I took Anne’s advice (after much hand-wringing trying to get Virtual Pinmame working), and purchased Williams Pinball Hall of Fame (for the XBox 360). Mostly, I got this one (as opposed to the Gottlieb version) because it has two of my all time favorite pinball machine in it: Funhouse and Medieval Madness.
I have to say it’s a pretty good representation of playing on the full machines — although I often want better camera angles to choose from. My mad skillz at Funhouse seem to have translated over, and my high score on the actual machine seems pretty close to my current high score in the video game. I’m not sure, but playing the video game might constitute a decent form of practice for real pinball.
Kim seems to have taken to Funhouse (yeah!), and I have hopes that any future house we buy might have room for pinball machines in it. For my part, I’ve actually enjoyed having a variety of machines to choose from. Taxi was fun and the overall goal was pretty easy to complete, but has repetitive sounds. Not the kind of game I’d want to own, but a fun diversion. I thought I’d enjoy having access to Black Knight, but that game isn’t anywhere near as much fun as I remember from my childhood. The table I like to explore the most (after I pry the controller out of Kim’s hands) is Tales of the Arabian Nights. I only had a chance to play it once or twice on location and I doubt it was working correctly on those occasions.
My advice is if you enjoy pinball, pick up this set. It won’t replace the real thing, but it’s a bunch cheaper and doesn’t take up nearly as much space.