I think i'm finally getting tired of spending 2 or 3 months at a time restoring pinball machines, just to look at them, play them for awhile, and then move on to more. I mean it's just a hobby and all, and it is rewarding to turn a beater into something to be proud of, but after doing 20 or so restorations over the past several years, it's beginning to lose it's appeal. So ... I am going to take the leap to the next level. Why not use all of the knowledge gained in restoring pins, along with all the used parts stashed away, microcontroller programming expertice, artwork assistance, and who knows what else, to construct a one-off custom pinball machine? A hugh task one would ask? You bet! Diverse and rewarding enough not to lose interest? I think so. How long would a project of this compexity take? At least one year, maybe more. How much would it cost? .. Well, not that much cash outlay really, considering the following: Parts: Most will be used pieces, from several parted-out junkers. Cabinet, a well used & abused German re-import Pinbot. Playfield, well used Williams Space Shuttle (hey it was free, and will not resemble it's formal self when completed anyways). Electronics, mostly spare parts, and some donated bits & pieces, and some ground-up new builds. We will be using a Data East 2nd generation cpu board here, since I know my way around them pretty good. I have more experience with the WPC system than anything else, but, I don't have any!! The DE cpu will work just fine here anyways. I'm more of an Intel MCS51 coder, but they never seemed to gain any popularity with the gaming manufactor's, so Motorola assembly it is then. (I am going to likely use MCS51 in the sound sections though, since I have done some MP3 storage & playback using this one before). DMD will be used for display (it should look somewhat modern you know!), and yikes!, I don't have any previous experience here whatsoever. But, a good excuse to learn the techniques.
I'll update this thread from time to time, with the progress, and of course PICTURES. I will also gladly accept and consider any idea's you may want to table, or help in any way, and of course any donations! (no, I don't mean money, this is a low budget project remember) .. by this I mean parts, labour, etc.
Anyone who donates any physical parts or pieces will be honoured with their name being mentioned on the rolling credits section of the DMD in attract mode. I may come here once in awhile looking for a specific part that we don't have on hand, hoping someone may be able to spare one from their junkbox. If the machine has the appeal I think it should have when completed, I hope it may make it to a few shows once in awhile.
I would already like to give a big thanks to Dave Astill, of Astill Entertainment for donating a ton of stuff (lower cabinet, pf, parts, cpu, almost too much stuff to list)! Dave has also become a great sounding board for idea's.
Oh .. btw we needed a theme of course, and my family settled on it last week: [b][/b]AC/DC
Why? Because we like them, Artwork is not too complex, lots of downloadable grafix, sound bytes, etc, etc, available. Plus, what classic band pin is not popular these days? (OK, maybe Dolly Parton pin prices are one of the only ones not on the rise!)
Enough rambling ... we got work to do !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
One last thing, let's keep the thread light-hearted, no bashing, etc. this hobby needs to be fun!
Oh, and my first urgent need: Looking to find a pair of those modern WMS/Bally/DE/Stern style backbox hinges, you know the ones, like on WPC machines. If anyone knows where I can find a set ASAP, either for cheap, or free, please drop me a PM.
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Wow Thats will be a cool project!!! Supprising to hear that you will use DE MPU kind of cool tho seeying I love that generation of MPU.
Life is like Pinball!! You never know where you will bounce or where your going but sometimes you have that one amazing shot But on the other hand you have those darn gutter ball where you just get frustrated.
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Poor Pinbot. Poor Space Shuttle.
Good luck on the project. I just wish that classic pins didn't have to suffer. It's sad the lives that pins lead until they find solace and retirement in our gamerooms.
Well, it's like this ... the Pinbot cab I'm using, was just that, a lower cabinet only. It was a 'leftover' from some re-imports that Dave had sitting in his garage for the past 5 years or so. No pf, no head, no electronic's. He was using it to store extra legs in, and he graciously donated for this project. The classic Space Shuttle was another dandy deal, it sat in somebody's barn in the dirt, on it's back for I don't know how long. The rear 6 inches of the lower cabinet was filled with dead grass, eaten corn cobs, and a whole lot of moisture. Rotted away so bad that the transformers on the bottom looked like brown rusted fuzzballs! The pf is 50% worn to the wood from a past that must have involved a ton of play, or very poor maintanence.
So .. the way I see it, these pins (basically parts) will have to suffer no longer !! We are going to attempt to breath a whole new life in to them!
A newly fabricated modern back box made out of 3/4" birch. And a picture of the primed cabinet & backbox.
If you look carefully at the lower cabinet, you can see that the side panel angles were raised by 2 1/2 " at the rear, to provide more pf clearance for toys, etc. Also gives it that 'WPC' ... or more modern appearance. It also eliminated the system 11 cab style 'neck' at the rear of the cabinet, as it was replaced by a deck to hold the backbox. Side mounted hinges will be used. The lower cab still requires more sanding, as noticed after priming. (darn)
I'll be happy when the woodworking is completed. It's a messy job.
I am very impressed by what looks like a flawless backbox. I am curious as to how you put it together (nails, groves, channels, etc.)? Not that I need to build one but because I recently repaired one and I am curious as to how the pieces join together. If you have other pictures, please post them. Also, isn't the back side wood usually MDF in some late 80s, early 90s machine?
Lastly, I see that you are like a full production house in that you didn't bother priming the inside of the backbox to save paint (and time)! I know it is a waste but I probably would have painted in there also just to be complete.
Nice job. And interesting thread indeed. Can't wait to see what you do for a playfield design....
Vids: Crystal Castles, Gauntlet/Gauntlet II, Donkey Kong Jr., Ms. Pac-Man, Vs. Super Mario Bros. (other Vids in storage - for now) Pins:White Water [WH2O]
Yes, the joints are grooved, kind of, just a simple recessed slot for the 4 corners, and the rear panel (which is 1/2" MDF ..btw) I'm not too big on woodworking at all, so it was all done with a table saw & a router. I didn't bother spraying the inside rear of the backbox, since most of it is covered by aluminum sheet anyways. Yeah, the 'factory' look! (and no body filler! ...too bad i can't say the same of the recycled lower cabinet)
The first of many, many layers of graphics .... this is going to be a slow process, choosing designs, transfering to paper, cutting with a razor, choosing color, masking, and finally shooting the paint.
Backbox is almost done (with the exception of the electronic, software, etc of course) Handmade DMD bezel panel out of 1/2" MDF, the speaker panels are something my son made up in highschool with 1/8" laminated black & white plastic routered & drilled using a CAD machine (handy tool!). The DMD cover is 1/8" lexan painted black on the rear to only show the display portion.
