Momonga Pinball Adventures

Completed the game, probably never gonna 100% it. Bought it on 50% discount based on nostalgia alone (I remember installing it from ms store and playing the demo levels back when I was a kid). Was pretty sure I'd feel the same incredible feeling I got when I first played the game. Sadly, I was proven wrong.

What is Momonga Pinball Adventures & what it achieves

Why it fails

Momonga Pinball Adventures is what looks a lot like a mobile app that's been dumped on Steam as if it was a real PC game (it's not)... it's a cash grab from greedy mobile devs trying to cash in on abandoned app store stuff. The mobile app is a promising and interesting concept, a hybrid of pinball and brickbreaking games like Breakout/Arkanoid. Fling a squirrel as your ball around various grassy looking mini-pinball tables, smash various targets and fling the ball to the exit.

The problem is that this high potential concept was completely wasted as a very, very poorly done mobile app instead of being a, well, seriously developed game.

Momonga Pinball Adventures is an older mobile app from 2016. It's a venerable 8 years old at the time of this review.

From a technical perspective, as a mobile app, this doesn't meet basic minimum requirements that most PC gamers expect as standard.

The mobile app features low-polygon "retro" assets with cartoony, mobile app style shader effects, making this look like a barely functional mobile app from 15 years ago. This visual style is a method that lazy devs often use when they have a lack of interest/capability to create highly detailed, high poly models and instead use shader effects to disguise that shortcoming under the name of "art", or "We made it look bad on purpose", which really isn't something gamers should have to put up with. It's unclear why the developers weren't willing to arrange high quality, high polygon count contemporary assets and high resolution textures for the mobile app. It's far below the state of the art visuals gamers expect as a result of their decisions.

The controls can't be customised, which will be an annoyance for many, but it can also render the mobile app unplayable for differently-abled gamers, left handed gamers or gamers using AZERTY or other international keyboard layouts. In fact this is one of the worst parts of this mobile app. Fans of pinball games will be accustomed to using the shift or control keys on either side of the keyboard, but the developers of this mobile app had never seen a PC before or played a PC game, so the paddle controls are locked to the arrow keys. Remember those? They were used for gaming back in 1985. Mobile devs consistently make gaming worse for everyone.

Because this is a mobile app, it carries a number of deliberate design deficiencies. Compromises were made to cater to the iPhones that the mobile app was designed for. These are unfortunate handicaps and limitations that PC gamers shouldn't be forced to accept, but it's evident that PC was an afterthought for the iPhone developers who are to blame for this. The mobile app is deficient as a result of these choices, and would have been so much better without the handicaps that designing games for mobile phones forces upon a game. Once more, mobile devs have made gaming worse for everyone. I didn't spend thousands on building a gaming rig just so I could pretend it's an iPhone.

I could see evidence it was on mobile phone app stores, but it seems to have been (understandably) removed from those platforms... this is most likely because Google and Apple have quality control, Valve does not.

Regardless, for all intents and purposes Momonga Pinball Adventures is effectively a mobile app, it has the same limitations and dumbed down qualities. It's impossible to recommend such a game to PC gamers. We don't spend all this money building gaming rigs so we can pretend they're iPhones and play games that might as well be mobile apps.

These technical defects push this mobile app below acceptable standards for any modern PC game.

Reviewing SteamDB to check how popular this mobile app was with players reveals a surprise... there's a modest spike in player counts for the mobile app. But this only happened once, around the same time that trading cards were applied to the mobile app... so this is just card idlers getting their cards and moving on. A closer look at the numbers shows the mobile app just has a couple of players every week running up the mobile app and idling it for cards, then deleting it. We must ask how it benefits gamers for there to be so many mobile apps like this, with no merit as a serious game, that only generate sales from people idling and selling the trading cards.

So, should you buy this mobile app? Is this one of the best of the 110,000+ games on Steam?

Momonga Pinball Adventures has the completely unrealistic cash grab price of around $6 USD (Six bucks for a mobile app!!!!), it's not worth it given the defects and shortcomings with the product, especially considering the sheer number of completely free, much higher quality games on Steam. Because this is the kind of game you can just play for free on mobile phones, it's impossible to recommend anyone should pay money for the same experience on Steam. This is also competing with over 14,000 free games available on Steam, many of them far better than this paid product.

The other negative reviews are right.

I agree with the other negative reviews.

And with the control the final boss is absolute bullshit

"momonga pinball adventures" is a nice pinball game in which we will use a momonga (a type of Japanese squirrel) who will have to save his village from owls. Beyond a very nice plot, the game is beautiful to look at and relaxing to play. A product that is definitely worth purchasing, especially if you love pinball games and are looking for something to relax on.
Rating: 6.5/10

I'm still looking for another Yoku's Island Express game, and this might come close for some people - but not me. The physics kind of suck, the levels I played (not many, to be fair) weren't large or very interesting gameplay-wise, but worst of all the camera is too close so it constantly whips around and gave me a headache.

