74 replies to this topic

[scott-Detroit Pinball]

I dont want to start an argument, every few months the programers for VP and VP table programmers make a giant leap forward, Especially when it comes to recreating FS tables.

I know there are quite a few people that havent jumped on the FS bandwagon, which is o.k.
But I will tell you, real pinball players are starting to notice and starting to trickle back to VP.

I did make a few tweaks to JP's and Grizz latest table, I plan on checking into to see if I can stretch the genie up a little bit. What you are looking at is my Actual TOTAN Gold, photographed from the exact angle/perspect that I play pinball at-- Take in mind, I am 5 ft 7 and have a normal stance. Obviously if you are shorter or taller and tend hunch while playing your perspective may be a little different.




This is cab shot to cab shot, Mine is a custom pincab by Noah with a 42 inch monitor. Virtua Pin

Lastly, before anyone starts to nick pick. Take in mind in the USA, a starter (players condition) working TOTAN will run you about $2500 cash, and a fully restored one can run you double that and above.

My hats off to JP Salas, Griz, Uncle Willy and other table re-creators..... your stuff is all top notch!!

I have to figure out what settings I changed... I know I raised the inclination to 10 and FOV to 40 and changed a few other settings. Flipper Power had to be changed from 1.6 to 1.9 to get the ball to make it to the magnet on the upper ramp. I hope JP and Grizz do not have a problem with me posting these pics.

Many Thanks
Scott
Detroit Pinball

[maceman]

Hey Scott,

That's pretty cool.

I would be very interested in your settings when done. I am 5' 10" but still, any improvement to the angle would be cool to try on my cab as well...

Maceman

[Sabbat]

really good comparison shot, thanks Scott

[rob046]

The dithering in your gif makes the real table look less real than it should. TOTAN in whatever form though is one of the prettiest tables ever.
It is a great recreation, though I'd argue it looks even better & more realistic rocking it out at 1600x1200 in 4:3 mode, & I personally think tables generally play better in 4:3.

Some people just don't take to FS. Just the way it is. I've given it an honest shot a few times, but can't get into it. I just can't trick my mind into seeing the kind of depth I need to in order to think it might be a real pin. I wish I could. But then again I'm plenty happy continuing to put my play money toward real pinball & hopefully doing my part to help keep real pinball from dying out, or I don't mind making my desktop experience better. I got a monster rig & a brand new 24" IPS panel LCD & gaming keyboard. I can play all my pinball games then a second later be playing Crysis. Can't complain.

Also, with all the pinball purists at RGP or wherever who think pincabs are the devil, that is actually a good thing. Cuz if we want to still be seeing new virtual recreations 5 or 10 years down the road, real pinball needs to not die. So we need the real pinheads to keep supporting Stern & the used pin market, else real pins are gonna fade even faster than they are now. These days I'd say for every new pin that Stern makes, 2 or 3 old pins get thrown in the dumpster. So hopefully at least Stern can stay in business.

If I didn't have real pinball growing up as a kid, I would never have been interested in VP, & also surely wouldn't be owning my own real pins today. So in order to keep newer generations into real pinball & virtual pinall, the real thing needs to be out there.
Sadly there are kids today who didn't grow up playing pinball, thus they have no interest in virtual pinball either, maybe we can turn some of them on, but many will want to sit at their xbox instead. They don't have that nostalgia for pinball that brought most of us to VP in the first place. So the more real pinball out in the world, the better.

For me the whole cab thing is a double edged sword. It is keeping some people interested in pinball, giving it a new life to others... but at what cost? Are we helping drive real pinball into the ground in the process? I don't know, but the facts & figures regarding real pinball are scary to look at. Perhaps nothing can prevent that anyhow, I don't know.
What I do know is that nothing can replace real pinball. My current real pin lineup, all great pins, & I wouldn't trade 1 of them for a pincab filled with hundreds of virtual pins. There is just something about real pinball that I don't think can ever be fully replicated. & I hope it sticks around for those of us who just can't get into the whole FS thing as an alternative to the real thing.
I encourage people to go ahead & enjoy pinball however they see fit, but please don't forget to also support the real thing whenever you can. Even if its just dropping by a local bar or bowling alley to drop a few coins into one every now & then.

[hassanchop]

nice pics!!

I encourage people to go ahead & enjoy pinball however they see fit, but please don't forget to also support the real thing whenever you can. Even if its just dropping by a local bar or bowling alley to drop a few coins into one every now & then.

..it's getting harder and harder.
arcade rooms are desapearing

[bladexdsl]

i'm not a fan of the FS tables either i don't like my pinballs looking like your looking down on them from above. but if you want a cab than that's what you need to put up with i guess...

Edited by bladexdsl, 30 March 2011 - 06:59 AM.