The boards you see are a WMS system 9 cpu, which is only temporary, to test none-DMD code on, using a monitor pod for uploading code (more on this later). The final cpu will be a DE with DMD cabling. The Power Supply (DMD ready) in the right top corner is new, and my own design since it had to fit into the tight corner of the backbox.
Translight is also completed .... It's just a poster from a CD store sandwiched between a glass front & lexan rear. The lexan rear piece allows silver masking to be added to prevent light from shining through the unwanted picture area's. Pretty basic since I'm stuck on using only designs of posters that are available. But looks pretty cool none the less! Uses a standard early Bally chrome lift channel (the older 1/4" style), and plastic 1/4" edge & top channel, also from an early Bally design. This older 1/4" trim works perfect when you need to fit a 1/8" glass and 1/8" clear lexan backer into it.
Whoa ! Those speaker panels came out in the picture looking really wierd. They look very good in real life, and are identical. I'll snap a close-up sometime.
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looking good man
Life is like Pinball!! You never know where you will bounce or where your going but sometimes you have that one amazing shot But on the other hand you have those darn gutter ball where you just get frustrated.
How are you going to do DMD programming? (or did I miss that part?)
I'm writing up a program in visual basic (with the help of my other son, who's a wiz with that stuff), to build graphics and compile them into the bin files required by the DMD controller ROMS. (of course we are 1st working on a de-compilation program to play around with existing roms to get the feel for it .. sorta like in pinmame).
That's most of the reason I'm sticking with DE hardware, since all of the DMD cpu handling and graphics storage are not on the main cpu .. (like in WPC), it's just too hard to get a handle on it that way. Stand-alone is the way to go when you are still learning.... and simply call it from the main cpu when needed (score updating, effects, modes, attract visuals, etc).
Now .. if I could just find someone that wants to part with a spare DE DMD controller board ..... check my WTB in the Parts Wanted section for part numbers!!!
Oh .. & don't forget to check your spare parts boxes for a set of Backbox hinges (DE, WPC, or similar)
BTW the current DMD boards from Stern are backward compatible. They are essentially the same board with fewer components.
Mike
Currently owning: ============ MAME in Sega cab with 25" arcade monitor (Has a 12" Bazooka powered subwoofer in it) - Not for sale Williams Civic Center Shuffle Alley (Puck Bowler) (1973) - 350$ Seeburg LS1 "Spectra" Jukebox (1967) - 300$
Currently babysitting =============== Heavy Metal Meltdown SOLD - leaving soon
Previously owned ============= Hot Tip, Countdown, HS, WWF, TFTC, T2, RS, Pinbot, Laser War, LOTR, Flinstones, FH, DM, STTNG, Getaway, Silver Slugger, Laser Ball, Bad Cats, Batman Forever, Meteor, TZ, Galaxy, 6MDM, TSPP, MB.
The boards you see are a WMS system 9 cpu, which is only temporary, to test non-DMD code on, using a monitor pod for uploading code (more on this later). The final cpu will be a DE with DMD cabling.
What language is used for writing romware? Does the system run a compiled code or do you need to work in assembler/machine language?
Great project! For those about to rock, we salute you.
The video game say "Play me" Face it on a level but it take you every time on a one on one Feeling running down your spine Nothing gonna save your one last dime cause it owns you Through and through
Tried to come up with theme-related way of saying :"nice".
Assembly at first, then after creating a pinball-related interpreter, the pin interpreter.
ToMMy if you are successful at creating some software tools to be able to manipulate the sound and gameplay, I think you will unlock a whole new dimension to pin collectors. This opens up new doors in fixing up some of the repetative annoyances that are intolerable in a home use pin that may have been acceptable commercially. Since ROM's have no permanence to changing the game and are quickly reversible back to original I see no reason why not to play with and tweak the roms. Just think of the possibilities. For instance re-writing or adding additional sound tracks, personalized comments, custom graphics, deeper rules, and the list goes on.
I assume you are working with Motorola 6809 emulation to begin with?
It's been a while since I posted an update, so here goes: The cabinet work is 100% complete with the exception of the headboard hinges, which I have still not been able to locate. The sideart is almost done, a little more to add yet. The PF has not been started yet, other than stripping the top of the donated board. I used it for awhile in it's stripped top format while I tested some s/w. Most of the time has been spent disassembling & re-assembling the stock Space Shuttle firmware, so it can be portable, and be modified to work in the DE cpu board. Thank god that's done & working 100%. (VERY labour intensive). So ... now that that's done & working, it's time to tackle the pf, so we can change around some, re-do the s/w to match, add some rule set's, etc ... then finish up with the DMD code and MP3 sound board calls. When your testing ROM code for one of these projects, the last thing you want to do is burn a new EPROM every time you want to test a piece of code, this could mean (for me anyways) burning & erasing about 500 eproms throughout the duration of the project. To get around this, I designed, constructed & wrote up some 6808 code to use a Monitor board. (See picture below). What this does, is allows me to upload new ROM code serially to a non-volatile RAM eprom emulator on board the pin. The RAM is 32Kx8, same as a 27C256 EPROM. No more burning & erasing eproms all day long. Once the final touch's are done to the code, burn a EPROM, remove the monitor board, and were back to a stock cpu board. Nifty! The monitor also allows me to dump the 6808 scratch RAM for debugging, etc, using a terminal program (Procomm in my case) at any point in the code run.
That's all for now ... I'll post some pict's of the pf progress as it comes along.
Still looking for a set of side-mounted backboard hinges (any brand) ... and a DE DMD controller board .. if anyone knows where I could find them. Thanks!
This project is so far over my head I can hardly comprehend it! Truly Amazing!! Great Idea and great work. I have toyed with the idea of making a conversion pin, but it would be purely artwork on an existing game. I am amazed at this undertaking.
Dave
Here are games I would like to acquire this year, or sometime...
24 Iron Man Attack From Mars Prefer Pounded playfield! Monster Bash Prefer Pounded Playfield! Elvis Sopranos Batman Forever Spider-Man Stern Prefer Pounded Playfield!
Have these available for trade or possible sale: Corvette South Park Theatre of Magic Twilight Zone RFM/SW:EP1 Nucore Combo AFM
Thanks! It turned out OK, all the simple stuff there! I kind of taught myself how the program worked as I went.
Now... Build me a Custom Pin!! Something in a Nightmare Before Christmas theme!!
Dave
Here are games I would like to acquire this year, or sometime...
24 Iron Man Attack From Mars Prefer Pounded playfield! Monster Bash Prefer Pounded Playfield! Elvis Sopranos Batman Forever Spider-Man Stern Prefer Pounded Playfield!