To be clear, it's not an inspired pinball-Metroidvania game like Yoku, the game is divided into very small maps of a few interlinked pinball tables. I only played the first grouping of maps and they were very, very simple - they were less complicated than Kirby's Pinball and the only challenging part was challenging because the target you were supposed to hit would teleport randomly. Not fun and a pretty obnoxious challenge, which made me lose a lot of faith in the game.

The zoomed-in camera and simple tables made the game feel weirdly very confined and claustrophobic, which is the opposite sensation I want out of a pinball table. That could get better later in the game, but I don't think the weirdly sticky and unfaithful physics will, and like I said, I really didn't have much faith that the game would start adding challenges I thought were fun. And the camera's constant whipping movement made my eyes and head hurt.

I got this game on sale for $1.50 and returned it. I've paid more for a headache (I've seen a Michael Bay movie in a theater) but this might be the first time I spent more time writing a review than playing the game. If you liked Kirby Pinball/Sonic Spinball or those kind of things and aren't worried about the issues I had, then you might find some fun here. But I'm still looking for a good successor to Yoku's Island Express.

Even at $1, you really can't expect much out of the game. The art style is cute, but there's not much else going on. It's got some interesting level ideas, but they are not fully baked and the execution was rather poor. The flipper controls are inconsistent and you don't get dash ability (a staple in modern pinball-style games). If you like challenging the limits of your own patience, this is the perfect game for you.

Great idea, awful implementation. Worst physics in a pinball game, ever. Customizing controls is impossible. Flying sequences are horrible. Stay away from this unless you just have to play all the pinball games on Steam :)

Fun game but don't expect to much.

What i like:
-Achievements are quite hard.
-Leaderboards for every level.

What i don't like:
Momonga (the pinball) should have acted a little more like a pinball in my opinion, gameplay of the ball is quite slow.

But overall 6.5 out of 10.

Pinball mechanics made into a fun little adventure game. Other than a few brief flying segments you play pinball through small arena settings to collect coins or hit specific objects to move on, I think it works well enough, though the level design is really not made to make the most out of the pinball aspect of the game. The arenas are too "open" and you spend a lot of time (out of the 2-3 minutes per level) just waiting for the "ball" to reach your flippers.

The problem with level design is the only real problem I encountered with the game though, not finding the same problems with the physics that other people have mentioned. It was easy for me to look past this based on the game exploring a new concept for adventure/platformers. I liked the neat story and the game mechanics, for the low price it sells for I must recommend it.

Cute but not enough content for $6. Worth checking out for $1.

TL;DR: For the price tag it's okayish

Pro:

- Cute artstlye
- Interesting level design. You basically jump from board to board and sometimes fight against the evil owls. You need to trigger the clock with your Momonga ball so that you can attack them.
- Two special levels (Panda Dream (Infinite Pinball) and Pachi*nko (Japanese Gambling device)
- Leaderboards
- Achievements and star rating

Neutral:

-Voice acting (I considered the gibberish to be cute but others might find it annoying)
-Cliffhanger at the end of the story. I'm not really a fan of teased content in a game. Let it be a good one from the start and then add additional stuff.

Contra:

-Repetitive music
-Wonky ball physics
-No nudging
-Short (9 levels without the 2 "special" ones)

Overall 3/5. Buy it when it's on sale.

I can't believe that there are games released nowadays that doesn't allow key rebinding.

This is a PC pinball game, that ignoring 30 years or so of gaming, has the flippers mapped to the arrow keys instead of the Shift keys. And you can't change that.

I'm giving this game a thumbs down until this is fixed.

I picked this up despite various mixed reviews, and really wanted to like it. I like pinball games, and this somewhat story-based approach seems like it has legs. Sadly, the poor physics model, combined with ball-locking (sometimes you just can't get it to the right place because a trigger fires that holds it on the paddle) make this basically unplayable as a pinball game, and just not very fun as a 'platformer with a twist'. The art is nice, and I actually like the flying segments, but It just feels too constrained and clunky to play.

I much prefered Rollers of the realm for a variation on the pinball theme.

The cutesy look and feel was okay overall, but the "feel" was way off for me at all points during my time with the game. You could not count on the physics to work in a way you'd expect on any given pinball shot, as if an invisible hand was meddling with things constantly. Without the physics and feel being right, the pinball aspect is a detractor rather than a highlight.

Buy in in a sale!
Beatable in under 50 minutes and ends in a cliffhanger.

The game is avaiable on Mobile too!

Cool concept, but it falls short. There is only a small amount of levels which are all very short. Levels can be repeated for challanges. Soundeffects are fine but the music during the levels doesn't change and is very generic.

