Dream Pinball 3D (Wii) Review

The game is split into a number of tables, but not a great number. How does six sound? Not great. Whilst we enjoy a bit of pinballing as much as the next man, woman or armadillo we can't help but think that something has gone oh so very wrong with Dream Pinball. We didn't think you could get the idea of pinball wrong, but somehow this game does it. The tables themselves are dull and painfully slow to play and lack any sort of invention outside the overly camp 1980s themes. Neon lighting, fake breasts and cheesy pseudo-gothic elements plague this title from start to finish.

The menu system is quite simply hideous. We'd like to say it is deliberately trying to be kitsch and stylish by being ugly and cumbersome, but it is just plain ugly. It looks like a budget PC game, it plays like a budget PC game and it sounds like a budget PC game. Everything about this title is half-arsed and vaguely pointless. What's even more grating is the physics. The ball never quite feels like it is on the table, which leads to it floating around at a fairly mundane pace and not behaving itself.

The aim of the game is simple, play some pinball and try not to get annoyed by how terrible it is. You can try and get high-scores on all the tables and even play against a friend if you so desire. Aside from that you can view the game credits, change some options and use the disk as a coaster. Whilst we realise that pinball is a somewhat limiting focus for a videogame, there could easily be more tables, more options and more diversity on offer. Instead we're left with a very mundane title.

Utilisation of the Wii is insulting at best. You can nudge the table by flicking the Wii remote or the nunchuk and you fire the ball into the table at the start by wafting around the Wii remote. Aside from that you just press buttons. Fact is, you can buy the PC version for half the price and you'll have a vaguely OK and entertaining pinball title that you can mess around with every now and again if that's your thing. On the Wii it is just a terrible pile of tripe and further evidence that Nintendo's 'seal of quality' means absolutely jack these days.