Have these available for trade or possible sale: Corvette South Park Theatre of Magic Twilight Zone RFM/SW:EP1 Nucore Combo AFM
Still looking for a set of side-mounted backboard hinges (any brand) ... and a DE DMD controller board .. if anyone knows where I could find them. Thanks!
Big thanks to Anthony Stebel for dropping off a nice set of backbox hinges last week, and to Takochef for the kind offer on another set.
The playfield is coming along nicely, It's a whitewood at the moment, a few more gadget placements, and I can give it light CC sealing coat before we start on the graphics. Monkeybug taught me this Bill Davis trick a while back, it makes acrylic paint work MUCH simpler, since it can easily be removed if changes or screwups occur.
Thanks again to Dave & Anthony for all your help, and keep those idea's coming!
PS .. still need to find a used or broken DMD controller board, before I build from scratch, which is a pain, but a definite possibility.
A whitewood in progress ...... finally for some artwork. A lot of holes had to be filled, levelled, new holes layed-out, cut, drilled. Sanding, sanding & more sanding. Two thin coats of clear to seal the wood, then finally a base coat to add graphics to. And course, more sanding.
The inserts were already in the pf ... it was formerly a williams space shuttle don't forget. Some inserts were removed & filled, along with some holes, like the up-post, drain gate, and pretty much everything on the upper pf area. Lots of new holes were added, for a scoop, a VUK, mini pf mounting, lamps, etc. Stationary standup target slots were widened to accept new drop-target assemblies also. No new lamp inserts were added, since the wood machining for that would be a nightmare.
There won't be much painting by hand, other than the black bordering lines, etc. It will mostly be cutting & pasting many small mylar pieces, similar to adding those insert decals to badly worn pf restoration. Photoshop & Autocad, used in conjunction with the ton of graphic material available on the net makes it pretty simple really. A white base coat of paint was chosen, since I can't print the color white with my color laser printer. All of the insert decals themselves have already been drafted in Autocad by my oldest son, printed on a transparancy sheet to verify alignment, so we are off to the races.
After all the mylar graphics have been put down to satisfaction, around 6-8 coats of clear will be applied, with lots of block sanding between, in order to level the mylar transitions with the rest of the wood. Hopefully it will be perfectly flat .... (and glossy!!)
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This is really extremely cool, Tommy. I'm very much looking forward to seeing photos of the finished product. Any idea on a timeline for completion? Thanks for keeping us up-to-date on your project.
Any idea on a timeline for completion? Thanks for keeping us up-to-date on your project.
Hoping to have the pf finished in about 2 weeks .. maybe populated in 4 weeks (the wiring harness needs to be changed around drastically, so thats going take some time). Things to do after that: design a solid state flipper board, sound board, and dmd controller ... 3-4 weeks for the h/w, and I don't know how long for the dmd s/w.
WOW! While I can hardly find time to shop a pin, you are able to MAKE a pin. That is absolutely incredible. Like Steph said, when you complete it, you are going to have a following Who knows, some rich guy guy's family may ask you to make a custom pin for them (like Spelling's family did with Data East).
Pic of the pf after it's last 3 coats of clear last night (makes like a grand total of 8 I think) Don't even ask what a pain in the arse this part has been ( certain mylar products tend to bubble with the chemical reaction to urathane, certain urathanes won't adhere properly to certain mylar's, etc, etc, ... HP color lasers blow at doing certain details )
anyway ... it's not near as perfect as I wanted it to be, but I'm nor a artist, or a chemist that's for sure !!
and a very crappy pic of the mp3 player I designed .. if it looks like there are two of everything, that would be correct ... one chip does background on demand, the other vocals & everyday pinball sound calls. I must admit though, it works better than I expected ... at least after I got the asic code flattened out properly.
Vids: Crystal Castles, Gauntlet/Gauntlet II, Donkey Kong Jr., Ms. Pac-Man, Vs. Super Mario Bros. (other Vids in storage - for now) Pins:White Water [WH2O]
Current 'working' lineup: ( 2 ) Flipper Football, The Shadow
Gone but not forgotten: ( 22 ) City Slicker, Dirty Harry, CFTBL, Big Shot, Big Guns, Black Rose, Judge Dredd, Indianapolis 500, Big Game, BS: Dracula x 2, Beat the Clock, Fire!, F-14 Tomcat, Getaway, Breakshot, Cheetah, Meteor, El Dorado, Nitro Ground Shaker, Chexx Hockey, Slugfest
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Wow oh Wow!!!! That is really amazing work. I hope to see and try it when complete. Also that MP3 add-on is really one of a kind genius. Keep posting progress.
Life is like Pinball!! You never know where you will bounce or where your going but sometimes you have that one amazing shot But on the other hand you have those darn gutter ball where you just get frustrated.
Brilliant work ToMMy! We are living the dream through you on this one! I have been thinking of doing the same on a Gottlieb (easy work for sound with that Flash memory card available), but never had the time to get the project off the ground.
I will be lining up to play this pin since I am also a HUGE AC/DC fan...
(easy work for sound with that Flash memory card available) Sparky
Flash card ..yeah. I have a funny feeling this thing is going to be reworked yet again to use a flash mem for the mp3 storage. I designed it with a pair of 8 meg eproms in mind at the time. After working the bugs out of it, and compiling a few s/w runs with some test sound clips in MpegII format, it occured to me that 16 meg might not cut it.
'tis the main reason why I chose a s/w re-configurable asic (FPGA) to handle the logic between the sound board's cpu & the mps ic's. Changing it over to a single (or even a pair) of high capacity flash cards should be failrly easy hardware-wise. Make an adapter to plug into one or both of the 32pin DIP eprom sockets that wires out to a flash card socket. Then re-code the asic to pull bytes via the same pins. No board re-wiring nesessary.
I don't know the off-the-shelf flash card reading/writing algo's yet, since I have never dealt with them before, but that's what this project is really for, learning something new every day !!
Necro ... triggering the mp3 calls is probably the easiest part, there a simple one-two byte calls done by the main cpu board, that are sent out via those PIA's we know & love, to the parallel port ribbon cable that goes to any existing sound board. The sound boards just take that set of bytes & decode them, then uses a look-up table to find the address in it's memory where the sound that needs to be processed is located, and simply pumps it out. Real easy.
In fact, it would be pretty straight-forward to add on a homebrew mp3 player to almost any existing pin that has an off-board sound card. (all DE's, WPC's, Bally's, exceptions being Sytem 11's that have there sound on the cpu board) without modifying the cpu eprom code whatsoever ....
Food for thought anyways .... If anyone is interested, these are the mp3 IC's I choose .. just search "STA-013" from ST on the net.
