Peggle (PC)

This is the most successful cross between Patchinko and Pinball! It will have you laughing and shouting at the damn bouncing ball...

At every level there is a number of colored pegs that have to be hit in order to clear the level. They are amongst generic pegs that is OK to hit yet will hinder your access to the colored ones you have to clear - and you have only a limited number of shooting balls.
Every time you shoot a ball it gets used - unless you are lucky to fall into an oscillating bucket and gets recycled. There are also special pegs that give you special abilities for a limited time.
I am afraid I am not doing justice to the game - if it sounds complicated it is not. You pick it up in a minute and it is GREAT FUN!

This is a perfect example of what has come to be known as Casual Gaming. It would be a good idea to download the 60-min trial version from a site, such as REFLEXIVE (you can Google it), and decide for yourself whether this is indeed your cup of tea.

Anybody can make a good game that will run only on a super-computer. This is an example of pure programming genius!

HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!

Peggle is a simple game but so much fun. There is so much content in the game there is hours and hours of fun to be had. You basically have to fire a ball that bounces down through round pegs and bricks, clearing them to get points. There are 25 orange pegs/bricks in a level and the rest are blue. You need to clear all orange to beat a level. There is a bucket that goes back and forth across bottom of screen. You start with 10 balls and if you catch a ball in the bucket it is added to your ball count again. If you score a certain amount of points in one ball you get an extra ball. There are also special pegs that are green (special powers) and pink (score boost). Each set of 5 levels has its own peggle master who have their own special abilities such as pyramid which increases the size of the bucket making it easier to catch a ball, and space blast which explodes all the pegs around it. As you clear the orange pegs their score increases making it easier to get free balls especially if you hit a pink peg as well. When all orange are cleared the ball falls into holes at bottom and you get extra score depending where you land.

There are 10 peggle masters. 55 Adventure levels including 5 master levels where you choose which peggle master to use. When you have unlocked a level you can play it in practice mode and play with any unlocked peggle master. You can also play a Duel, which is a 2 player game either with a human opponent or against the computer. You choose the level and any unlocked master and you take turns on the same level. Here more tactics are needed as you get a 25% score deduction if you don't hit an orange peg so you won't want to clear the way for your opponent to get a good score and won't want to limit your chances on your next turn. You start with 5 balls each and the winner is highest score at end - the level doesn't need to be cleared.

When all adventure levels are done you unlock challenge mode. You choose which master to use and there are 75 challenges including complete a level starting with one ball, complete level with extra orange pegs eg:35,45,55 instead of 25, get a certain score upto 1 million points over 3 chosen levels, beat 2/3/4/5 or 6 random levels in a row. These are excellent fun, some seem impossible, some are easier, some you beat and are very proud of yourself! Each time you play a level on any mode it will be different as even though the layout is the same the position of the orange and special pegs will be different everytime. This can be to your advantage and mean the difference between winning/losing a level. The pink peg changes position every ball, even if hit it will appear somewhere else next turn.

I think everyone can play this game from very young children to old people and all inbetween. Some of the later levels are a bit tricky but you never tire of playing until you win. There can be at least 6 maybe more separate saved games so everyone can have their own game if wanted. I also had great fun spotting Chuzzles on some of the levels. The backgrounds to each level is a nice picture, and there are hidden chuzzles in some of them.

Even though I recommend this game if you are thinking of buying a peggle game I recommend you look at Peggle Nights the sequel to this. It is a lot better and if you don't buy both you should get that one. I have written a review for that explaining some of the differences so do consider it even though it costs slightly more (at time of writing) its well worth it.

I bought this a bit of a joke for my 65 year old Mum for Christmas as she never plays on computer games - but now she's cursing me bcause she's addicted! It's supposed to be suitable for children but we haven't found out yet as her grandchildren haven't had a look in!!
If you're thinking of buying, go for it.