High Scoring Strategy Guide for Paranormal

[Cloda]

Most peoplewill not be able to rasie the levitation jackpot as high as Cloda. You're better off with the much easier fourth dimension. More fun too actually.

Yeah...Not much longer to activate, and faster to get jackpots and raise them.... Really appreciated your guide,Cloda( they're ALWAYS useful), the strategy is perfect, i guess though that everyone can pick their favourite multiball mode. Well done, man!

My gameplay video should be on my youtube page soon (http://www.youtube.com/user/Cloda007). Take a look at that and maybe you will see why I specifically played levitation multi-ball;

- easy to start - only need one locked ball so less chance of losing a ball through normal play.
- levitating ball is out of the way for 20 seconds or so allowing you to concentrate on raising the jackpot.
- It becomes easier to hit the levitating ball once you get used to focusing on the shadow.
- once you get used to it, it becomes relatively easy to get the ball into the cube again to get the jackpot.

Not saying the others once aren't possible... this just worked well for me.

I don't get why people would wanna put caps on jackpots and such. I couldn't go into the Pinball museum here in Vegas and tell Tim Arnold that Spiderman is giving out too many extra balls and high jackpots so I want him to put a cap on or change these things. Well, I guess I could, but he'd probably ask me what drugs I'm currently on. Just accept the tables for the way that Zen designed them unless there is some mind numbing glitch on it like ball acceleration like the PS3 tables have.

I agree that they will most probably never change the existing tables. This is more an appeal to Zen to puts caps on jackpots, EOB bonus, extra balls etc. as they design their further tables. As someone said... the less skilled players will most probably not even know about it, but the guys at the top will feel there is more of a chance to play a reasonable time on a table and still get a chance at a top score.

[Womble]

I don't get why people would wanna put caps on jackpots and such. I couldn't go into the Pinball museum here in Vegas and tell Tim Arnold that Spiderman is giving out too many extra balls and high jackpots so I want him to put a cap on or change these things

Of course you could. Virtually all SS and later machines provide operator-level access to settings for things like extra balls, the default number of balls, free replay targets, table pitch, tilt bob sensitivity, specific score progression rules, etc.

Extra Balls are routinely capped or banned in tournament play, on all but the most primitive machines. Some machines are avoided entirely in tournament play precisely because they're grindfests, or because they have exploitable bugs.

And all the major manufacturers have distributed ROM updates for their games, in order to fix bugs, scoring exploits, difficulty levels, etc. And Stern still do it (albeit via USB upgrades.) Commonly, a new table is a very early WIP, and it's fully expected that the design will be fleshed out and improved over time.

The machines also produce statistics, showing the impact of the various settings to the bottom line.

It's ironic, but the certification/QA requirements (and costs) and limitations of XBLA and PSN means that a fully digital game like Zen's may have even fewer updates than a real, physical machine.

There's nothing holy or sacrosanct about the choices Zen have made. They are all subject to change. (See: Rocky & Bullwinkle.) Things slip by even the best designers. The trick is to fix the problem areas, iron out the gross imbalances.

BTW, it is not demeaning or disparaging Zen to point out where they can improve. Informed feedback and constructive criticism helps Zen improve their products. And they seem to welcome it. More importantly, Zen acts on these suggestions. So there's no need to go all defensive on Zen's behalf whenever someone suggests changes or points out problem areas.

[Vincent]

BTW, it is not demeaning or disparaging Zen to point out where they can improve. Informed feedback and constructive criticism helps Zen improve their products. And they seem to welcome it. More importantly, Zen acts on these suggestions.

I couldn't agree more, objective feedback is exactly what people at Zen want. They said it many times. Their attitude is that of intelligent creators.

[Cloda]

Strategy Guide Video

I'm no expert in making videos or editing so I hope you can make out everything decently enough!!!

In this video I demonstrate some of the elements of the high scoring strategy guide for Paranormal. It shows you how to lock the ball, start the levitation multi ball mode, raise the jackpot value and score the super jackpot by hitting the levitating ball.