[Sandro]

I'm sorry the comparison shot only further proves my opinions that FS tables just appear to flat and the scary thing is if this was a clearer pic you would really be able to see the flatness. I do appreciate and have fun with FS tables but the depth isn't there and in all likelihood never will be. It is what it is though some like FS some like 4:3.

[Noah Fentz]

Here's the originals Scott emailed me ...





Many of the responses I get from people who play a VirtuaPin are amazing. None of them ever say it looks flat. The majority say they get immersed and forget they are playing a virtual version. One went so far as to call it a 'placebo' effect.

You'd have to play it in a cab that closely replicates a real pin in every detail to really understand. Simply playing it on a monitor turned on its side does it no justice at all.

[Bob5453]

If I could get that effect for about 50 dollars, I would be all over it, but to invest thousands of dollars for that? You've got to be kidding.

[Noah Fentz]

50 bucks?

You pretty much just get a movie, popcorn, some candy, and a soda for two for about 50 bucks these days, Bob.

Get with the times!

[bladexdsl]

If I could get that effect for about 50 dollars, I would be all over it, but to invest thousands of dollars for that? You've got to be kidding.

would a real pinball machine cost $50? I should know cos i'm buying one

[Gravy]

To all you guys who dont see the attraction with FS tables, have you ever played them on a large screen layed flat on its back? Or are you just viewing them on a desktop monitor and looking at them head on??

Personally, Im playing FS tables on a rotatable 16:9 23 inch monitor and will occasionally lay the monitor on its back for a bit more realism but that makes it a lot slower to setup so I usually just rotate the monitor which is still great but nowhere near as realistic as a layed down screen.

The larger the screen, the better the effect will be when its layed on its back.

Whilst images are not true 3d and will have some flatness, it is possible to create anamorphic images on a flat surface that do appear to have real depth, take 3d sidewalk chalk art as an example if you have ever seen that.

If we are ever to have true 3d though, we'll need to sort out a system where the position of your eyes is monitored and the angle of the 3d is adjusted in realtime as you play, coupled with either 3d glasses or a lenticular 3d screen.

Lots of people already have a large 1080p LCD tv that they could use to test out the effect simply by hooking it up to their PC and laying the screen flat on its back on the kitchen bench or dining table. Not an ideal situation but worth testing to give you an idea of how a cabinet screen would look.

[kruge99]

...
I encourage people to go ahead & enjoy pinball however they see fit, but please don't forget to also support the real thing whenever you can. Even if its just dropping by a local bar or bowling alley to drop a few coins into one every now & then.

I don't disagree with that statement Rob, the problem is simply, that the environment you describe doesn't exist today for many people. There are NO pinball machines in the town I live in. (a town which is soon to be a city if I'm not mistaken) I have to drive 50km (that's about 31 miles) to another city, to a place that is only open occasionally. That's the closest place to me that has working pins. There is a place closer to me, but all 4 pins are in need of complete overhauls because they have not been maintained in years it looks like.

I truly wish I could, as you say, drop by a local bar or bowling alley to drop a few coins into a pin... because I'd do it at least once a week, and twice on Sundays.

To paraphrase what Destruk has written in his signature: "Play a real game, play pinball" - Forever!

Best Regards,
Todd.

[CHANCE]

Wow , really nice ...

i would like to see more side by side PICS of other tables

[epthegeek]

FS Tables is the only reason I got back into VP. Period. VP makes a nice 'computer game' when you play on a computer keyboard with a plain old monitor. Even if the tables look 'a little flat' -- the immersion that a full on cabinet adds is key. The right stance, the real buttons. It just feels better than sitting at a desk pressing shift keys.

Yeah, it's not perfect. But it is pretty awesome.

I think the comparison shot does a nice job of showing off just how fantastic of a job the current tables & VP do of approximating the real thing.

[bladexdsl]

Or are you just viewing them on a desktop monitor and looking at them head on??

pretty much this

[BFG Brutal]

The fullscreen tables are what brought me back to VP also, and back to my fondness for real pins. 20 years ago we had three arcades within 3 miles of me....now the only place to find a real pin is my friends house! So I felt the need to build my minipin...I think that the digital pincabs ultimatly help rekindle peoples wants for real pins. I think they suppliment each other. I fear the day and hope it never comes that real pins will cease to exsist outside of personal collections, but maybe these virtual pins are the next step in the evolution...who knows. I for one would love to have a real machine, but money, and space just wont allow it for now, I wish I couldve built a full size cab, but budget only allowed for a mini. But I definitly plop quarters in every pin I come across, but when I cant I always have my mini pin!

