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It’s been 36 years since the first Star Wars movie was released and it just never seems to get old. We’ve seen countless licensing deals and spinoffs, especially when it comes to the world of video games. Franchises like Angry Birds were able to secure a Star Wars deal of their own and now it looks like Android gamers can finally experience pinball after it’s been infused with the power of the Force.
Virtual pinball wizards, Zen Studios, are the brains behind the latest mash up, giving Android users the ability to play out Star Wars: Episode V The Empire Strikes Back with a classic pinball table made especially for the movie. If it’s one thing Zen knows, it’s pinball. And they’ve gone to great lengths to provide players with a true-to-life pinball experience, as if the game was found in your favorite bar, only with a little graphical flare.
Besides crisp clean visuals and advanced pinball physics, Star Wars Pinball features leader boards for Jedi players to brag about their highest scores. Players can actually choose light or dark side and watch as the pinball community “fights for the balance of the Force.” Fun stuff.
Value
Star Wars Pinball is currently available for download in the Google Play Store for a fairly reasonable $2. It should be said (again) that the download will only give you the single Empire Strikes Back table, and not the other 2 tables shown off in Zen’s listing on Google Play. A little bit misleading, maybe. But that’s why we’re here. The other 2 tables — Clone Wars and Boba Fett — can be downloaded for an additional $2 each, bringing the grand total for balls-to-the-wall Star Wars pinball action to $6. While we aren’t going to say that’s a bad deal (it’s still cheaper than plunking down quarters at your local pizzeria), we just want to let you know what you’re getting yourself into. More tables will be arriving in a future update, so we’ll be keeping an eye out for those. In the meantime, light or dark side — which will you choose?
Downloaded this game on my VZ S3 on release. It has a bad habit of glitching. The table will freeze like a screenshot but the Dot Matrix scoreboard continues to work. Pressing the screen also lets you hear the flippers are still active and the ball is still in play.
Yeah, guess they still have some bugs to work out. Seeing a lot of comments like this.
Don’t get me wrong, I still love the hell out of this game! I tried changing graphic settings and the size of the matrix score screen to see if it had any effect. But it had none :( screen issues seem to be random as well, coming at different time intervals. I’m sure they will work it out!
I took a flyer on this one, has become my new favorite time waster on my Android.
Pinball has always been my go-to time waster. I used to play Pokemon Pinball all the time on my Gameboy Micro. Saved my life at the DMV.
Chris, thanks for pointing out the misleading advertising by Zen. I downloaded it because it was listed as a “top review of the week” on CES. I watched the video and didn’t see anything on paying extra for other tables. After playing the Empire table I said wow 3 tables for $2, that’s a good deal. But when I realized extra $ for the other two I refunded and uninstalled. The reason was simply because of the company misleading me, not because of the quality of the game. If I had read ur review first I probably would still have it installed. They need to be a little more forthcoming on information.
You could’ve also mentioned that these tables are also available within the main Zen Pinball app for those who already have that and don’t want the tables as part of a separate app. I’ll definitely have to grab these… I have a bunch of their tables on Android and on my PS3 and love them.
I’ve got Boba Fett and The Empire Strikes Back and they are great! I have the main Zen Pinball app and I downloaded the two tables from within the app.
Fry expresses my thoughts…
http://genophoria.files.wordpress.com/2012/11/shut-up-and-take-my-money.jpg