Indie Gamer Chick

02/10/2025

Here's the threader to end all threaders. Dad put up back-to-back 900K games on a build of Firepower where some of the targets don't work and multiball is impossible because the locks don't ever light.

I love how the Pinball Gods punish him immediately for it. "GET THAT F*CKING SH*T OUT OF HERE!"

02/10/2025

Dad is really upset because Firepower on The Pinball Arcade on Nintendo Switch is OUT OF ORDER. The lights don't turn off between games, and they just don't behave the way they're supposed to, and it prevents things like multiball from working. It does this in multiplayer too. It's his all-time favorite table and it doesn't work at all. It's like they didn't code any of the lights to work properly, or the ROM, or the scoresheet. We literally can't get multiball going at all, and in fact, haven't even successfully locked a single ball yet. Terrible. Now granted, this wasn't even meant to be sold, and only around twenty copies exist of it, but still, Firepower should IN THEORY be one of the easiest pins to convert, and they screwed the pooch. In this clip, you can see me get three lights on the table, RESET THE GAME, start a new game, and those three lights are still on. This is almost as bad as Bram Stoker's Dracula's build.

01/10/2025

Holy crap, we're keeping Kuminga! Huh. Okay, cool.

Breaking: Ending a summer-long stalemate, Jonathan Kuminga has agreed to a two-year, $48.5 million contract to return to the Golden State Warriors, agent Aaron Turner told ESPN. The deal has a team option designed for the contract to be ripped up and renegotiated next summer.

01/10/2025

What an age to be alive. New games for old platforms. My friend Ryan at The Otaku Authority looks at S-11.

Game Boy is surprisingly potent for vertical shmups.

Project S-11 is easily the best vertical shmup on the GameBoy Color

01/10/2025

We took a quick detour to show Sasha the Kid the 1993 Gottlieb table Gladiators, which has a very fascinating piece of trivia, because it had a different title before it was called "Gladiators." In case you didn't know, the original name of this table was, I sh*t you not........

The Legend of Zelda.

Nobody knows exactly why that didn't happen since Gottlieb's Super Mario Bros. table was a big, profitable hit for them (update: designer Jon Norris did talk about it: https://forums.arcade-museum.com/threads/legend-of-zelda-pinball-machine.323143/post-2872730 Apparently they decided American Gladiators, in 1993, mind you, was better for business than Zelda. This is the same company who did a Rescue 911 table without William Shatner doing the call-outs).

I'm not a big fan of the Super Mario table. I think if it had been anything BUT Super Mario Bros, Nintendo fans wouldn't call it one of their favorites. Regardless of what *I* think, it sold 4,200 units, at a time when Gottlieb was not in healthy shape. Mario was their 4th best selling table of the "Premier" era (1984 to 1996), which was the final era of Gottlieb's existence. A table based on Street Fighter II was their second best seller of the era (5,550 units. Cue Ball Wizard was the best seller at 5,700), so video game licenses were a lifeboat, and they sank their own lifeboat. My theory: their out-of-touch execs hadn't heard of Legend of Zelda and confused it with Zelda Fitzgerald or something along those lines. But the layout, with its twisty-turny, maze like structure, is inspired by Zelda dungeons and, unlike a lot of pinball themes, you can genuinely feel the connection. It really does feel like Zelda! Seriously! The name "Gladiators" is because, after they dropped Zelda, the table was THIS CLOSE to being based on American Gladiators, but they ordered the table changed before they even had the license, and when they didn't get the license, they didn't have enough time to re-up the Zelda license so it was just the generic "Gladiators." And this type of thing is why they went belly-up.

01/10/2025

Elvira and the Party Monsters (even if they're denying it) HAS to be it, but it could be Bram Stoker or Terminator 2.

Or Flintstones. Or NBA since apparently they wined and dined the NBA people.

SURPRISE! 🎉

Season 3 Episode 4 of the Pinball Bites just aired… but we’re not done yet! A special episode lands October 2, 10 AM PT / 6 PM BST!

Get ready for party hats - we’re celebrating Zen’s 25th birthday AND revealing one more table.

https://youtu.be/kv61dBNdaMc

30/09/2025

Hey hey! Look what Angela did! Not shown: she also got the "40K in a single ball" achievement this same game. Dad got that on our Arcooda but we never got it on PS4.

