Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection Review: Some Good Pinball Action!

Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection Review

It’s been awhile since I’ve had some good pinball action, but thanks to Crave Games I’ve had the opportunity to hit up the tables once again in Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection for the Nintendo 3DS.

From the start you have 3 modes to select from with those being arcade, challenge and tournament. Starting with arcade you will have a selection of 7 tables to choose from and after you select a table each one has a table menu in which you can see the goals for each table, instructions, a flyer for the table and high scores. I found it helpful that they provide you with the table goals option so that you can go through each goal and see how you get bonuses and such on that table. Also, each table is a lot of fun to play in there own ways with each having there own unique traits and scoring options. There are a couple tables that come off as seemingly small or don’t have a lot going on, while a couple others have a lot happening with them. That also affects the scoring as some tables you feel you go on and on, yet have a low score and on other tables it will only take you a couple minutes to hit over a million points. There is a good variety with the seven selectable tables for you to play in.

Something else to make mention of is that each time you finish playing a table, a quick chance game will appear where it will give you a number and you will have to try and stop your continuously looping number to match that number. By doing so you will earn credits that will be available to use when you collect 100 credits. At that point you will be able to use your credits to buy a free round on one of the tables.

Challenge mode is a fun mode to play in as well, as it gives you the challenge of beating a specific score to continue on in the game. Each table will have a specific score for you to beat and you must beat the score if you wish to continue on and add to your overall high score in challenge mode.

Visually the 3D looks very nice and you can switch between two camera angles, in which one will follow the ball more and the other will stay put at the bottom of the table. It doesn’t have the most exciting music to go along with the tables, which I guess should be expected though it does have good pinball table sounds to make the experience like playing an actual pinball machine.

If you are looking for some good pinball action in 3D then definitely give Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection a shot. It looks good in 3D, plays out very well and will keep bringing you back for a higher score to put on the specific tables leader board. It didn’t grab me for too much excitement, but I still did enjoy what I got out of this title and the basic pinball action. You have the option to play the game with your 3DS flipped upside down as well, although I found it a little awkward to hold it that way. But once more the gameplay is solid pinball action and you can even use the control stick to shake the table during gameplay as well. One last thing I should mention is that each table does have unlockable options, which include custom ball, tilt and mirror mode.

Score: 3/5