If anyone is interested, these are the mp3 IC's I choose .. just search "STA-013" from ST on the net.
It's likely worth mentioning though .. if you intend to approach a sound card project alone, that these ic's are not cheap (at least not yet anyways .. ) A pair of STA013's, and a pair of DAC ic's run around $50 from Digi-Key, and raw asic's are around $50-$125 each unprogrammed. Of course you could get by with only one set, instead of two players, but I thought it would be simpler to overlay sounds using two at the same time ................. Also, the asic would not be needed with only one player, as long as you used a faster mpu ... it's only real purpose here is to divide up the storage space of the roms or whatever, to feed two bitstreams to two independant mp3 players at the same time.
man did my brother freak when i sent him pics of it. he is a big fan of AC/DC. now he is a big fan of TOMMYS. he is into pins alittle but now he is asking about if TOMMY ever has a meeting at his place can he come.... told him to hold his horses and that there will be a line up to at his door once he is done.
great work with the mp3. you make it all sound so simple. i too have thought of redoing a pin to a tattoo & piercing theme. but i am thinking of using a EM. yes, cheap way out. but all i am good for is artwork and clean up. just learning basic repairs all the time(baby step).
thanks agian for keeping us up to date on your progress. can not state how impressed i am with you.
you just HAVE to bring this machine to expo once it's completed ! IT'S A *MUST* for the world to see it !
My good friend Dave Astill has committed to bring this thing to a few of the shows next year ... he's regular visiter to EXPO, and others ... he has been a TREMENDOUS help in getting this off the ground. I, personally have never been to one of these shows, but who knows, maybe I'll just get around to it one of these days
I think we should post a "underneath the pf" pict too ... even has that NIB look & smell to it !! (I'm only guessing here, since I have never had the NIB pleasure)
If you take good look at the top pf picture on this page (5), you will notice a rather empty space on the top right side of the pf (just to the right of the mini pf). Not too sure yet what to put in there (other than more flash lamps of course).
So ... pour-on the suggestions ... the person that comes up with the best idea, that is supported by others, and is a FEASABLE thing (ie: no toys that require solenoids, since we are already maxed-out on the cpu for drivers, except flashers) gets to have their handle on the DMD in the credits (like Dave for his help, and A. Stebel for his captive ball idea).
Needs to be more of a visual thing, since it's not in the playable area of the pf.
You really need the Bell!! You know the one that breaks your ear drums! Bong... Bong... Bong...
Would be cool if the captive ball hit it or something, but even just a 3D Bell, Or really cool Plastic of it!
Dave
Here are games I would like to acquire this year, or sometime...
24 Iron Man Attack From Mars Prefer Pounded playfield! Monster Bash Prefer Pounded Playfield! Elvis Sopranos Batman Forever Spider-Man Stern Prefer Pounded Playfield!
Have these available for trade or possible sale: Corvette South Park Theatre of Magic Twilight Zone RFM/SW:EP1 Nucore Combo AFM
i just looking at the pics and saying, "Oh my god". wow. thats looking like i expected, just great. no wonder i put it on my list of top machines to own.
You really need the Bell!! You know the one that breaks your ear drums! Bong... Bong... Bong...
Would be cool if the captive ball hit it or something, but even just a 3D Bell, Or really cool Plastic of it!
Dave
Agreed on the bell! Maybe even a cannon pointing at it with a small flasher bulb mounted inside the tip of the barrel. (maybe a different colored flasher bulb in the bell itself? - ie white in the cannon barrel, red in the bell)
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How 'bout a couple of cannons like on the cover of "For those about to rock". You could put flashers inside them to make it look like they're firing. I understand the cannons were /are a big part of the AC/DC concert experience.
Large Bell, Angus (McFarlane Figurene), Cannons .... hey .... you guys are great! None of these idea's even close to occured to me ....
I thought of maybe a small (toy size) red baseball cap, that I could glue some devil horns on ... but,
These idea's beat THE CRAP OUT OF THAT!
I have to put the project on hold for a few weeks .. since I gotta replace the camshaft in my ATV in the next couple a weeks (hunting season is only a month & 1/2 away!) So let's keep the idea's running for awhile longer .. who know's what other cool things you might come up with
Have to admit though .. the Bell sounds pretty solid. The Angus figurene too .. if it was not so hard to get, a little too big. I have the cannon covered, since one is going to be fastened to the VUK ramp already.
As far as the Bell "dong" (and the cannon firing) .. this WILL be done via the mp3. VOLUME overide is pretty simple with this ... you can instruct the cpu board to raise or lower the volume beyond the coin-door up/down volume settings at will. (Like just long enough for the blast, or bong)
No, Thank You!! For sharing this project, It truly is Wondrous!!
Dave
Here are games I would like to acquire this year, or sometime...
24 Iron Man Attack From Mars Prefer Pounded playfield! Monster Bash Prefer Pounded Playfield! Elvis Sopranos Batman Forever Spider-Man Stern Prefer Pounded Playfield!
Have these available for trade or possible sale: Corvette South Park Theatre of Magic Twilight Zone RFM/SW:EP1 Nucore Combo AFM
This is so bloody amazing it brings a friggin tear to my eye I also wish I had even half the skill required to re-theme a pin complete with mp3 sounds etc. Somebody should invent a generic pin interface sort of like what the mame community has for encoders etc. You get 10 solenoids, light matrix etc....but I can't even begin to wrap my head around having user configurabe rules etc...
Whew ... after a month of designing, hair-pulling, re-designing, constructing, testing, more hair-pulling, asic coding, and re-coding (and yes, more hair pulling, at least what's left of it) .. and finally a little bit of font mapping, etc. we have a DMD CONTROLLER!
The board may look a little small compared to what you normally see, but it's just as powerfull as a WPC or Stern unit. Just a low parts count, since it's all inside of an ASIC chip (the big black square one in the picture.) Much the same approach as the dual MP3 player board. It also contains an MCS51 cpu .. to handle all the calls & mapping. VERY simple code thus far .. much more to go.
The absolute worst part of this piece of the game, is turning a graphic idea into an array of 128x32 dots. Gotta find an easier way!
You are showing amazing creative talent, in addition to deep knowledge and great design implementation ability. There are very few people in the small world of pinball able to do this at your level. I tip my hat. WOW.
You should get in touch with Stern Pinball and submit your work to date soon. Who knows, you could be the next big Pinball Designer over there one day !
