Nearly forty years after Steve Ritchie unleashed the original Black Knight in 1980, the self-taunting villain returned in 2019 with Black Knight: Sword of Rage — a sequel from the very designer who built the legend. Ritchie, the man fans call the Master of Flow and the best-selling pinball designer in history, gave the original its two-level playfield and its patented Magna-Save magnet, and both ideas echo through this third chapter. Magna-Save is back on the Pro, a button-triggered magnet that can yank a doomed ball away from the outlane — or, for the daring, snatch a super jackpot right off the ramp wireform.

The theme is medieval menace turned up to eleven. The Black Knight jeers at you through a thrash-metal score co-written by Anthrax’s Scott Ian, while a motorized gate shaped like the Knight’s flail and a second styled as his shield physically block and redirect your shots. Two vertical up-kickers and a trio of pop bumpers keep the ball ricocheting through a layout built, as Ritchie’s always are, for speed and long smooth lines.

For the competitor, the joy is in the combos. Nearly every shot can be backhanded, which opens up controlled, repeatable lock sequences — trap, backhand the lock target, post the ball, repeat — and the real points come from stacking the three-ball Knight multiball on top of a started mode. Powering up your modes with the drop targets before you launch them, especially against the brutal Hydra, separates the survivors from the slain. It’s loud, fast, and unapologetically old-school in spirit, a worthy heir to one of pinball’s most enduring grudge matches — and proof the King of Flow still rules his castle.