Pinball evolved over the years from simple electro-mechanical tables, to solid state tables, to the modern computerized tables, and along the way they grew more ambitious and more complex. Pinball FX has followed a similar path. When it first started it did nothing but it's own original tables with it's own engine, that they felt wasn't good enough, so they then created FX2 with an updated engine. But, they then decided that they wanted to recreate real pinball tables, and they knew that their engine wasn't up to that task, and thus FX3 came about with a further updated engine. But, in the meantime, real pinball had also advanced, and now tables eschew the old dot matrix displays of the past in favor of video score screens that play actual video and graphics. And that's how we got here, Pinball FX, Zen's newest update.

But hopefully this should be the final engine change, as this time they realized that rather than keep fiddling with their own engine, they're using Unreal Engine going forward. This way they can concentrate on the pinball, and let someone else worry about the engine. Some people have complained about them changing engines again, and say that they're just doing it to milk customers again by making them pay for their tables all over again, and while I have some issues with their pricing mechanics, they didn't do this for that reason.

They did it to have a definitive version of FX, one that can be used for pinball tables of any era, and they HAD to update the engine if they wanted any chance of convincing companies making modern pins, companies such as Stern, Jersey Jack, etc. to license their tables to Zen, because getting a license would be useless if the engine couldn't handle recreating the tables.

And the new FX is great. It plays well, and the graphics are excellent. I know some people have complained of numerous bugs, but I've encountered relatively few. There's always things that can be improved, such as some rough aspects of their UI, but the games themselves run smoothly and largely problem free.

The main issue that many, including myself, have with Zen is over their pricing issues. They used to sell the tables individually, and us old timers bought many of the tables as single tables, but then they decided to stop selling tables individually, and only sell them in packs of three. When we upgraded from FX2 to FX3, they didn't charge again for the tables, and just let everyone carry the tables over from 2 to 3. But, now they're saying that they're not doing that for FX, because they had to port the tables over to the new engine, and that required time and resources to perform, so they can't afford to do that for free. But, they said they would have Legacy packs for us to cost us less to buy the old tables in this new engine.

But, the problem is that they changed the old tables from single table sales to the bundles, so even though we have the tables in FX3, they don't count unless you bought the bundle and not the table individually, which is leading to some weird pricing issues. For example, two weeks ago, I bought the Williams Pinball Vol. 2 Legacy Pack for about $3.35, which worked out to roughly $1.11 per game. Fair price I thought. But, last week they had a bundle of 3 Star Wars tables where I could buy the bundle direct for Pinball FX for around $6.75, but the Legacy Pack price was something like $8.89 for the same three tables. Needless to say, the pricing is very screwy if you're an older player.

If your a new player though, those issues don't concern you, and you shouldn't let the reviews by salty older pinheads dissuade you from getting the game. It's the best digital pinball around, with lots of great tables, and they're going to be adding many more. They have classic Williams tables, but they also have lots of fun and clever original tables as well. So, if you enjoy pinball, Pinball FX stands alongside Zaccaria Pinball as one of the best digital pinball simulators out there.