Zen Pinball

This is one of the 2 toughest trophies in the game! I’d say this and “Master Mind” are equally difficult and incredible accomplishments for anyone who achieves them! The trophy description for this is accurate, but misleading… There is actually a fifth disaster that you can only cast after you cast and successfully complete the other 4 disasters. All disasters are completed by getting a ball in all three juggler’s holes (the sink holes on the left and right and the one behind the drummer), so I won’t repeat that in every disaster description. Once you hit a sink hole, the lights will go out so you don’t have to hit it again. Of course it’s not as easy as that… each disaster has other requirements as well. When you complete a disaster you will see a corresponding light on the shaman’s staff turn on so you know you’ve completed it.

Tip: When you successfully complete a disaster ball save becomes enabled, and you immediately go into multiball where you can score mucho points… but I would highly recommend avoiding this. Points is not what you are going for here and multiball can get out of hand very quickly losing all the balls and wasting a real ball. If you’re feeling brave you can play multiball until the ball save is used or times out, but then you have to worry about catching one of the balls without letting them all drain. I got burned by this too many times so when multiball began I literally caught one of the balls and just let the others drain.

Let’s go through each disaster one at a time:

• Volcano This disaster isn’t too bad. When you cast it you’ll see a light indicating that you have to go into the volcano. The right ramp will lead into the volcano if you get a strong clean hit, otherwise it will just take the lower path to the right lane. Once in the volcano you should nudge the ball to try to hit as many little metal triggers as you can before leaving (of course don’t tilt because you can always go back in and you’ll need to). I generally only nudge a little while I’m in there. I think hitting the flippers must shift the lights around because when I go back in there they seem shifted making it pretty easy to light them all up and spell “VOLCANO”. After you’ve successfully spelled “VOLCANO” the lights will flash and the ball will come out orange (it’s hot!). At this point you have to hit the ball into the 3 juggler’s holes. This may involve clearing the drop targets in front of the drummer again. The ball has to be orange or it doesn’t count and it only stays orange for a short time. Fortunately, every time you go into the volcano the ball comes out orange (you don’t have to spell out “VOLCANO” again).

• Flood The flood is the second hardest disaster to complete. When you cast it you’ll see that the left and right orbits are lit up. You have to hit 3 orbits to raise the flood waters and then you can hit the juggler’s holes. This may sound easy, but the flood waters slow the ball down a lot! You can hit the left orbit starting from a caught position on the right flipper with some practice (the positions are slightly different with the slow ball speed), but the right orbit is tricky. You can’t hit this directly from a caught position on the left flipper. You have to build up enough speed to hit the orbit with enough force to make it all the way around. I was able to do this by hitting the left ramp and then hitting the ball as it was still moving on the left flipper. This is still by no means an easy shot and I was never able to do it consistently. You’ll have to figure out the timing for yourself with some practice. Keep in mind that even nudging the ball is different so it’s not even as easy to get the ball from one flipper to the other unless you nudge relatively hard. I would recommend hitting the left orbit, then the right and then the left orbit again. After that the juggler’s holes should light up and you can finish the disaster.

• Tornado This is not too bad if you’re careful. All 3 spinners come on and they drastically affect the ball flight if you get too close to them. If you hit the ball hard and clean enough then it should be fine generally. For this disaster you’ll have to hit the left ramp and the right ramp (hitting the right ramp must not go into the volcano or it won’t count). I’m not entirely sure how many times you have to hit them, but hitting them changes the direction and speed of the spinners so I know it has something to do with that. I basically just hit them while they were lit up until the juggler’s holes lit up. Finish the disaster by hitting the juggler’s holes when they are lit up.

• Earthquake This is definitely the hardest disaster to complete. When you cast this the view zooms out and the table immediately goes to 3 ball multiball. You have to hit the juggler’s holes while keeping at least 2 balls alive. The table periodically shakes due to the earthquake making it even more challenging. I would start out by focusing on hitting the balls as they are on the edge of the flippers (typical side sink hole shots) and making sure that you don’t let anything drain down the center. The more balls you hit, the more you’ll hopefully have accomplished. If you get down to 2 balls try to catch them on one or 2 flippers. At this point you can assess what you have left to do and try to focus on that. Be careful though because if they are both on one flipper the earthquake could shake one of them free so pay attention. If you managed to get them on opposite flippers you can shoot one up a ramp and make an aimed shot with the other. Don’t try to hit a left or right sink hole if there is a ball on the opposite flipper because you will slam right into that flipper and probably lose your ball. There’s not much else that I can say for this, it just takes some practice and a lot of good luck! Fortunately the only thing you have to do here is get the balls in the juggler’s holes to complete the disaster.

After completing all 4 disasters you’ll need to get back up to the mini playfield one more time to select the final disaster. This time you won’t be presented with 4 disasters, but instead you will see some sort of picture with a spooky creature that looks like an owl… I’m not even sure you have to hit it with the ball, but I did a few times to make sure. Cast that disaster like all the rest and you will have the trophy. Now feel free to go crazy for points since you don’t have to complete this disaster for the trophy!

Tip: I’d complete the disasters in order of difficulty so you don’t waste time completing the easy ones when you want to focus on the hard ones. I started of with earthquake, then flood, then tornado, then volcano.