11 replies to this topic

[unclewilly]

Sorry I can't find the text document I had on this before.

Does anyone know the conversion for vp units to millimetersor vp units to inches
Any info is appreciated

[koadic]

50 units = 1 1/16 inches

[unclewilly]

Another question. How large of an area will vp allow fir. Say I were to triple a tables dimensions. Oh yeah stupid question, I guess with the scaling any dimensions should fit. Is there a limit in the source code for the max table size

[EalaDubhSidhe]

I use 47 units = 1 inch for the sake of numerical accuracy, but it's far easier, with minimal difference to the ball, to use 48 units = 1 inch instead since 48 divides evenly and cleanly into any standard unit of measurement used in the creation of any standard pinball part - 1/2, 1/4, 1/8 and 1/16 of an inch.

[hmueck]

The limit seems to be 16000x16000. After that, VP is stuck at "Initializing physics".

[unclewilly]

So you could essentially make a table 5 times larger than what we do now. I wounded if the physics would change at that size. I think I remember a thread somewhere suggesting this

[EalaDubhSidhe]

Yes, i think it was one of mine - a suggestion that with a resizable ball, you could for example scale up both the playfield and the ball to double, and the relative ball speed would drop by half. That way, it may be possible to upscale the power of a flipper while still keeping the speed of the bigger ball managable, and thus overcome one inherent problem with VP physics in creating decent-feeling centre shots without having to resort to excessive oblique correction (the issue with the 'default' style of table being that you can have flippers with high speed or high power, but not both at the same time without completely losing control).

 

I don't think anyone's tried it yet - with custom timer-based ball-dampening, you don't need to on an old-fashioned game with just a single ball to read (see my Nitro Ground Shaker) - but it gets a lot more complicated with multiple balls on a modern table, all of which would need to exist and be readable at any time. At the very least, you'd have to get used to realistic ball stacks and create troughs, kickers and subways that store and handle all the balls like any normal machine does. Under these conditions, upping the size of the playfield and balls may well be the easier solution, especially as the feel of a modern game is different from an old one in any case.

Edited by EalaDubhSidhe, 02 July 2013 - 04:50 PM.

[unclewilly]

I think jimmy fingers uses timer based dampening on his physics mods. I know he had it for at least flippers and slings in my bbb table or maybe I'm not understanding what you are saying. I'd love to try your theory out. Would you consider firepower as a good candidate for testing your theory.

[StevOz]

I did experiment with this idea some time ago whilst considering the emulation of a fruit machine, this was with VP8, though I imagine the same findings would apply. I found larger table sizes did produce a much sharper, clearer and better looking image, though anything above above 4096x4096 the difference was not noticeable. Although with the forum reducing the size of my original attachment from 1600x1200 > 1200x 900 some of that clarity is lost.

 

This was when VP was restricted to 1024x1024 images so a table 4x the size of the image to render seemed to produce the best results.

Attached Files

•  test3A.jpg   161.74KB   24 downloads

Edited by StevOz, 03 July 2013 - 01:02 AM.

[maceman]

Why not recreate Hercules instead :

 

 

  I have no images sorry

[EalaDubhSidhe]

Because the real thing actually is like something out of the Flintstones and plays about the same. How would you ever know if you got it right, for the right reasons?

 

Firepower's a good idea to test the theory out with - there's plenty of rubber on it, three balls, and tighter and stronger Williams coils compared to the Bally ones of the time. It'll be useful to see whether an effective compromise can be reached between old-school pin physics and more modern, in a style that feels right. For the same reasons, Kingdom Hearts would also be a good one to try at my end.

 

Don't forget that if you're doubling the size of the playfield, that applies to every dimension - you'll have to rebuild every playfield object and double their heights too.

Edited by EalaDubhSidhe, 03 July 2013 - 09:56 AM.

[unclewilly]

My firepower table is in desperate need of an update so I'll play around with this as I'm working on Mr and Mrs pacman. Have a lot of objects to resize and build