Good luck! Regards, - Sylvain
Looking for 1966 Bally Capersville, 1967 Bally The Wiggler, 1981 Stern Viper, 1986 Pinstar Gamatron, 1986 Williams Grand Lizard, 1991 Williams Bride of Pinbot, and a few others. Cash or some trades available. Could also repair a machine of yours +/-$ if needed, in exchange for one machine on my want list, non-working/unshopped welcome!
Is there anyone on this board that is good at Visual Basic, or Java programming, that would be interested in a simple non-profit project? I need a better way of converting DMD dots into either a binary file, or even a text file of compiled dot arrays (in HEX).
In the PC world, I only know the old MSDOS Qbasic, and it's not good at handling graphics on a screen that needs 128 dots wide.
Some of you may find this comical, but this is how I am currently doing it: With Notepad, I created a 128x32 grid of text -'s & O's, like this:
- - - - - - O - - - - - .......... - - - - O O O - - - - ....
A dash means the dot is off, a 'O' means it's on. Then I run the text file through a Qbasic program I whipped up that converts the array of -'s & O's into a HEX file. The HEX file can then simply be added to my DMD eprom for real use.
As you can tell, it really suck's since it's so labour intensive.
It would be really cool if someone could write up some VB code to show the DMD panel on the PC screen, and all you would have to do is mouse-click on a dot to turn it on or off .... then save it to a binary or HEX file !!! If anyone has the knowledge, and want's to play with it, LMK, and I can explain the dot-to-binary relationship for the program.
If anyone has the knowledge, and want's to play with it, LMK, and I can explain the dot-to-binary relationship for the program.
You have PM ...
Do you want a consol application with a grid that clicks on/off dots and saves the resulting frame.
or would you like to work with a paint program (say mspaint or pshop) ... save your file to bmp and then the program converts the image to your hex file.
I have had several offers for help on this, and that is just GREAT
I sent Meatpopsicle an email already, since he was the first to jump in, but as I replied to everyone else, I will post the details here, for all to see, and maybe stir up some more discussion, and idea's: (hopefully Meatpopsicle understands what I'm trying to get across .. and be able to whip something up !!!)
Here's what I was thinking ....
A simple windows-screen, with a representation of a 128 wide x 32 deep rows & coloums of small circles (Just like a real DMD display) at the bottom 1/3 of the screen. The circles (dots) would be blank (or background color) at startup, scroll your mouse over any dot, right click on it, and it turns orange, (or red or something).
After you have drawn your image using the dots needed, the 128x32 panel could be saved to a file.
Here's the tricky part on saving the file as useable format:
Each 'lit' dot represents a binary '1', each unlit dot a binary '0' .. ok, so far so simple.
Starting from the left top corner of the DMD screen, going across (the top row of dots) the first 8 dots across from the left is equal to one byte (8 bits). The leftmost dot of the eight is the least significant bit, the 8th bit (dot) from the left is the most significant. Therefore, the 1st 8 dots would make the 1st byte of the saved file. The next 8 dots, going from the left, top row, is the next byte, and so on.
So we have 128 dots per row, 8 dots per byte, = 16 bytes for one row. 32 rows, = 512 bytes, the total length of one file for one screen.
The 512 bytes can be saved almost in any way, since I can easily convert it if required.
For example, if they were saved as HEX characters in ascii text even, such as: 00 00 08 FF F0 B8 92 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 (one line of 16 bytes = one row) and followed by the other 31 lines.
The absolute best way, is similar to above, but in a format that my MCS51 assembler can handle straight-up, and that is formatted in the same manner, but with each byte looking like this in one line:
(tab) db (tab) 000h, 000h, 008h, 0FFh, 0F0h, 0B8h, 092h, 000h ..... (16 of them)
That is to say, each line starts with a tab char, then ascii 'db' then a tab char, then all 16 bytes in ascii, preceeded by a zero, and ending with a h, then space, then the next (no h, on the last byte of each row).
Doesn't really matter, whatever is easiest.
It can get even fancier, by having the program be able to load a file in the same format & display it too ... so one can save their work & come back later.
That's it in a nutshell ... wish I had a better grip on PC based programming, instead of mostly assembly language.
Meat Popsicle let me now what you come up with, but i can do something like that with Macromedia Director, sounds pretty easy.
I could take a real DMD picture and dot to do it. Saving and loading the files is not a problem either. This would create a standard Windows app and i can even compile it for the "Mac freaks"
Currently owning: - Solar Fire, Medusa, Flash Gordon, (Centaur), No Fear ------------------
Okay will do .. I will take a serious look at this tomorrow or after the weekend. Mondo busy at work at the moment.. but will find the time to make this project happen.
I'm hoping whatever any of you guys can come up can be fairly easy to use & could be shared with everyone in the group .. I figure if somebody has some spare time & wants to do a few pages of graphics, and forward them on for the project, GREAT!!!
(I really can't see me plucking away all by myself for a year or two, to get a complete set of frames, for this one game, but i did start preparing to ... I have a complete set of fonts done already, std 5x7, 7x10, and ACDC Sqealer 15x23).
I'm ready to list everyone on MAACA that helps, even a little bit, on the scrolling credits of the DMD ... no matter how large of a list it may become !!!!
Once you have a coded application could you script the series of events that would be part of the gameplay?
It would be fun to open up the floor to the group to try and build various animations for those events. Sort of a contest to get your sequence into the game.
Tommy: I'm guessing you're not planning on using shading?? I believe the older DE does 4 shades. 25%, 50%, 75%, and full bright. It would definitely make the coding much more complex.
VERY nice work so far!! Simply amazing!
Mike
Currently owning: ============ MAME in Sega cab with 25" arcade monitor (Has a 12" Bazooka powered subwoofer in it) - Not for sale Williams Civic Center Shuffle Alley (Puck Bowler) (1973) - 350$ Seeburg LS1 "Spectra" Jukebox (1967) - 300$
Currently babysitting =============== Heavy Metal Meltdown SOLD - leaving soon
Previously owned ============= Hot Tip, Countdown, HS, WWF, TFTC, T2, RS, Pinbot, Laser War, LOTR, Flinstones, FH, DM, STTNG, Getaway, Silver Slugger, Laser Ball, Bad Cats, Batman Forever, Meteor, TZ, Galaxy, 6MDM, TSPP, MB.
all above my head. but tommy i can understand why all want to jump on and help. who wouldn't want to attach themselves to this project. it unreal. such great work has gone into it and no one want to see you cheapen it. hence mr.mikes comments on display. these guys are the best and will put all effort into solving this for you. now can't wait to see what happens. wish i wasn't such a scarecrow and could help. will just sit back in ahhh.
Tommy: I'm guessing you're not planning on using shading?? I believe the older DE does 4 shades. 25%, 50%, 75%, and full bright. It would definitely make the coding much more complex.
