Midnight Bowling 2 is a huge improvement in graphics over the previous Midnight Bowling game. Gameloft has a good franchise here and they are making the best of it.

splash screen

I downloaded and played Midnight Bowling 2 from Gameloft.com . Here's what I found.

• I had to do a work-around to choose my handset.
• When I chose US as the country my handset didn't appear in the T-Mobile list. When I chose UK as the country it did appear in the T-Mobile list. Then I went back, re-selected the correct country and all was well.
• Having the correct country is important because they bill your phone account and send the SMS with the download link to the phone number. Had I not re-selected the country the SMS would have gone to a phone with a +44 code rather than a +1 code.
• Having the phone model correct is very important because you don't want to pay for a game that is not compatible with your phone or arrives with the wrong screen resolution. That would result in not being able to see all of the playing area or having the game so small you can't really use it properly.
• The game downloaded  and installed without incident.
• The new opening music clip is a bit more corporate sounding and less funky than Naughty Girl.
• Took one frame to figure out the new interface.
• About four frames into the the first head to head game the game crashed back to my phone's game menu. This has not happened again.
• Game restarted without incident was able to re-start the head to head match - Kicked _ _ _!
• Audio is a bit glitchy sounding, a bit of certainly non-intended noise and/or silence between various parts of the sound effects after the ball has contacted the pins is a distraction. I wear a Nokia-Sennheiser headset when playing so the quality of the sound is quickly evident for good or for bad.
• Jumpy video when the ball is rolling down the lane to the left at the beginning of each frame makes games play a bit difficult. When I remember my lane etiquette and don't try to bowl until the lane next to me has completed their shot this becomes a non-issue.

This is a head and shoulders improvement over the previous game.

• Too powerful balls are now salvageable. In the original they were gutter pups without exception.
• Reflections of the pins in the lane!
• They streamlined execution of the code it seems because ball speeds, aiming indicator speed and everything else seems to run much more quickly.
• More screen is given over to the active components of the game, less is taken up with static scenery.
• Some aspects are much improved such as explaining the cryptic terms used in the original game to identify various pin configurations.
• Golden Gate Split was self explanatory but a Woolworth? That's the 5 and 10 pins (nickel and dime). Knowing small things like that adds a lot to the game.
• Graphics are much better.

    Midnght Bowling                               Midnight Bowling 2

• Pin action after the ball strike is different. In this version I see pins going down that I'm not sure I saw being hit. In the original version pins I saw being hit remained standing. No doubt they have a new algorithm for determining what constitutes a condition for a pin fall.
• Inter-frame graphics are a hoot. Very lively and detailed dot matrix animations above the lane are entertaining.

Things that are familiar yet different make the game comfortable

• The trash talking opponents at each head to head match are a carry-over feature. New opponents, new taunts but pretty much the same idea.
• The keys to select lane position, aim the ball, release it and control spin are the same. This is probably the best thing a game can carry over from one version to the next.
• 
•        MB 1                                        MB 2
• Money for pin sets and spares and strikes is carried over.
• The terms used to describe pin arrangements remain the same.

I loved Midnight Bowling. This improves every aspect of the game. I'm glad I got it and will no doubt spends countless hours at this, as I did with the original.

Notes

1. All comments refer to the game as provided by Gameloft for a Nokia 6290 handset. This has a processor running at 192 MHz, a 240 x 320 screen full color and stereo sound. It is based on the S60 3rd release with feature pack 3 operating system.
2. Graphics are shown at original size - about 240 x 320. The eBay photo hosting server resizes and compresses the graphics. They develop major jaggies when resized to original size.