The Making of Stern's Avengers: Infinity Quest Pinball!

Stern Pinball·video·11m 14s·analyzed·Jun 4, 2021

Analysis

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TL;DR

Stern's making-of AIQ video highlights Keith Elwin's design philosophy and team collaboration.

Summary

Stern Pinball's official behind-the-scenes video on Avengers: Infinity Quest features designer Keith Elwin, mechanical engineer Harrison Drake, programmer Rick Nagle, and artist Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti) discussing the game's design philosophy, mechanics, rule set, and artwork. The video emphasizes collaborative design methodology, iterative playtesting, and thematic integration of Marvel IP into pinball gameplay through features like the Dr. Strange spinner, captain marvel loop ramp, and soul gem wizard mode.

Key Claims

Keith Elwin designed Avengers Infinity Quest with a focus on balancing easy and hard shots with good shot flow
high confidence · Opening design philosophy statement by Keith Elwin
The game was designed around the Dr. Strange spinning disconnect mechanism that Keith wanted to create as one of the fastest spinning playfield spinners in pinball
high confidence · Harrison Drake and team discussion of mechanical design priorities
The soul gem wizard mode features 8 shots with 30 flips, subtracting a flip for each flipper switch hit, creating a unique time-pressure mechanic
high confidence · Detailed rule set explanation in video
The subway ball lock feature is a throwback to Flight 2000, which was Gary Stern's favorite game from the 1980s
high confidence · Design team discussing classic Stern game influence
The game was designed as a comic book universe adaptation rather than a movie tie-in, allowing for panel framing and character design flexibility
high confidence · Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti) art direction statement

Notable Quotes

“I think a good game design has a good mixture of both easy and hard shots, easy to follow, lots of shot flow. It's got to give you that feeling that you accomplish something always.”
Keith Elwin @ Opening — Core design philosophy articulated by legendary designer
“You look at this and you can go, it's a Keith game from a mile away.”
Team member discussing Elwin's design signature @ Early — Recognition of distinctive design style
“If it's not fun, it's not a pinball, right?”
Team member @ Mid-video — Core principle driving iterative design decisions
“My favorite part of the game design is building the first whitewood based on the CAD I've been working on for usually a couple months before that.”
Harrison Drake (mechanical engineer) @ Mid-video — Insight into iterative playtesting methodology
“I'm aiming to be the Keith Elwin of art.”
Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti) @ Art discussion — Artist's career aspiration and creative goal
“It's the comic book game, it's not based on the movies, and that's why you have sort of the panel framing elements.”
Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti) @ Art direction — Explains thematic and artistic approach diverging from MCU

Entities

Keith Elwinperson Harrison DrakepersonRick NaglepersonRaymondpersonJeremy Packer / Zombie YetipersonGary SternpersonAvengers: Infinity QuestgameStern Pinballcompany

Signals

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community_signal: Design team incorporates feedback from actual competitive players and casual testers in UI/interface standardization decisions
high · Team references feedback collection from players regarding score display and interface placement
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design_philosophy: Retro design influence: Gary Stern's preference for classic game references (Flight 2000 subway mechanic) integrated into modern game design
high · Design team discussion of subway ball lock as deliberate callback to Flight 2000
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design_philosophy: Intentional whitewood prototyping methodology: CAD-to-hand-assembly-to-playtest cycle over several months before metal production
high · Harrison Drake describes favoring whitewood playtesting as favorite part of design process
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design_philosophy: Keith Elwin emphasizes balance between accessibility and challenge as core design principle: easy-to-hit shots with good flow that create accomplishment feeling
high · Opening statement on game design approach and recurring theme throughout team discussion
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personnel_signal: Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti) confirmed as art director for second Keith Elwin game; describes strong collaborative relationship including humor compatibility
high · Packer states 'second game working with jeremy pecker' and discusses design collaboration process
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Topics

Game design philosophyprimaryMechanical engineering and playfield designprimaryRule set design and gameplay mechanicsprimaryArt direction and visual designprimaryIterative development process and prototypingprimaryTeam collaboration across disciplinessecondaryMarvel IP integration and adaptationsecondaryClassic pinball design influencesecondary

Sentiment

positive(0.85)— Consistent enthusiasm from team members about design decisions, collaborative process, and final product. High confidence in mechanics and gameplay. Celebratory tone throughout video showcasing pride in finished game.

