Pinball (game)

Pinball is a regular pinball game for the Nintendo Entertainment System that was developed and published by Nintendo. It was first released for the Family Computer in 1984, and the same year, a Nintendo VS. System version, VS. Pinball, was released worldwide. Pinball was of the 18 launch titles released for the Nintendo Entertainment System in North America in 1985, and was also a launch title released in Europe and Australia in 1986.

Pinball is the first released video game that Satoru Iwata programmed for Nintendo; his first Family Computer project, a 1983 home conversion of the 1982 arcade game Joust, remained unreleased for over four years until its eventual 1987 production by HAL Laboratory.

While it is not a part of the Mario franchise, Pinball features a bonus stage with Mario, who is also shown on the game's cover. Shortly before the Famicom version was released, Pinball was preceded by a Game & Watch game of the same name, which does not have any Mario-related elements.

Gameplay
Pinball is a game where the player controls the paddles of a virtual pinball machine. The game has two screens to represent the traditional pinball table and one for a bonus mode. Play begins when the player launches a ball with the plunger from first screen—the bottom of the pinball table—through the top of the screen to the second screen. Play will move to the first screen if the ball falls through the bottom of the top screen and will return to the top screen if the ball is hit back through the space at the top of the first screen.

If the ball falls through the hole to the right at the bottom level, the player will enter a mini-game featuring Mario and Lady.

The player controls the paddles on either screen to deflect the ball to keep it from falling off the bottom of the lower screen.

Bonus stage
In this Breakout mode, the player controls Mario (in his NES Mario Bros. palette) carrying a platform. The objective of this mode is to rescue Lady (previously seen in Donkey Kong). The player achieves this by bouncing the ball off Mario's platform and hitting various targets, the destruction of which also earns them points. When the blocks under her are all gone, she will drop. Catching her on Mario's platform earns the player bonus points, but allowing her to hit the ground causes the player to lose.

Staff
Hirokazu Tanaka is credited for creating original music for Pinball.

Legacy
Four versions of Pinball have been released since it was initially launched on the NES. The game was also included in Doubutsu no Mori and its Nintendo GameCube remake, Animal Crossing. In 2002 Nintendo re-released it as one of the several e-Reader games under the name Pinball-e. Pinball was one of the first titles to be ported to the Wii's Virtual Console in 2006 and for the Wii U's Virtual Console in 2013. On May 26, 2022, Pinball was released on the Nintendo Entertainment System - Nintendo Switch Online application for the Nintendo Switch in North America. On May 27, 2022, Pinball was also released for the application in other regions.

In Family BASIC, a piece of software made for the Family Computer in Japan, the penguin that appears in Pinball makes a brief appearance in Game 1 along with the Sidesteppers from Mario Bros. Both the penguin and Lady have very similar sprites as in Pinball.

In WarioWare Twisted! there is a microgame titled Pinball, which is based on the bonus stage from Pinball. The actual surface is circular instead of flat and to control Mario the player must twist the Game Boy Advance or Nintendo DS. There are three stages and each stage lasts only a couple of seconds and becomes progressively harder as the speed increases and the paddle size decreases.

Pinball is one of the 16 games featured in NES Remix and NES Remix Pack. It is also one of the unlockable Nintendo Entertainment System game demos for the Wii U application, Amiibo Tap: Nintendo's Greatest Bits.

Trivia

 * Mario's outfit on the American box art of Pinball would later be used as one of Luigi's alternate costumes in the Super Smash Bros. series, starting with Super Smash Bros. Brawl.
 * This game depicts Lady as a brunette, predating the 1994 Donkey Kong for Game Boy.