As a fan of Zen Studios' Pinball FX and a stalwart resistor of all things Apple, I've been holding out hope that eventually some of the tables Zen developed for Apple Arcade's Zen Pinball Party would eventually make it to the Epic Games Store mothership. Now it seems, the first crack in the Apple Arcade dam has appeared, as Zen has announced that a remaster of Hasbro's My Little Pony table will soon appear on Pinball FX.
I had some time yesterday afternoon to take a look at the My Little Pony table, and found that it perfectly mixes accessibility for young players with some serious old-school pinball challenge.
In deference to young pinball newcomers, the game has a simpler ruleset than a lot of Zen's more adult tables. Skill shots are just given to the player with the reward being based on timing rather than shooting skill, and the ball regularly slows down a bit to give players a chance to get oriented to the current action. Extra balls are relatively easy to achieve, shooting ramps is intuitive, and it is dead simple to start missions. That said, the game doesn't hesitate to sink your ball down the middle if you aren't careful. Simple, but not easy.
There are several other tables that have only appeared on Apple Arcade that I would love to see make their way to Pinball FX, including a Trolls table and a Kung Fu Panda table. But hey, for now I'll take what I can get.
In addition to the ponies, Zen is also prepping a slew of Star Wars titles for release on Pinball FX, including a few that I haven't had a chance to play yet. Included in this latest wave of tables are:
That's a lot of Star Wars action. Most of these have appeared on other platforms or in stand-alone Star Wars Pinball titles, but it's great to see Zen piling them into this new platform, which is touted as the end-all-be-all for Zen Pinball fans.
I took a look at the Battle of Mimban table, just because I had no idea what it was. Turns out, the battle was the one that Han Solo found himself in the middle of in his early days as a "mud trooper", as depicted in the film Solo. This is an excellent table, and I found myself having a pretty epic run on it - particularly since this was my first time playing on it. Cool idea for a table, and a remarkably gritty and fun experience.
Pinball FX is free to download in early access for PC on the Epic Games Store. It is expected to officially launch on PC via the Epic Games Store, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch later this year.