[chriz]

check out the cabinet sections of vp and hyperpin forums and you will freak out for FS tables

http://www.hyperspin...isplay.php?f=38
http://www.vpforums....hp?showforum=29

To all you guys who dont see the attraction with FS tables, have you ever played them on a large screen layed flat on its back? Or are you just viewing them on a desktop monitor and looking at them head on??

You'd have to play it in a cab that closely replicates a real pin in every detail to really understand. Simply playing it on a monitor turned on its side does it no justice at all.

amen

[mwong168]

I have to drive 50km (that's about 31 miles) to another city, to a place that is only open occasionally. That's the closest place to me that has working pins. There is a place closer to me, but all 4 pins are in need of complete overhauls because they have not been maintained in years it looks like.

That's not true Todd, I'm in the middle (401/Yonge) between your house and the Church of the Silverball so give me a shout if you ever want to stop by and play, quarters not required I've got a Flintstones, World Cup Soccer, Demolition Man and my VP cab which has 215 tables setup at the moment and growing thanks to jpsalas and the many other talented authors on here.

-mike

[sza]

My thoughts exactly, I would never waist space in my game room that can hold the real thing for a pincab. Saying that pincab is better or as good as real pin is like saying that pornography is better than real women. (You can also put 100 movies on a shelf, they will not get jealous, and the screenshots probably even look better than the real thing ;-) ) Pinball Sims are fun, but they are incomparable to real pins, just like FPS game is not like a war or even like a Paintball or Airsoft game.
As for pin simulations, somehow I found that scrolling made the experience always more exciting for me. So I like Pinball Dreams series much more fun than many later Windows productions with static pre-rendered table like in VP.
Probably the best visual experience for me is FP and other 3d dynamic camera simulators on whole wall screen with pinball wizard - like controller. But it is still not a real pin experience. Even a real pin set to free play looses a bit of its attraction. So if I see a pin somewhere on a location I always put a coin into it, in part to “save the pinball” in part to have a complete experience.

In the cabinet or not FS tables ARE flat, until VP gets updated to DX10 and has support for 3d glasses they will remain 100% flat . A MAME cabinet is a completely different story it really can be like the real thing.

But it is nice that people who want to have a pincab can order it from Noah, complete or in parts, maybe at least there will be less people making a pincab by ripping apart an old pin that could be easily restored.

The dithering in your gif makes the real table look less real than it should. TOTAN in whatever form though is one of the prettiest tables ever.
It is a great recreation, though I'd argue it looks even better & more realistic rocking it out at 1600x1200 in 4:3 mode, & I personally think tables generally play better in 4:3.

Some people just don't take to FS. Just the way it is. I've given it an honest shot a few times, but can't get into it. I just can't trick my mind into seeing the kind of depth I need to in order to think it might be a real pin. I wish I could. But then again I'm plenty happy continuing to put my play money toward real pinball & hopefully doing my part to help keep real pinball from dying out, or I don't mind making my desktop experience better. I got a monster rig & a brand new 24" IPS panel LCD & gaming keyboard. I can play all my pinball games then a second later be playing Crysis. Can't complain.

Also, with all the pinball purists at RGP or wherever who think pincabs are the devil, that is actually a good thing. Cuz if we want to still be seeing new virtual recreations 5 or 10 years down the road, real pinball needs to not die. So we need the real pinheads to keep supporting Stern & the used pin market, else real pins are gonna fade even faster than they are now. These days I'd say for every new pin that Stern makes, 2 or 3 old pins get thrown in the dumpster. So hopefully at least Stern can stay in business.

If I didn't have real pinball growing up as a kid, I would never have been interested in VP, & also surely wouldn't be owning my own real pins today. So in order to keep newer generations into real pinball & virtual pinall, the real thing needs to be out there.
Sadly there are kids today who didn't grow up playing pinball, thus they have no interest in virtual pinball either, maybe we can turn some of them on, but many will want to sit at their xbox instead. They don't have that nostalgia for pinball that brought most of us to VP in the first place. So the more real pinball out in the world, the better.

For me the whole cab thing is a double edged sword. It is keeping some people interested in pinball, giving it a new life to others... but at what cost? Are we helping drive real pinball into the ground in the process? I don't know, but the facts & figures regarding real pinball are scary to look at. Perhaps nothing can prevent that anyhow, I don't know.
What I do know is that nothing can replace real pinball. My current real pin lineup, all great pins, & I wouldn't trade 1 of them for a pincab filled with hundreds of virtual pins. There is just something about real pinball that I don't think can ever be fully replicated. & I hope it sticks around for those of us who just can't get into the whole FS thing as an alternative to the real thing.
I encourage people to go ahead & enjoy pinball however they see fit, but please don't forget to also support the real thing whenever you can. Even if its just dropping by a local bar or bowling alley to drop a few coins into one every now & then.