David's Midnight Magic is a faithful simulation of a pinball game. The question is, who wants to play pinball in this age of crazed robots and monster aliens who spirit pathetic humans away to fates far worse than death? On the other hand, if you feel that pinball was treated unjustly, then this game is for you.


The game provides you with a very sharply drawn pinball field on which you have a bumper, a ball trap, two sets of flippers and multiple targets to hit. You can control the tension of the spring when you hit the ball, and determine which flipper you want to use. The ball even changes direction if you hit it with the tip of the flipper as opposed to hitting it with the middle.


Although David's Midnight Magic promises a lot of things, it unfortunately has some trouble delivering on them. For example, it says that you can apply 'body english' by pressing the space bar but if you press the space bar nothing happens except that you might see a pretty red sign saying "Tilt." That's about it.


The game is especially disappointing to anyone who's played the version for the Apple II. The biggest problem with the Atari 800 edition is that you have to control the game by using two paddles. While it's terrific that there's a game besides Breakout which uses paddles, two Atari paddles at the same time just don't work. Apple paddles are slim, but holding two stubby Atari paddles causes what can be mildly termed "discomfort."


When hitting the boll, set the spring a bit above medium tension. This will let you rock up a lot of points on the upper half of the field.