Actually, yes .. shading will be employed where required. It's pretty simple to do shading really. You start out with a full screen frame of whatever, that is to say, the entire picture is one solid group of dots that are 'on'. Save this screen to a file, then remove (turn off) the dots you want shaded on the screen, and save it as another file.
What happens on the controller board is this: It contains RAM memory for up to 16 full DMD screen pages. You write the 1st file to a page, the 2nd file to the next page, and more if you like, depending on the amount of shading. When this graphic is called, the controller quickly flips the 2 or more pages onto the display rather quickly, the effect to the eye is 'shading'.
Animation works in a similar way, only the pages are flipped through a lot slower.
I always wondered what they used to create their DMD animations. And is there something on the PC (or Mac or Linux....) that does the same?
Or do they just use Microsoft Paint and the old cell animation technique?
From Louis Koziard
Quoted Text
As WMS we used Brief to edit our programs, compiled with UniWare 6809 Assembler and Opus Make. We had a couple of custom programs for special preprocessing and post-processing, as well as converting dot-matrix files from the Deluxe Animation LBM format into our special compression formats. All of these tools ran on standard PCs. I wrote the majority of my games on a Dell with a Pentium 90. Assembling a whole game probably took 10 minutes back then (probably still does, with WindowsXP...)
Mrhide.pinnesota.org RAA La marié de Pinbot et La Créature du Lagon Noir, Eclipse et Capt. Card
Assembling a whole game probably took 10 minutes back then (probably still does, with WindowsXP...)
Vids: Crystal Castles, Gauntlet/Gauntlet II, Donkey Kong Jr., Ms. Pac-Man, Vs. Super Mario Bros. (other Vids in storage - for now) Pins:White Water [WH2O]
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God man this is such a cool project. Every time i look at it I am really amazed. I wish i knew how to program thought. I do know a few people who do thought maybe pm weirdguy but not sure if he does i think he does cobol but possible he knows more.
Life is like Pinball!! You never know where you will bounce or where your going but sometimes you have that one amazing shot But on the other hand you have those darn gutter ball where you just get frustrated.
Fiddling around with a very cool beta-version of a dot generator that Matt came up with............ also have multipage graphics of pop-bumper explosions, extra ball & replay page flipping. My cheapo camera is just a little too slow to capture those. MAACA & Meatpopsicle ruleZ .......
Whats that Shap pain in my back Oh it's a Knife Complete MAACA-Wacko!
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Wow this looking so dam cool. Man keep up the amazing work i know it has been said so many times but this is truly amazing and I am really amazed by your patience.
Life is like Pinball!! You never know where you will bounce or where your going but sometimes you have that one amazing shot But on the other hand you have those darn gutter ball where you just get frustrated.
was at a great party friday night in peterborough and big topic of the night was this machine. i send out emails to all on my list every update. they can't get over how someONE could do all this work, with such wonderfull results. then we always end up on the topic of what machine would you want made.
Very close to having a 1.0 of the Dot Matrix paint program. Needs final approval from Tommy first
If other parties are interested (I know Tommy asked for Artwork contribution) PM me and I will send you a link to download the application via FTP when its released.
It's works flawlessly ... fantastic job !! I can simply take the output file, c&p it into rom file, no conversions required. I'll package together a few sample clips to go with the dowload so everyone can get a feel for how it works.
My hat goes off to M'popsicle & his co-writer for this ... it's real timesaver.
Now .... if I could get them to make it flip or scroll through 2-18 file pages, like the real thing, we could make up some pretty fancy animations !!!!
Only kidding .. that would be alot more work on their part .. and it does a decent job as it stands V1.0 .... I thank you both again
Well it got Tommys approval so v1.0 is open to the masses.
PM me and I will send you a link to an FTP address. Please don't redistribute the link at this point as its a private FTP and I don't want to generate too much traffic on it. If the demand is there I will put it on a public share. If people want to host just let me know.
Nice stuff. Why is the Tilt example not moved up one scan line (6 pixels above and 4 below instead of 5 & 5)??
Vids: Crystal Castles, Gauntlet/Gauntlet II, Donkey Kong Jr., Ms. Pac-Man, Vs. Super Mario Bros. (other Vids in storage - for now) Pins:White Water [WH2O]
Nice stuff. Why is the Tilt example not moved up one scan line (6 pixels above and 4 below instead of 5 & 5)??
My fault ... When I sent some sample files to Meat Popsicle for testing, I left an assembler 'comment' line at the top of the file, so I could keep track of the file blocks within the uncompiled ROM file. My assembler ignores comment lines, but DOHO does not, and does not expect to see them (nor should it). So, as you can see, it just shifted everything down one line. It has been rectified on my end.
Y'Know' ToMMY, You could always Use PinMAME To test your rom before you burn it to an EPROM I think (If you're already not doing it).
Yeah .. I'Know' ... I fiddled around a bit with PinMAME a few months ago .. problem I have with it is that is not out-of-box compatible with my DMD driver (since it's home-brewed), nor my sound card (same thing), without having to write-up some add on C++ code for Pinmame. I found it just as easy to test it in the actual machine, cause it gives you the whole sensation, and it's easier to find bugs. I don't burn it into a ROM usually anyways ... I just upload it to a non-volatile RAM EPROM emulator.
Anyways .. I'm pretty much done the ROM code now .. the game actually plays now! Rules are complete .. multiball working .. only thing left code is: -The skill shot (easy enuff) -Sound calls (not started that yet ..) -Finish the rest of the DMD calls (50% complete ... need more DMD screens to complete)
Speaking of DMD screens ... anyone tried playing with Meat Popsicle's DOHO program yet? I need some more graphics !! ... like a cannon firing a big cloud-o-smoke, A guy pounding on a large Bell with a big hammer ... and anything else you can think of. Oh, ... and a MAACA Banner !!!!
I have all the generic stuff done, like replay, tilt, multiball, tri-ball, special, extraball, shoot again, match, and much more (all the regular stuff).
Hey Tommy, does your DMD support multiple shades? Ie - Off/Dim/Med/Bright?
(( edit - the reason I ask is that I tried out MeatPopsicle's DMD program, and got the idea that it would be cool if you could take an image created in photoshop; then convert it automatically with a program to "DMD format" (very quick to create content that way). I've created a test application that does this fairly quickly (I haven't put in the hex conversion part yet, but I see by looking at the ASM files that this should be pretty straightforward... just whipped this up this morning), I just wondered if there would be a use for other states than just "on or off" in your project.
Here's a pic (next post) just to show how it would work, I temporarily converted the "real" pixel readings to simple 0's and 1's to show how this would work/look.