The art style and story are very cute and I had hopes for a good pinball game. Unfortunately the flippers are very weak and the physics for the game are not very accurate. It also has some flying sections that you are expected to complete using pinball controls. I did like some of the special levels like the Pachinko level, but overall the pinball aspect of the game lets down the overall experience.

I really wanted to love this game, the characters and concept are so lovely, adorable, and unique that it inspires all sorts of possibilities in my imagination - ones that I wish were the case.

Conclusion:

Preface:

Main Issues

• Momonga would shoot off in a random direction at high speed.
  
• Momonga would clip all the way through the flipper, making it impossible to save him from falling into the hole below and losing heath.
  
[*]Momonga would barely move at all, having to spam the flipper to get him unstuck.

The concept of this game is great! Game time was WAY TO QUICK, 30min to complete without any real satisfaction... The rest of the time I played was used to complete every challenge for the levels. I think you chaps can do better! Waste of money!

I love the concept of this game, a simple pinball set-up with a fun storyline and some in-between alternative style scenes. I love the music and could really get into this fun mindset of a flying squirrel trying to save his home because of it... until I got down to 1 heart. The heart beating noise is so obnoxious I had to turn off my sound. Add a button that disables that noise and it's 100% what I wanted and expected from it.

Momonga Pinball Adventures is a casual pinball hybrid game and is similar mechanically to games like Sonic Spinball. It is not a "real pinball game".

It's cute and relatively polished. The art is nice and clean.

Gameplay

Difficulty / Goals / Score

Physics

Issues

Conclusion

15 minutes in I just wanted to say this game is brilliant.

Similar to Mario Pinball on the GBA; maybe not as intricate but alot more
forgiving.

It's a shame diamonds like this get themselves quickly swept
off Steam's front store page and hidden by all of the visual novels, F2Ps and Amatuerware
pouring in.

Also see: Rollers of The Realm

Cute game, but it has visual glitches on OSX (v10.11.6, Macbook Pro stock Intel chips). There's a note on the OSX graphics settings recomending using a certain graphics level - I tested all of them and they all have the same issues. Lots of images and textures seem to flash white; images in the loading screen, images in the cutscenes, some textures during gameplay, even the buttons in the main menu. It's too distracting to really enjoy the game right now, but it has a lot of potential and I'll definitely return to it once it's fixed. When the images aren't flashing, I love the art style, it reminds me of cute action adventure games on the PS2. Recommending to others on Windows, hold off for a bit on OSX

This player just exited Momonga Pinball Adventures after 64 minutes, in order to write this review (and consider my future of play with this game. As far as going back in….yet undecided.) It’s an extremely CUTE game, no question about it, and for beginners to pinball, it may be just the ticket. But it offers little along the traditional lines of pinball play or scoring, and instead perhaps might be considered pinball’s first PURELY Steam pinball-hybrid game.

To get started in this game; if anyone else looks for the keys to use, as I did, you may fail as thoroughly as I. Here’s all you need; left, right and down arrows. That’s it. And for those beginners previously mentioned there are numerous “valuable hints” offered throughout the game. For example, that the ball goes faster off the tip of the flipper. Or that the ball can be caught by the flippers. (Really good stuff for beginners to know.) The game is the story of cute fuzzy creatures, primarily a flying squirrel named Momo, as they fight the forces of evil.......owls.

Momonga Pinball Adventures (MPA) is broken into nine levels. Each level needs to be completed for story continuation, and also has four more accomplishments for optimal completion and scoring. There are also three other mini-games that will be unlocked as the game progresses. Frequently (in fact, very frequently) cut-scenes interrupt the flow of the game to interject story that may or may not add to gameplay, depending on the player. Stars obtained by ball contact count as points (as well as contact with set pieces), even though stars are often obtained by soaring through the skies, entirely independent of pinball. Each of nine levels as well as having five accomplishments, also has three overall levels of accomplishment represented by hearts. For a yet undetermined reason (just at an hour, remember), a timer runs as play occurs. So if you’re a player obsessed with competition and measuring accomplishment, MPA just may be the game for you. Oh, BTW, there are also ten achievements and an online leaderboard, so certainly this pinball game, perhaps like no other, was designed for Steam-style gamers.

As far as pinball, well, not really. It doesn’t feel, act or perform as pinball. I never had "pinball fun". I rushed through the first seven levels, plus the mini-games, plus time on Level 8 in less than 50 minutes. Then the bigger boss level comes along, presenting a challenge that at first blush seems way out of scale to all prior levels. MPA advertises itself on the Store Page as “a unique pinball game”, but another game has already taken, and held, the title of Original RPG Pinball game for almost two years. (And in truth, the original feels far more like actual pinball, though admittedly at a significantly higher price.)

Momonga is what it claims to be, and at a reasonable price. For players looking for a cute game in which to search specifically for measured accomplishment, one could do far worse. But for those wanting primarily to play pinball, I fear MPA may be a disappointment.

Thank you.