Transcript

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i think a good game design has a good mixture of both easy and hard shots easy to follow lots of shot flow it's got to give you that feeling that you accomplish something always that's how i approach any design no way so this is avengers infinity quest pinball where we take the comic book universe and turn it into the ultimate pinball experience so the story is basically the black order has gone through time and collected the gems but they haven't reached thanos yet so doctor strange is sending all the avengers back in time to battle the black order to get those gems back i want you to bring back that jeff let's get him team it's just a really great union of both layout and rules and pinball moments that all comes together in an amazing package you look at this and you can go it's a keith game from a mile away this is team elwin's third game at stern pinball harrison drake is our lead mechanical engineer i'd never touch a pinball machine before i started working here our head programmer is rick nagle the guy's a ninja we work a little different than the other teams in that he will design the rule set as well as the playfield layout our support programmer raymond who also helped me with some of the rules i'm able to just come up with rules that that i like and hope other people like them as well and of course zombie yeti Jeremy Packer (Zombie Yeti) on art i'm aiming to be the keith elwin of art that is full asgard the obvious answer was iron man because i'm the engineer but i kind of like the character authority kind of a little sarcastic so i'll say thor but i'm sure everyone else said iron man if he doesn't say iron man he's lying it's the stereotype captain america i suppose what i liked in the beginning versus what i liked in the end is a little bit different right now i'd say hulk is is up there i'm a nerd so i'd have to say iron man doctor strange because i got the little doctor strange going on look here probably doctor strange very even tempered and relaxed and go with the flow if it's not fun it's it's not a pinball right so we built some really low res quick dirty heck together versions of games just to get the shots down the flow down figure out where mechs need to go get something that you know we want to play even if it you know it's just literally a piece of wood in the box my favorite part of the game design is building the first white wood based on the cat i've been working on for you know usually a couple months before that you know we'll do a one-to-one printout we'll assemble it by hand we'll shoot it like oh this this works great or no this sucks i need to redo this game was designed around the dr strange sling ring a spinning disconnect that i've wanted to do for a couple games now and i thought it felt would fit perfectly into this game due to how dr strange uses his magic portal this was something keith really wanted to nail and make one of the best fastest spinning playfield spinners that you know pimble's ever seen this is the kinetically satisfying thing we had to iterate on this game the layout i was going for more traditional uh shot angles than i have in my previous games so i wanted to make an upper left flipper game much more integrated in the game with as far as things to shoot the gauntlet ramp first whitewood we threw the thing on there just messing around and you know you you could hit it repeatedly loop it from the upper flipper so we kind of accidentally created this self-looping upper flipper ramp shot the metal ramps and the steepness of the ramps in the back opened up a ton of space to add other shots and other things to go for it vertical ram keith really wanted a shot in this spot but with the pop bumpers being right there we didn't know what to do with it we basically looked at and said let's just take where the shot would normally go and kind of just bend it up out of the play field into the vertical ramp it is now the next step was you know we yanked a magnet out of a t-rex mechanism stuck it right on the end there and on the first shot it went right up there stuck to the magnet got a nice pause we're like you know we're doing this the rules for the hawkeye challenge is a perfect fit for that type of mechanism with a countdown the drop and then setting up those shots hawkeye challenge get ready i think people are excited to see what the captain marvel ramp does because when you look at that it just looks so different he's like man what does that do i want to shoot that the captain marvel loop ramp he found an old ramp in the back took a jurassic park half pipe ramp cut the top off open it up like a can stuck the ramp in so it's off your flipper up the ramp into the wire form turn around and come right back to the flipper i have to pitch everything to gary and sell them on it and if it has anything to do with a retro vibe he's for it the subway ball lock feature is a throwback to flight 2000s gary's turn's favorite game from the 80s we can actually lock three balls and step them through all of the relatively simple mechanics we have a