Crystal Caliburn: Yet Another Great Pinball from CeCraft
I have been a great fan of pinball games ever since I was a kid. In those days, it was the orginal marble and nails shooter (quite unlike any real pinball machine). When we have spent all our pennies at the arcade, we would get a soap box and construct an home-made one for our own pleasure. Later, the silver balls of steel took over; followed by more electronic stuff.
Then computers (remember Apple ]['s Bill Budge's pinball?) and consoles (eg Nintendo's Pinball) came to the scene. Fun as it was, computer pinball really took off for me when I got my first laptop and ported it over so I can take it wherever I go. But nothing beats playing pinball on the go with a PDA where you can get your hands on the buttons almost like the real thing. While there are several pinball games for the PPC,
CeCraft produces the most number of pinball games and certainly the best. Read my reviews on
Young Paladin of Paladin series and the more recent cutesy
Angel Egg.
A few weeks ago, CeCraft invited me to join in a 'closed' beta test of their latest pinball game, Crystal Caliburn.
Would I be interested to participate? nice gal Sarah from CECraft emailed me. Do birds fly? Certainly! And I was in for a real treat as Crystal Caliburn was my favorite pinball table since my Mac days. And I wasn't disappointed.
On first looks, Crystal Caliburn looks very much like the standard quality pinball game that you have come to expect from CeCraft - carefully crafted, well polished and running ever so smoothly.
The first thing you want to do is to configure the buttons for the game. With so many new PPCs (Toshiba, Fujitsu, NEC etc.) released recently, such a utility can decide the playablity of many a game. I am so glad that CeCraft took my suggestion and improve on their keyconfig utility here. Instead of second-guessing which buttons on your PDA are A,B or C; all you have to do is to hit the exact button you want to use. I personally prefer to use the rightmost and leftmost keys for flippers, and the inside buttons for tilt.
Having played Crystal Caliburn on both the Mac and PC, I am quite at home with the table. Eventually, after all the physics of the game engine have been taken care of, it is the table that really counts. I've got to hand it to those guys at CeCraft - the port is literally perfect in every detail.
If you enjoy Crystal Caliburn, you will go wild with this port. I cannot find any fault with this game - it is truly a pinball hustler's dream come true. Even if you have never played this table, a test run will immediately get you hooked. It is truly a classic and a real break from run of the mill tables.