Is nudging part of pinball or just a form of cheating? You decide.







"Nudge" is a funny word, don'cha think?


Subject spawned out of this thread:
http://archive.maaca.org/s107351202.onlinehome.us/cgi-bin/Blah/Blah.pl?m-1276265738/

Looks like Bally gave it the green light early on:

http://www.ipdb.org/showpic.pl?id=1686&picno=38281

Just my opinion... I thought I would post it in this thread because the other one I find too aggressive and personal....

Keep in mind that prior to Humpty Dumpty in 1947, the ONLY way you could influence ball trajectory, apart from shooter rod impact, was to nudge a machine. Even before flipper tricks, there was nudging. It is a basic principle of pinball. Flipper control is but a part of it.

Unfortunately, once flippers started getting longer and outholes getting smaller (you think Pinbot is a drain whore, play a woodrail!), nudging skills became less used by the average players, or often, over-used in an aggressive manor.

A skilled player will control his nudging. It is quite impressive. I had the priviledge of playing with Bowen Kerins at Bally Boy's place and his playing was quite impressive. His nudging was very slight and very controlled. I don't get impressed easily in pinball, and that night I was. He was not what I call a spastic player like Rick Stetta. Very calm, and he barely moved his body. He kept a light pressure on the lockdown bar, which permitted to move his hands quickly if needed.  

Back in the 80's, when I was in arcades, anyone who was consistantly successful at achieving high pinball scores possesed good subtle nudging skills.

My .02

Some games encourage nudging more than others. Centaur for example, has posts in the outlanes specifically designed to require a nudge for save.

Quoted from tinyrodent

Some games encourage nudging more than others. Centaur for example, has posts in the outlanes specifically designed to require a nudge for save.

WOF is another example of a more modern version of that.  WOF is a nudgers dream machine.  

Quoted from tinyrodent

Some games encourage nudging more than others. Centaur for example, has posts in the outlanes specifically designed to require a nudge for save.

Agreed. Fireball II has the same posts in the outlanes. It's a pretty easy nudge to save the drain.

Quoted from tinyrodent

Some games encourage nudging more than others. Centaur for example, has posts in the outlanes specifically designed to require a nudge for save.

Medusa's outlanes BEG you to shake the crap out of the thing. Best example I have seen.

Other classic notables:

Paragon's beast lair on the left. Often, if your ball gets in there, you have to nudge and hope the ball trips the bumper and bounce the ball out.

Future Spa's right lane. If you let the ball roll, instant death. You HAVE to nudge it to make the ball bounce over the drain hole.

Xenon's top saucer. You can hit a few rollovers to activate the drop targets, and hit the saucer while you're at it.

Any of the wedges with bagatelle lanes... Atlantis, C37, on the left sides for example - nudge nudge nudge!

Quoted from cooke

"Nudge" is a funny word, don'cha think?

It looks like the etymology of the word is 17th centruy Scandanavia, meaning "to push with one's elbow".  Like "nudging in line."

In the UK, it is popular to have Fruit Machines (Slot Machines), with buttons that advance or "nudge" the reels after a spin.  It's usually given as either a computer generated guaranteed win (unless you're absolutely daft, in which case people have launched cases wanting to ban nudging for taxing stupid people) or as a "teaser" for a close win. This is done purposefully as opposed to shaking the machine, but one wonders if it's use here originated from those trying to cheat the final stopping place of reels on a fruit machine.

I think they (Williams, Bally, Stern, etc..) let nudging get out of control...even catering to it in some of the above mentioned games.

I think nudging should have been discouraged greatly with higher/more difficultly set tilt limits....but whatever, too late now...Nudge if you got to. I just try to control the ball/shots so I don't have to nudge.