Special thanks to Meatpopsicle for sharing his program with me, it gave me some inspiration to try this on a whim. ))
Here's a pic of what I mean. I thought this might be handy because you could then just get images off the net (got the ac/dc logo off of google from the front of a tshirt picture), or make them yourself in bitmap format, load them and then the program could automatically convert them to a DMD ready format.
I took a screenshot of Meatpopsicle's DOHO frame from his program, took it into photoshop, shrunk it to 128x32, adjusted brightness and contrast, converted to indexed (2 color), replaced the white with black with the magic wand and coverted it.
Ok final one, I don't mean to hijack the thread, just thought you guys might find this useful for developing DMD content.
I did the hex converting etc; and now can create the same format data as Meatpopsicle with my bitmap 2 DMD converter.
Here's a sample of the same DOHO pic meatpopsicle made; converted to hex in my program; then I took the results, copied/pasted into notepad and loaded it in Meatpopsicle's DOHO dmd program to check if it worked. Yup! It's not perfect (capturing/resizing/photoshopping added some tiny pixel artifacts to the source image I used from the DOHO.asm file), but demonstrates how this could be used on any 128x32 bitmap.
Hey Tommy, does your DMD support multiple shades? Ie - Off/Dim/Med/Bright? -cyBORG
Oh yeah .. cyBORG .. This is what we are after ... The DMD suppports shading, (up to 15 pages) .. but in reality ..anything more than 3 levels is just not noticable. (even the WMS dudes will support that)
Looks like your taking it to another level ...& that's what it's all about here.
Meat popsicle's app. works just fantastic, as it was designed, but trying to manually place those dots is pretty tedious to say the least. But that was the goal.
Shading is not very complex on it's own .. 3 levels anyways... in the hex format world, it is really just 3 pages, background, medium, and full-on. The DMD driver simply rotates thru all the pages rather quickly, giving you the illusion of shade.
Now ... being able to import graphix is just wayyy cool .. open's it up to all of us amatuer artists .. if you know what I mean ... Very intererested in what you have to offer .. ...
I took a screenshot of Meatpopsicle's DOHO frame from his program, took it into photoshop, shrunk it to 128x32, adjusted brightness and contrast, converted to indexed (2 color), replaced the white with black with the magic wand and coverted it.
-cyBORG
After seeing Meatpopsicle's app, I figured there had to be some sort of Photoshop plugin to allow you to convert images (or a stream of images) to 2/4 bit colour depth and resize which would allow for easy animations. I didn't find anything.
Ok Tommy, here's a sample of what I produced today, I basically created a 5 color image (4 "colors" and black) and then ran it through my program. Basically after exchanging PM's I had it write the bright pixels to all 4 'frames', the medium to 3 frames, medium dim to 2 frames, and dim to 1 frame.
This is a (not accurate!) gif of the results that I put into Meatpopsicle's DOHO program to see if it appeared to be processing it right. Looks like it will work. (4 frames) This obviously is not intended to be an animation, but shows how the frames were processed from the image.
I used a full color (converted to 4 shades of red + black) picture of Brian Johnson I got off google as a test.
Looks like it's going to work great cyBORG .... send me the hex file & I'll try it on a real DMD at around 130hz or so .... & we will see if the shading works the way it looks like it's going to.
I would say it works fantastic! There are what looks like a lot of artifacts or something in the background, but they are simple to remove with the original doho ... not sure the picture I snapped will do justice .. since it likely only stills one frame (ie: it looks a heck of a lot better in real life)
I would say it works fantastic! There are what looks like a lot of artifacts or something in the background, but they are simple to remove with the original doho ... not sure the picture I snapped will do justice .. since it likely only stills one frame (ie: it looks a heck of a lot better in real life)
Oh ok, yeah I just made that image *really* quick and put a "pattern" dither on it (generally that looked best), but I didn't bother cleaning up the extra dots that the dithering put in the background at all. Oops
Ah well, we know it works now though, good to see!
I'll send you another example which will be more cleaned up to try out.
This is really REALLY looking good.. how much time have you put into it so far do you figure? You could always make some good money making custom pins for rich guys..
Own Magic, Star Gazer, Batman Forever, STTNG, Mystery Castle (project)
Gone Fairy, Secret Service, Meteor x3, Title Fight, Eight Ball Deluxe, Bone Busters Inc., Seawitch, Starship Troopers, Strange Science, Arena, Hook, Pin*Bot x2, Time Warp, Motordome, Robocop, Black hole, Jurassic Park , Wipe-Out, Pinball Pro: Challenger I, Swords of Fury, Stargate, Party Zone
This is really REALLY looking good.. how much time have you put into it so far do you figure? You could always make some good money making custom pins for rich guys..
A fair portion of the hardware stuff was donated .. (see earlier comments near the start of the thread) ... electronics was stuff on-hand, or scratch built, so no big costs there either. New DMD display was purchased, and a whole lot of small things.
Time? ... completely lost count months ago.
Make another pin? .... I doubt it, but who knows.
Depends if boredom sets in again after I finish this .. whenever that may be
hey this is sensational, i normally am on rgp but just found this, im also creating a custom pin of WPC quality, 'Coconut Island' heres the whitewood proto of layout. i was thinking of different implementation, i will be using VB, sounds will be .wav & music .mp3. the animations were (!) going to be .gif limited to 12 frames. the rule set will be implemented in a 2d array of switch VS mode, sound calls and dmd calls reside with the switches rule. this way anyone who wants to have a go at custom rules can. this will be a complicated matrix but totally configurable (mode timers, lamp effect routines etc all built into npc (nuggy pinball controller!) the pc will use a hacked keyboard encoder for sw input and lcd masked and windowed with red cellofane for a DMD copy. the output stage will be parallel port driven and is the pinmame HW prototype as seen on rgp. all ahrdware is of williams origin, enjoy and again fantastic job, yes you should be at stern!
'nuggy', nice start. The title of your future custom Pinball machine sounds very interesting. It makes me think of a lot of things including:
The Beach, The Ocean
Baywatch Pinball machine (aggh, ok, I know your machine will be much better than that).
Coconuts (of course)
Congo Bongo old 80s Video Game
Hawaiian Tropic suntan lotion (ok, the Hawaiian Tropic models in bikinis actually ).
If you will have regular updates (and photos) for us to see here, please start a new thread on this Projects board. You might want to update your Location in the Profile Information in the 'member center' link of this forum.
Thanks.
