The Pinball Arcade Gottlieb Table Pack 2 Review

Following on from our review of Gottlieb Table Pack 1, comes *shock horror* Gottlieb Table Pack 2. This DLC released in 2018 for ‘The Pinball Arcade’ adds SIX new tables – offering a mixed bag of conventional vs experimental designs, both old and newer. Before we dive into the specifics of each table though, I’m just gonna drop the list of tables here for you to glance over…

• Wipeout
• Rescue 911
• Bone Busters
• Black Hole
• El Dorado City of Gold
• Goin’ Nuts

If you’re into pinball it’s probably not too much of a surprise that the themes can range from wacky to mundane, but this table pack leans more towards the somewhat oddball. I’m thinking specifically of Goin’ Nuts – it’s horrible. The music sounds like they gave crack to an 8-bit Bugs Bunny, which makes you go nuts after about 5 seconds. This was one of those experimental tables that I spoke about, where you have 3 timed rounds to score as many points as possible, as opposed to a limited number of balls – a cool concept but the actual table felt a bit devoid of features. This is similar with El Dorado City of Gold, unless I just never unlocked any hidden areas of the table. At least with El Dorado the table looks interesting though – with a dark green jungle theme and easy to navigate progression track.

That leaves us with 4 tables that in my opinion, are absolute crackers (in a good way). First up we’ve got Wipeout. This table is pretty narrow and is adorned with a ski-lift on one side and a slalom slope on the other – taking up much of the table’s real estate. That said, you need real precision to take advantage of these two features. The slalom run is awesome as you can use the flipper buttons to move the ramp – guiding your ball through the ski gates as it hurtles towards the finish. The voicing is hilarious – taunting your ‘skiing’ ability through mock surfer quotes – the irony of which was not lost on me for a change. Solid table.

Rescue 911 is based on the hit TV show which claims to have garnered audiences as large as 30 million people at the height of its fame – dubious inflation of figures perhaps? This table sold around 4,000 units across the world and I actually remember playing this one in real life back in the 90’s as a kid. Rescue 911 is innovative in that it has a helicopter which flies from one side of the table to the other and picks up your ball on the way. To activate this, you’ll have to have a quick trigger finger and good aiming. The table also features plenty of chutes and an abundance of buttons to aim at – all triggering different 911 calls and emergency events to interact with. The table also looks great, with a colourful but not over the top style.

I’m gonna go with Black Hole next so that I can save my favourite table for last! Black Hole is very much like Haunted House from Table Pack 1. If you remember from my previous review, Haunted House is a 3-layered table, and quite an early model at that. Black Hole is 2-layered in a similar style, with a central ‘basement’ area for players to drop down into. The space theme is dark and foreboding, but looks amazing as those bouncy mushroom-shaped things light up and mimic the vast expanses of the universe. Space-themed missions await those daring enough to jump into the Black Hole.

Lastly, we’ve got the insanely colourful Bone Busters. Despite the phallic name, the theme is very Terminator with a neon edge. There are all manner of chutes and slides to aim for and some insane multi-ball scenarios that feel crazy to play, due to the table playing out with some serious speed. There’s a fair amount of progression with Bone Busters too, with 3x multi-ball rewards and countless ways to trigger the score multiplier – this one will keep you coming back to bust some bones.

Overall the Gottlieb Table Pack 2 offers up a set of challenging and intriguing tables to add to your collection in Pinball Arcade, regardless of whether you have Gottlieb Table Pack 1 or not. Whilst 2 of the 6 tables are disappointingly bland for all their colour, the remaining 4 are solid if not great tables – full of innovative design features and unique replayability.

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary Nintendo Switch code was provided to Bonus Stage for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to press@4gn.co.uk.