Pokemon table that looks pretty cool with a lot of modern bells and whistles including a persistent poekedex. I’m 100% on board, assuming I find $10k in the couch cushions.
I expect it’ll be fully integrated with stern insider. The machine scans a qr code on your phone and records achievements, high scores etc to your online profile.
Their recent D&D table lets you have a persistent character so you can continue leveling up on any D&D machine.
I’ll be interested to see what they do with Pokemon in that vein
I would love to have one of these - not sure I would play it enough though?
I actually have the space put aside for 2-3 tables, but for a lot of reasons have not actually pulled the trigger on one yet. Thematically, I really want the Labyrinth table that came out a couple years ago, but I have not had a chance to play it yet, so I do need to find one.
In December I was at the Pinball Hall of Fame in Vegas and kind of loved the John Wick pin, and am really tempted to try to pick one up. But that D&D with the different characters also sounds really cool to me.
And for nostalgia sake, I kind of really want the old ST:TNG table, but finding one in good condition that is not incredibly expensive might put some other options as priorities.
It’s probably another year before I seriously decide to pick at least one up.
The ST:TNG pinball is my all-time favourite, and the only pin I’ve seriously considered picking up. But given the high price of tables and the amount of maintenance it seems they require, I’ve managed to hold off so far…
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