Pinball Yeah!

The one thing you can safely say about this ‘80s-child reviewer is that, like The Who’s Tommy, he sure plays a mean pinball. Well, providing he’s not playing Pinball Yeah! anyway.

You see, endless experience in mastering the fine art of flipper – err – flipping is no use when confronted with poorly designed tables and a disorientating zoomed-in default camera that often reduces your input to little more than frantic guesswork.

First impressions count for a lot in pinball and, for those who’ve ever played the real deal, the flashier the table the more coins you’re willing to splash out.

Each of the four tables boasts a distinctive theme and soundtrack. Liquid Bread has an Irish pub background, complete with rowdy locals cheering you on, Code Runers has a ‘60s spy flavour, A.i. is all Tron-style neon, while Pirate Cove has high seas to sail your ball around and treasure chests to plunder for points.

They all have at least stand out feature, too, like the circling sharks of Pirate Cove, and a handy level guide tells you what bonuses can be won with skilful ball bouncing.

Scores can also be compared via online leaderboards, which is a boon for serious players aiming for insane high scores.

Once logged in, global high scores and your own personal bests are displayed whenever you boot up a table.

Sadly, there are a lot of issues that prevent Pinball Yeah! from being a retro classic. The table layouts, for example, are a major sticking point.

The placement of bumpers and other obstacles is, at points, frankly bizarre. Liquid Bread features some seemingly unavoidable dead ends that really break the flow of play, while circling sharks just above the flippers on Pirate Cove are a constant source of teeth grinding frustration.

Meanwhile, A.i. and Code Runers are simply dull to play, with little innovation or challenge to keep you coming back for more.

Furthermore, mid-range phones like the Desire HD used by this reviewer struggle with jerky performance on most tables.

Things are smoother on high-end devices, such as the Galaxy Tab (powered by essentially the same GPU as the iPhone 4), but are still not silky enough to make you think you’re actually playing a real game of pinball.

Switching to the ‘Low’ detail mode helps, but it cuts out the background music, making the tables seem even blander.

The standard camera, which dizzyingly chases the ball around the screen, is another misstep. Fortunately a camera icon at the top of the screen enables you to switch to a more comfortable zoomed-out view.

Oddly, it doesn’t work on all levels, though, making A.i. even more of chore.

It’s a shame as, like the immaculate remake of Pinball Dreams on iOS, the game gets a lot of the pinball basics right.

The default controls, where you tap on either side of the screen to move the corresponding flipper or nudge the table by jabbing the top right, are perfectly suited for touchscreens.

But the unpolished tables and lack of optimisation mean the game’s more Pinball Meh than Yeah!