Two mechanics extend and reward a game of Pokémon Pinball: extra balls, which lengthen the game, and the bonus multiplier, which inflates the end-of-ball summary. Both play out over the course of a single ball and reset when it is lost, which gives you an incentive not to lose it.
Extra balls
An extra ball is announced by the EXTRA BALL message in the American version, and the AGAIN light stays on permanently. When you lose the current ball, the ball counter does not go down: the game displays SHOOT AGAIN and launches a new ball for you. Extra balls stack up to ten, without the game telling you how many you have left. If an eleventh is awarded, it is replaced by 100,000,000 points.
Here is what earns one, per ball played. All counters reset to zero when the ball is lost.
| Condition | Frequency |
|---|---|
| Catching Pokémon | Every 10 Pokémon, up to 100 |
| Reaching a bonus multiplier milestone | 25, 50 and 75 |
| Having Pikachu step in | Every 10 saves, up to 100 |
| Red Field: entering Bellsprout | Every 25 entries, up to 100 |
| Blue Field: entering Slowpoke or Cloyster | Every 25 combined entries, up to 100 |
| Red Field: making all three heads of a Dugtrio pop up | Every 10 triples, up to 100 |
| Blue Field: getting a three with Poliwag or Psyduck | Every 10 triples, up to 100 |
| Slot Machine | On the 25th pass, then every 15 passes |
The counters are visible in the end-of-ball summary.
The bonus multiplier
The bonus multiplier multiplies the end-of-ball summary. It starts at 1 at the beginning of each ball and can reach 99. Two buttons located near the loop entrances and two digits, tens on the left and units on the right, control it:
- the flashing digit shows which button to hit;
- you must hit the left button, then the right one, in that order, to confirm the next value;
- each button hit earns 100 points;
- the “bonus multiplier” reward from the Slot Machine adds 1 to 5 steps at once.
These two buttons are also among the possible targets of Evolution Mode. The multiplier falls back to 1 as soon as the ball is lost: its value only matters for the current ball. Passing 25, 50 and 75 grants an extra ball.
The end-of-ball summary
At the end of each ball, the game shows the “End of ball bonus” screen in the American version. It details what you accomplished and applies the bonus multiplier to the total. Each category is capped at 100 units.
| Item counted | Points per unit |
|---|---|
| Pokémon caught | 500,000 |
| Pokémon evolved | 750,000 |
| Entering Bellsprout (Red) or Slowpoke and Cloyster (Blue) | 75,000 |
| Dugtrio triple (Red) or Poliwag and Psyduck triple (Blue) | 50,000 |
| Pass through the Slot Machine (complete CAVE set) | 25,000 |
| Spin of the wheel | 10,000 |
Example: a ball that caught three Pokémon (1,500,000), evolved one Pokémon (750,000), completed two CAVE sets (50,000) and made twenty spins of the wheel (200,000) totals 2,500,000 base points. With a multiplier of 10, the summary climbs to 25,000,000 points.
How an extra ball is used up
An extra ball does not advance the ball number. When the current ball is lost, the game first shows the end-of-ball summary, then takes one extra ball out of the reserve and launches a new ball with the SHOOT AGAIN message, without touching the counter for the three starting balls. The game therefore only ends once the reserve is empty and the last of the three balls is lost. At any given time, the reserve can hold up to ten balls, in addition to the current ball.
The ten-ball cap applies to the reserve, not to what you earn: an eleventh extra ball won while the reserve is full is turned into 100,000,000 points, which is not to be sneezed at. Finally, the cap of 100 on each ball counter also limits the end-of-ball summaries: one hundred Pokémon caught in a single ball are worth 50,000,000 base points.
Hitting the milestones of 25
The bonus multiplier is the less obvious of the two mechanics. It goes up one step at a time with the loop buttons, or by one to five steps with the Slot Machine. The milestones of 25, 50 and 75 grant an extra ball, even when the Slot Machine makes you skip over the milestone: the game compares the number of multiples of twenty-five before and after the addition. A multiplier of 99 is the limit: beyond that, gains no longer count.