visual subway you know we know roughly it's got to come out near the flipper how do you get in there and the obvious thing was you know we got this big disc hole in the play field let's use it for something else so i kind of whipped up this version of the mech so you could shoot down through that hole that already existed in the play field uh you access the portal through the dr strange disc on the premium nle if you spin the disc you spell strange it pops up you shoot it into the subway uh it's got some rgb light shows down there it can hold the balls or it can pass them through and gary loved it because it harkens back to his favorite classic stern game so keith has an outline of of all his his rules that basically he breaks down into little tasks uh you know like code this one mode it should have this progression of shots it should you know give you somewhere in the ballpark of this many points it's a great resource for raymond to be on the team with keith because they're both like high competitive players you pair that with my technical knowledge and me architecting the game i think it's a great combination the bread and butter of the game it's the whole goal where you go in doctor strange's portal and get sent to recover a gem hulk get the power gem and so you're fighting against someone for this gem doctor needs stone i'll careful once you win the gem quest now you got to decide what do i do with this gem entrust an avenger with the power gem so there's six gems in the game each one has its own special power like the reality gem will do multipliers the power gem will allow you to keep your avenger powered up it's another level of strategy is not only what gems you get but where they are that was a good idea to have each shot represent a character you're shooting shots you're collecting avengers you want to collect all the avengers and do something exciting so you get this cool wizard mode called the soul gem the flip mode is the soul gem mode you know there's eight shots and you have 30 flips every time you hit a flipper switch it's subtracting a flip but if you drain you get the ball back it just takes flips away from you once you get to zero flips the mode ends it's kind of like a different mindset for like how you normally play pinball you wanna take your time because every missed shot means more flips you're gonna need things can go wrong pretty fast as anyone who's played it can tell you you know you're down to your last flip and you hit a shot and then add some more flips and so now you've got just these few flips left and you hit another shot and adds more flips and it just it snowballs into this really fun exciting mode our guys basically really kind of jumped in with both feet to come up with a look that we haven't done before we had to animate everything and come up with a style and the look we wanted to convey was comic book cages come to life it looks like we did a lot more animation than we did like a hulk animation which was just two frames provided by marvel it looks like he's actually animating we hit a lot of things with particles and effects and explosions and you know background stuff which is also you know credit to the art team we tend to try to convey a lot of information to players and generally they're looking at the the play field we're standardizing the interface a lot of it's based on feedback from actual from players you want to have your scores at the bottom screen so you're not looking up too far from from the play field rest of the ui frame is catered to the game so this is my second game working with jeremy pecker aka zombie yeti i think we have a pretty good relationship we both enjoy dad jokes and discussing art i remember when keith first showed me this he's like listen i left this entire area down here open for you you can put all kinds of stuff down there uh and then i'm like oh crap i have to have like you know 20 characters so that seems like an easy one but uh i try to put a lot of thought and time into what i'm going to do with each of those characters i'm creating everything from scratch like my version of it i really had fun drawing thanos probably more than anything only because he is just a big brute of a of a thing but then i got to you know do the black order folks and uh you know they're interesting in and of themselves this is a comic book game it's not based on the movies and that's why you have sort of the panel framing elements i like to kind of put in the broad strokes and figure out shot paths and i knew i was going to have the hulk shot here and i wanted to do the hackney transformation because well i've never had a chance to do it so why not it's just a monster game it's like huge you want to keep hitting the start button over and over again on this game i think as we go everything's getting a little more polished in the game it's a different perspective and take on what games can be and what they should be hope they like it you should be grateful to meet an end by my hand this game has a lot of kinetic satisfaction um trademark the story of the universe has reached its conclusion