The footage was taken from my high scoring game after I reached my goals of a 100bil score and a 100mil levitation jackpot.

[Womble]

Excellent work there Cloda. Cheers.

[Wickedwonder]

Omfg, just got 2 bil and got the damn bug where the ball is stuck on the right side of the table. I knew the bug was there and to not shoot when the ball was floating right, but accidentally did and ofc it happened. Won't do another try again sigh...

[Wickedwonder]

Pfff, after 15 mins i was finally able to get the ball back on the plunger with nudging while the table was on tilt and it got shot back on the table. Only lost 1 ball and that's better then 1 whole game :')

Taking a break now at 3 bil and glad to be still going. I'm really not as good as raising the jackpot as Cloda since it's only 11 mil now and i know i won't even get like 10% of the score, but just gonna try to make the best of it and then leaving the table to rest for some months :P

[IndyRC_Racer]

While Paranormal File #1 is the easiest to activate, you can advance the jackpot value on any of the 4 Paranormal multi-ball modes (I'm not sure if the Jackpot value carries over on Paranormal File #5 - Wizard mode between each time you play it.)

Personally I think Paranormal File #4 is more fun to play, since you start off with 3 balls in play. You also don't have to go through the levitation process to keep getting jackpots. It does take a bit more to start this mission though.

[Wickedwonder]

Yeah true, but been on the same game now for a day and saving in between so just gonna finish this one with levitation. I'll probably will do that mode then in my next game much later on ^^

[lasvegaspinballhalloffame]

Fourth Dimension is so fun!!

[Babbylonian]

Personally I think Paranormal File #4 is more fun to play, since you start off with 3 balls in play. You also don't have to go through the levitation process to keep getting jackpots. It does take a bit more to start this mission though.

Another nice thing about 4th Dimension is that you get the teleports which often send the balls down the Nessie ramp (with the handy audio cue to remind you), giving you more shots at spinning up the jackpot. On the one billion-plus game I've had so far, I managed to get the jackpot on 4th Dimension up to about 4 million and I was playing the table "straight," activating each multiball in turn, activating wizard, and repeating.

Also with 4th Dimension, you can get your box bonuses easier because you get a straight shot to two holes and they can stay open indefinitely with no risk of a locked ball making them flash again.

If I decide to try grinding the table (in my pathetic, inefficient way), I'll be using 4th Dimension to do it.

[PARALAX]

Pinball Expert has found a small sensation!!!!!

Hey, guys. Listen to me! I've found out yesterday a small sensation...how you can get a skill shot EVERY TIME befor you launch the ball. Just use the right analog stick and don't bend the spring to much. If you can handle that correctly, the ball lands on a second ramp instead of the table but even if not you get a skill shot (500.000 Points) in most cases. From the second ramp you can even get a Super Skillshot (1,5M) with the left shooter. With this trick I got up to 33M for a game and that's quite a lot for this table. I could even make a video of this if you like.

BTW: I'm currently searching for some players playing with me so I could demonstrate this as well. Just add me under XBox Live: PARALAX1974

[Vincent]

I got up to 33M for a game and that's quite a lot for this table.

To be honest, it is not. Getting 1 or 2 millions on this table is very quick and easy, there are other methods to do it : for example, with the Clairvoyance Reward, you can get 2 millions by just selecting the right entry in a DMD menu. Another method to get 1 million very easily is to enter the Haunted Mansion and to shoot the ball outside so it get caught by the UFO.

But thank you for sharing your Skillshot technics, I'm sure it will be useful.

[Womble]

With this trick I got up to 33M for a game and that's quite a lot for this table. I could even make a video of this if you like.

Go for it. All videos gratefully accepted, and linked from the videos page.

Cheers.

[Vincent]

Go for it. All videos gratefully accepted, and linked from the videos page.

Cheers.

Yeah that would be nice !