The Pinball Arcade Gottlieb Table Pack 3 Review

Tuning in for our final Gottlieb Table Pack review? No worries if you missed parts 1 & 2, as each pack is a standalone edition to The Pinball Arcade on the Switch. Table Pack 3 is by far my favourite in the collection however, due to the variation in design of each level. Again, I’m just gonna pop the list of tables here and for the keen-eyed of you, you’ll probably notice that there are only 5 this time instead of 6. That said, they’re a solid 5, so let’s get into it:

• Tee’d Off
• Cue Ball Wizard
• Class of 1812
• Cactus Jacks
• TX-Sector

Tee’d Off is probably my favourite in Table Pack 3. This tongue-in-cheek golf-themed table is not only bathed in colour, but it contains more innuendos than you could ever have imagined would come from a golf and pinball combo. Tee’d Off is tight to the theme of golf, with voice actors screaming “hole in one” and “fore” at regular intervals. You also have the gopher wheel in the centre of the table, which yields a bonus if you manage to hit it enough to spell out gopher.

Cue Ball Wizard is an interesting table that actually has a real cue ball in the middle of it, attached to some kind’ve bungie system. You can smash your pinballs into this to take shots at other snooker balls, although how this actually works isn’t always clear. The table does have some really satisfying ramps to aim at and a game of Cue Ball Wizard seems to flow smoothly with little jaggedness created by lots of bouncing around suddenly. The table also looks great – like a dimly lit cue ball club room.

Class of 1812 is a weird mashup of classic gory horror meets 80s neon nightclub. It’s a little twisted and rewards you for digging up ‘stiffs’ – no innuendo intended. The table has some awesome-looking plastic elements to it such as the light-up heart, hand and chattering teeth. The classic mushroom-shaped bumpers adorn the top of the table and provide a solid way of racking up points, whilst you can cash in a hefty bonus by shooting your ball into the ‘graveyard’ slot and getting a ‘stiff’. Really garishly coloured graphics are abound here, but it’s a fast-paced and intriguing table to play.

Cactus Jacks has a bassy soundtrack that makes you feel like you’re in a Mexican saloon bar fight in the 1800s. Oh wait, you actually are but everyone in the bar is a piece of fruit? Weird… That said Cactus Jacks is a lot of fun, with a huge flashing banjo circle of lights in the middle and the chance to rack up a huge amount of points whilst bashing cacti with your balls (wait maybe that doesn’t sound so great).

Last and perhaps least unfortunately, is TX-Sector. Don’t get me wrong, the table itself is a pretty classic setup with 2 chutes, some targets and an extra flipper up to (not to mention the bouncy mushrooms), but the theme was a tad off for me. Is it a superhero theme where the hero has electrical powers, or is it just generic sci-fi? I’m not really sure, but despite this the graphical style still works and this dark-looking table is nicely lit to highlight key points of interest.

So there you have it, Gottlieb Table Pack 3 – is it any good? Like I said it’s my favourite pack of the 3 Gottlieb packs available, in spite of it being 1 table shorter than its colleagues. The sports themed Tee’d Off and Cue Ball Wizard are unique and vibrantly coloured with an accessible level of challenge, whilst Class of 1812 is wacky and filled with choices to make to bump that score up as high as you can. Even the tables that I didn’t love so much, had elements that made them fun to play and more importantly, replay!

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.