Surprise: Sasha the Kid loves EMs now. They grew on her. "So does athlete's foot." I'm not a fan of Fireball. I ranked it #84 out of 100 Pinball Arcade pins. I like the IDEA more than the ex*****on. My favorite EM video game translation remains Centigrade 37, which is really very close to being a solid state anyway. The ratings are Cathy and Angela: BAD, Dad: GOOD and Sasha the Kid is giving Fireball GREAT. Geez, if she liked this, I can't wait to see what she gives Gorgar. Angela and me both gave that MASTERPIECE status, and so Sasha could, in theory, put it in the Pantheon. So far, TPA on Switch only has two, and those are Black Knight and Black Knight 2000. Nothing is safe. Attack from Mars fell from a perfect 5.0 scoring average in the Standard/Arcooda builds to jaw-dropping 3.0 average on Switch.

With forty tables level to evaluate, here's pinball fans on Switch DIDN'T get (unless you bought a copy in that 90 to 100 minute window)......

Black Knight (4.75 - Pantheon)
Black Knight 2000 (4.75 - Pantheon)
Doctor Who (4.5 - Certified Excellent)
Dr. Dude and his Excellent Ray (4.25 - Certified Excellent)
F-14 Tomcat (4.25 - Certified Excellent)
Addams Family (4.0 - Certified Excellent)
Centaur (4.0 - Certified Excellent)
Earthshaker (4.0 - Certified Excellent)

And it has four more clean scorecards, one of which is the ultra-ultra rare "VERY Clean Scorecard" because it has the points to win a Certificate of Excellence but not the simple majority of GREAT votes. It a MASTERPIECE vote (from Sasha the Kid), a GREAT vote (from me) and two GOOD votes (from Dad and Angela). You guys hosed it.

Diner (3.75 - VERY Clean Scorecard)
The Machine: Bride of Pin*Bot (3.25 - Clean Scorecard)
Attack From Mars (3.0 - Clean Scorecard)
Cactus Canyon (3.0 - Clean Scorecard)

So, far, there's only been ONE Certified Turd.

The Champion Pub (1.25 - 💩Certified Turd💩)

And three tables are OUT OF ORDER
Banzai Run (transfer often fails)
Bram Stoker's Dracula (a ton of problems. See our review: https://thepinballchick.com/2025/03/04/glitchula/ )
Cirqus Voltaire (We will reevaluate this as the slowdown doesn't seem AS BAD on Switch 2, weirdly)

30/09/2025

The answer is the Carolina Hurricanes. It's a f*cking splotch.

🌳 SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE 🌳=======================Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/urinatingtree Twitter: https://x.com/UrinatingTreeInstagram: http...

30/09/2025

My father wasn't even an Expos fan and he says ALL THE TIME "they got hosed. They would have won the 1994 World Series. Such a shame that team fell apart."

On September 29th, 2004, the Montreal Expos played their final home game before a grieving crowd at Olympic Stadium. For 35 years, the Expos had been more th...

30/09/2025

The other Flintstones review at IGC is called "Surprise at Dino Peak" and it's one of those NES games that can sell for thousands of dollars. And that's a little heartbreaking because it's one of the most underrated NES games, albeit one with a BRUTAL final stretch. Either way, all parties involved need to figure this out and do a compilation, because Dino Peak is good enough to headline the set.

The Flintstones: Surprise at Dinosaur Peak aka The Flintstones II Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System Released October, 1993 Developed by Taito NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED Flintstones: Surprise at D…

30/09/2025

The Flintstones is celebrating its 65th birthday today (jeez louise), and there happen to be two Flintstones games for the NES reviewed at IGC! AND, both got a YES! The first one, Rescue of Dino & Hoppy, is just barely okay.

The Flintstones: The Rescue of Dino & Hoppy Platform: Nintendo Entertainment System Released December, 1991 Developed by Taito NEVER BEEN RE-RELEASED The first Flintstones game didn’t rel…

30/09/2025

I just talked about this with my family a few months ago when I finished The Simpsons Video Games: The Definitive Review. The kids and their friends LOVE the Simpsons. I might think its best days are behind it, and some of the voices sound off (Julie Kavner is 75 now for God's sake), but they don't "sound off" to the kids because this is the Simpsons THEY grew up with. The jokes and plots land FOR THEM. (shrug) So now that generation is getting their movie. Hope it's as good as mine. I don't think I've ever laughed harder than when Bart just starts jabbing out the eyes of the multi-eyed squirrel. "JABBA! JABBA! JAB! JAB! JAB!" It's so f*cked up 😝

"The Simpsons 2" is officially in the works and set to release in theaters on July 23, 2027.