24. Family Pinball (KID, Famicom, 1989)

Family Pinball is a pinball simulator. You can select from one of 4 modes:

The first is a relatively standard pinball machine with Pac-Man theming (this was published by Namco). It's all pretty much exactly what you'd expect from an 8-bit pinball game, nothing particularly notable or interesting here.

The other modes are where things get a bit better. The next is a kind of gambling / bingo hybrid where the play field is set up kind of like a plinko board and there are a bunch of holes that you are trying to get 9 balls in. I tried for several rounds but it was a bit too difficult to actually get any points, though I was getting a little better. In this mode, tilting the table is essential.

The 2 remaining modes were head to head versus and by far the most interesting to me. The first was a versus pinball mode. Imagine a pinball machine that had 2 tables back to back, both sloping upwards to a point in the middle, so if player one hits the ball over that apex, it starts coming down on player 2's side. The second head-to-head mode is similar, but with sports theming, so you can play a hockey-styled or soccer-styled version of this double pinball. I love simple virtual sports games, so these 2 modes really scratched an itch, though I don't think they'd be great to play for an extended period.

3/5, I wish versus pinball was a thing in real life.