6/1/2011: Let it be said here and now that I'm the first to use a projector to project images onto the playfield. It is pretty cool. All that time I spent messing around with an expensive printer, making lexedge overlays, that was a waste. This is way better. Now I can display anything, including animation, update it between games and during the game, and I don't have to change any hardware. I am so glad I never painted the playfield! This is very inspiring. I need a special USB->VGA device so I can get the original monitor working, and then there is no stopping me. Either way, I feel of all the nifty little things I have done here, this is the most innovative. I have 2 new games in the works, the original woody, and a tarot game that is a real game (the last one was a fortune machine that was more of an amuesment device than a real game).
12/28/2010: The summer of good hair is long gone, but on the bright side, I have come out of pinball hibernation and started working on 2 new games. One is a beach theme, called Woody. My cousin is working on art, and he is great, so this should be very cool. The other game will be a fortune teller theme. So far it derives heavily from tarot, giving a 3-card fortune based on the player's shots. I have even purchased and integrated a small printer, so players will walk away with their future predicted on a piece of thermal paper. It is very promising. Travelin' Dan Miller has contributed some excellent fortune text, and we have only gotten started. Stay tuned!
6/25/2010: The Northwest Pinball and Gaming Show (http://www.nwpinballshow.com/) was a great success. They had an amazing selection of pinball machines, a good video game room (that included Donkey Kong II, next to which I met Steve Weibe), and the speakers were interesting. My game played alright and it was very well received. I met some very interesting people. It was the best time I've had in a while. Now I have a lot of ideas about next steps for my game...
6/2/2010: The pinball party went well, but at the end of the night the computer crashed. This happened last summer, too; I am pretty sure it gets too hot and shuts itself down. In the last two weeks I have implemented an Arduino Mega to do I/O through USB. I finally got it all working tonight. Now a lot of the custom hardware I was using is obsolete. I no longer have to run the game as root, either, because the serial port driver I am using does not require special access. Best of all, now I can use any computer because I don't need a parallel port or ISA slot. I have picked up a newer computer at Free Geek, and it is all working nice with Ubuntu 10. Best of all, in the process of upgrading I figured out I had a memory stomp in my software. I am not sure how it ever worked like that, but it is possible this is the cause of my random failures. I've got my fingers crossed...
4/4/2010: Yes, it is true, the pinball party is going to happen. If you want to see the game in person, send me an email. As for construction, I keep on plugging away. As you can see from the picture above, I am experimenting with head shapes. So far I built a wedge-head out of cardboard, and I am considering a circle. Cardboard is easy and I can attach it to the monitor with velcro. There are now technically 3 versions of the game, with different play modes, over 20 different modes in total. I still have an occasional hardware glitch, but the frequency is very low and I am trying to handle them better.
12/26/2009: I often feel like my work on this pinball machine is worthy of an honorary degree in electrical engineering. Lately I have been fixing my ground loops. I am convinced my "annoying unrepeatable random hardware problem" was caused by ground loops. After changing my grounding configurations, I have played over 75 balls without a failure! Maybe that wasn't explanation point worthy, but I'm pretty excited about it. Now I can move on to other, more fun, improvements.
11/16/2009: In case you were wondering how one might play my pinball machine in a dark room, I have installed LEDs for general illumination! They aren't overwhelming, but between the lights and the screen you can see well enough to play with no other light. The game has 13 working levels. I also made an alternate version from the same software that is only 10 levels, but there is continuous play that blends the levels together into one long experience. Unfortunately, the game also has an annoying unrepeatable random hardware problem that causes the outputs to stop working. That is the thorn in my side these days, but once that is fixed there is no stopping me.
9/17/2009: The cabinet is pretty sweet. I have the monitor mounted, but I still need to build a box around it. All 13 of the software levels are done and playable.
6/24/2009: My goal was to have the game ready in time for the Seattle pinball show. That was 2 weeks ago. I guess there is always next year. As weeks turn in to months and years, I sure hope this game is fun because I have a lot of time invested in it. The playfield has a real custom cabinet now, and it is pretty sweet. Look at all the room for great artwork! The software is complete for 4 of the 12 designed levels, and with the cabinet in a stable place I may start adding to the software next. I also need to build the head for the cabinet...there is a lot to do, but it is sweet to keep making progress.
2/22/2009: The software is pretty fun. Right now I have one level, and I can play it and everything works. The picture above is recent, and you can see the lights have been added, and I am gaining on the display. I wrote a class that makes the scoring reels roll like a real old pinball machine. The artwork is from Geoff Brock, one of southern California's premier pinup artists. The real artwork will not contain nudity, but it will be very sexy, with monsters and curvy women. The display is 1200x900, and I would like to fill more of it than I currently am. If you know artists who like pinball and have monster pinup style, have them contact me.
2/11/2009: I know, it isn't 2008 anymore, and still, no pinball. I am gaining on it, though. All the stuff in the pictures is working now, and I am writing software. Sometimes it is super fun. Sometimes I worry that I will finish it and it will not be fun and all this work will be for nothing. I will finish, though. I'm making good progress.
12/7/2008: I was hoping to be this far at Thanksgiving, but like most things on this project, it is taking a lot longer than I thought it would. Have you ever seen the bottom of the pinball machine? It is easy to take for granted from the outside, but think about multiple tasks for every light, switch, and solenoid. My game is much simpler than a production game, but it is still a lot of wiring. Luckily I scavenged a lot of wire from old games, because that could have been expensive. Now everything is wired, so after a little testing I can get on with the software!
9/15/2008: I just had a week off work, and I have built up the bottom board electronics (see picture below) and made many playfield adjustments. I stripped 100's of feet of wire from an old playfield, so I should now have everything I need to finish (except time!). I have another week of vacation coming in November,and it now seems possible that I could be playing a working version of the game by the end of the year!
3/23/2008: The hardware is complete now so that I can have 24 digital outputs and 24 digital inputs. I have also tested a phototransistor to replace old wire switches, and so far it is pretty cool. Here is a picture of my test setup, all alligator clips and experiments, but it is starting to work the way I want:
2/9/2008: I have never used the traditional wire switches, so I put together a test and they work great. I just bought some motion sensing switches, and I am going to try them, too. However, my ability to read switch inputs very quickly was a concern, and I have passed that roadblock with flying colors. A few weeks ago I bought an old PC from free geek. It is one of the last computers on Earth that still has an ISA slot. I ressurected the old ISA expansion card, and I am going to use that for input, and the parallel port for output. This gives me 24 inputs and 24 outputs, which is just more than I need. At this point there is nothing in my way except time...
1/5/2008: They say this is the year of the rat, but I say this is the year of the pinball. On my block alone 7 new public pinball machines have popped up in the last month, and that says nothing of the pinball creation taking place in my garage. Below is my new playfield, which is not exactly as I designed it. I spent a lot of time tweaking loops and trying different ideas, and I think this will provide exciting shots. I have a lot of work to do, but I have momentum now, and since it is the year of the pinball, nothing can stop me! Check back or e-mail for the latest progress.
