BIG BUCK HUNTER PRO |
Following our first three reports on the game, Stern have published a press release formally announcing it to the trade. It includes two pictures which are slightly different to those in our initial report. They're still mocked-up images as you can tell from the lack of the new side rails which cover the area around the flipper buttons and the missing tournament start button on the front. These pictures include the artwork on the apron featuring a wood panel texture and show the buck stopped at one of its resting places half way across the playfield and the elk diverter open. The playfield picture reveals how the two inlanes on the right effectively move the flipper area and the playfield's centre line quite some way to the left, meaning it is no longer aligned with the shape of the apron. This could make it harder to detect SDTM balls. Along with the two pictures we also get more information about the people working on game which reveals a close co-operation between the video game's creators and the pinball design team. The design of the pinball game was assisted by Big Buck Hunter video game creator George Petro - a former Midway game designer who founded Play Mechanix in 1995. Play Mechanix merged with Eugene Jarvis's Raw Thrills in 2007 to become a wholly owned subsidiary. Eugene is a well known pinball and video game person, working on software at Atari and Williams where he often teamed up with Steve Ritchie on games such as Airborne Avenger, Firepower and F-14 Tomcat. Former pinball designer Mark Ritchie was in charge of the Big Buck Hunter series at Play Mechanix where he is still Production Coordinator/Producer. All three worked with the Stern staff on the design of Big Buck Hunter Pro pinball with George providing the main narration, just as he does in the video game. The voice of Pappy is provided by Scott Pikulski who also has a pinball background. Scott created dot matrix display effects and animations for Capcom Pinball on games such as Pinball Magic and Big Bang Bar. Capcom, of course, was where Mark Ritchie was Director of Game Development. Artwork on Big Buck Hunter is by long-time pinball artist John Youssi while sounds come from Ken Hale who worked on the recent Stern Batman game and also sound engineered on the Big Buck Hunter video games. So here's Stern's press release:
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