I’m always on board for a pinball adventure, so I was keen to try this on Apple Arcade.
This is a rogue-lite, which in this case means advancing up the floors of a tower, death setting you back to the start (or a checkpoint floor), while between runs you can get permanent upgrades. You’ve got your classic fantasy theme, with a wizard fighting off beasties. Except of course that it’s also pinball, and you’re the ball!
Each floor of the tower is a fun, simple mini-pinball layout. Sometimes there’s targets to hit, there’s rows or groupings of treasure to find, and always monsters to bump off by bashing your tiny wizard body into them. You command the flippers but also some spells: a dash, for better control of your movement, and a magic orb for a brief multiball to aim at your goals. This can ease the frustration of ham-handing the flippers, as your spells are directed in bullet time, giving you an easier chance of fulfilling whatever objective you want to plink into.
It’s a lovely application of pinball mechanics to a fantasy-action theme, and it looks beautiful too with its subdued, flat shaded cutesiness. I had some problems with my flippers sticking or being unresponsive (I don’t know whether to blame the game or the Apple TV’s controller support), which cost me some runs. But it’s hard to stay mad at this addictive little gem, particularly when runs are quick to start and end, and you make progress on your perks regardless. It’s short but very sweet, one of the better pinball-adventure games I’ve tried!
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