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The 22 Best Pinball Video Games of All Time

By YPB Team

From arcade-era cartridge classics to slick modern simulations, digital pinball spans four decades of flippers, ramps and multiball mayhem, with occult cult favorites, licensed blockbusters and genre-bending oddballs all in the mix. Which one earns the high score?

  1. Balls of Steel — ranked #11
    Balls of Steel
    Wildfire Studios' 1997 DOS set of over-the-top original tables published by Apogee.
    1000pts
  2. Pinball Fantasies — ranked #22
    Pinball Fantasies
    DICE's 1992 Amiga classic with four themed tables that set the bar for early digital pinball.
    899pts
  3. Pro Pinball: Timeshock! — ranked #33
    Pro Pinball: Timeshock!
    FarSight/Cunning Developments' 1997 simulation prized for photorealistic physics and one of the deepest single-table designs ever made.
    750pts
  4. 3D Pinball: Space Cadet — ranked #44
    3D Pinball: Space Cadet
    The Full Tilt! table bundled with Windows that introduced a generation to digital pinball.
    660pts
  5. Epic Pinball — ranked #55
    Epic Pinball
    Digital Extremes' 1993 DOS shareware favorite famous for its Android table and driving soundtrack.
    592pts
  6. Rollers of the Realm — ranked #66
    Rollers of the Realm
    Phantom Compass's 2014 hybrid that fuses pinball physics with an RPG party and story.
    592pts
  7. Yoku's Island Express — ranked #77
    Yoku's Island Express
    Villa Gorilla's 2018 open-world 'pinball metroidvania' that reinvented the genre.
    513pts
  8. Sonic Spinball — ranked #88
    Sonic Spinball
    Sega's 1993 Genesis title that dropped Sonic into a physics-driven pinball dungeon crawl.
    513pts
  9. Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection — ranked #99
    Pinball Hall of Fame: The Williams Collection
    FarSight's 2008 anthology of beloved Williams and Bally solid-state tables.
    513pts
  10. Kirby's Pinball Land — ranked #1010
    Kirby's Pinball Land
    HAL Laboratory's 1993 Game Boy game built entirely around bouncing Kirby through themed boards.
    513pts
  11. Odama — ranked #1111
    Odama
    Vivarium's 2006 GameCube oddity mixing pinball with real-time strategy and a voice-controlled army.
    513pts
  12. Pinball FX3 — ranked #1212
    Pinball FX3
    Zen Studios' modern platform and licensing juggernaut, home to Star Wars, Marvel and dozens of original tables.
    420pts
  13. Star Wars Pinball — ranked #1313
    Star Wars Pinball
    Zen Studios' acclaimed set of Star Wars-licensed tables spanning the whole saga.
    420pts
  14. Demon's Tilt — ranked #1414
    Demon's Tilt
    WIZNWAR's 2019 bullet-hell tribute to Devil's Crush with 32-bit occult chaos.
    420pts
  15. Dragon's Fury — ranked #1515
    Dragon's Fury
    Tengen's 1992 Genesis sequel to Devil's Crush, a fan-favorite fantasy-horror table.
    420pts
  16. Pinball Dreams — ranked #1616
    Pinball Dreams
    The 1992 DICE original that proved a home computer could convincingly simulate a real pinball table.
    308pts
  17. Devil's Crush — ranked #1717
    Devil's Crush
    NAXAT Soft's 1990 TurboGrafx-16 cult favorite with an occult theme of skulls, demons and mutating targets.
    308pts
  18. Metroid Prime Pinball — ranked #1818
    Metroid Prime Pinball
    Fuse Games' 2005 DS spin-off that folds Samus into a rolling Morph Ball across Metroid tables.
    308pts
  19. The Pinball Arcade — ranked #1919
    The Pinball Arcade
    FarSight Studios' meticulous digital recreations of real-world Williams, Bally and Gottlieb machines.
    171pts
  20. Alien Crush — ranked #2020
    Alien Crush
    NAXAT Soft's 1988 TurboGrafx-16 biomechanical pinball forerunner to Devil's Crush.
    171pts
  21. Pokemon Pinball — ranked #2121
    Pokemon Pinball
    Nintendo's 1999 Game Boy Color hit that turned catching Pokemon into a rumble-pak pinball table.
    171pts
  22. Video Pinball — ranked #2222
    Video Pinball
    Atari's 1980 2600 cartridge, one of the earliest home pinball simulations.
    171pts

#games262#retro21#arcade3#pinball1

Comments

Mascots keep wandering into this genre. Pokémon Pinball hid a rumble motor in the cartridge, and Sonic Spinball is on the same list: https://youpick.best/articles/pokemon-ranked-many-ways https://youpick.best/articles/sonic-the-hedgehog-ranked-many-ways

YP
ypb-team·Aug 21·
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