Vids: Crystal Castles, Gauntlet/Gauntlet II, Donkey Kong Jr., Ms. Pac-Man, Vs. Super Mario Bros. (other Vids in storage - for now) Pins:White Water [WH2O]
Whew .... A couple of months of serious DMD programming, and I think the graphics for this thing are almost complete. What I thought would occupy 8 Meg of data, took just under 4 meg.
Everything is looking really cool .... Again, a REAL BIG thanks to Meat Popsicle & CyBORG, for their wonderful DMD editing tools. Without them, I don't think I could have ever completed this phase.
Currently owning: ============ MAME in Sega cab with 25" arcade monitor (Has a 12" Bazooka powered subwoofer in it) - Not for sale Williams Civic Center Shuffle Alley (Puck Bowler) (1973) - 350$ Seeburg LS1 "Spectra" Jukebox (1967) - 300$
Currently babysitting =============== Heavy Metal Meltdown SOLD - leaving soon
Previously owned ============= Hot Tip, Countdown, HS, WWF, TFTC, T2, RS, Pinbot, Laser War, LOTR, Flinstones, FH, DM, STTNG, Getaway, Silver Slugger, Laser Ball, Bad Cats, Batman Forever, Meteor, TZ, Galaxy, 6MDM, TSPP, MB.
Allright! This project is coming to a close (and not soon enough). It's done folks! ... well, all except for the backbox lamp board ,, the MDF material for it is stranded in my back shed, with 3ft of snow in front of the doors. I'll get to it in few weeks. Plays 100% ... CPU board s/w, DMD s/w done, sound & music done.
It's been a real blast to try this ... not sure if I'll ever do it again .. but I had a lot of fun, got a real lot of help from some really good people on this board .. & I guess I can say I'm pretty satisfied with the results.
Here's some finished pict's for your viewing pleasure ....
More pict's .... if you look closely at the electronics, you will notice that I had to add onto my mp3 player board ... see that Compact Flash card in there ??? Screw the EPROMS when you want add a lot of music .... 128M flash works MUCH better !!
You should haul to Allentown in a few months!!! It would definitely get attention!
Well done you!
Mike
Currently owning: ============ MAME in Sega cab with 25" arcade monitor (Has a 12" Bazooka powered subwoofer in it) - Not for sale Williams Civic Center Shuffle Alley (Puck Bowler) (1973) - 350$ Seeburg LS1 "Spectra" Jukebox (1967) - 300$
Currently babysitting =============== Heavy Metal Meltdown SOLD - leaving soon
Previously owned ============= Hot Tip, Countdown, HS, WWF, TFTC, T2, RS, Pinbot, Laser War, LOTR, Flinstones, FH, DM, STTNG, Getaway, Silver Slugger, Laser Ball, Bad Cats, Batman Forever, Meteor, TZ, Galaxy, 6MDM, TSPP, MB.
It's hard to get pictures of the DMD display on this game for some reason ... likely due to something with the scan rate & glare ... but I did manage to get all the main supporters of the project in there .. including the MAACA logo as well.
That will be the last of the posts for me on this subject .... I wish to thank each and every one you on this board for all of your generous support, comments, idea's and help. In particular, Dave Astill, Meat Popsicle, Cyborg, Anthony ... and all the fine admin's and support staff of MAACA.
If your ever north of Barrie, Ont. drop me a PM, & stop by for a few games !!!
I never thought of that ..... Thanks Phil! I'll take some decent pic's & do that, when I get it moved outta this cramped workshop.
Someone sent me this link the other day .... looks like the MAACA project got some international exposure as well .... though I don't know the nationality of the blog: http://pinball.blog-fx.com/Pinball+Custom/
Be nice to get my space back, never thought I'd say it, but I'm looking forward to getting back to regular old restorations again. I have a Royal Flush EM, very clean Bobby Orr PP, and a very rare Bally BMX to get to this year.
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I have to say amazing work Congrats man. I am sure now that it is done some fame will come your way. Also thats spanish that i know could be allot of places. I would like to see your pin on Ipdb that would be cool.
Life is like Pinball!! You never know where you will bounce or where your going but sometimes you have that one amazing shot But on the other hand you have those darn gutter ball where you just get frustrated.
Hey ToMMy, What did you ever decide for the Top right corner of the Playfield, Is something missing there, or is that a couple of Flashers?? Hmmmm, Maybe I am looking at the backboard, Does it go down further than most Pins?
Simply, Beautiful! Congrats!
Dave
Here are games I would like to acquire this year, or sometime...
24 Iron Man Attack From Mars Prefer Pounded playfield! Monster Bash Prefer Pounded Playfield! Elvis Sopranos Batman Forever Spider-Man Stern Prefer Pounded Playfield!
Have these available for trade or possible sale: Corvette South Park Theatre of Magic Twilight Zone RFM/SW:EP1 Nucore Combo AFM
Hi. If by chance you have some video filming equipment/experience, is there anyway we can get a few video clips of the game in action?!
A very nice accomplishment indeed. Thanks for inspiring us.
Vids: Crystal Castles, Gauntlet/Gauntlet II, Donkey Kong Jr., Ms. Pac-Man, Vs. Super Mario Bros. (other Vids in storage - for now) Pins:White Water [WH2O]
Hey ToMMy, What did you ever decide for the Top right corner of the Playfield, Is something missing there, or is that a couple of Flashers?? Hmmmm, Maybe I am looking at the backboard, Does it go down further than most Pins? Dave
I decided to go with a brass Bell, something like one of those old school bells, the type the teacher used to use in the old days .... polish it up, remove the wooden handle, put a mylar sticker on it & mount it in there. I just have not found one yet. One of you guys suggested that, and I think it would fit nicely. There is about 5"x5"x4" of real estate to fill there. I'm all out of flasher resources though, and the solenoid drivers are already multiplexed and all used up, so it's going to be just a visual thing. The flasher you see is actually just a reflection of the top flasher beside the stage, off the black plastic below it. The backboard is around 6" high.
80's fan .... I'll see if I can do that, I think the wife's digital camera will do video. Not sure how to upload it to the board though ......
I'm posting this shot, as part of the attract-mode credits ... ( per JD3's request !! ) (It looks better than this pict in real life, since I have been unable to take a decent photo of the DMD when it's in shading mode ... only seems to capture one frame every time, instead of all four blended shades).
I also took a short video of the machine in action, it's pretty crummy (digital camera), mostly due to all the glare & stuff ... you can't even make out the upper pf very well.
It shows the beginning of ball served up the shooter lane, and making the skill-shot (sinking it into the VUK) .. which does it's reward, then fires the ball to the stage. Dropping all four the stage targets increases bonus multipliers, up to 7X, then lites extra ball (on captive) ... (none of this is shown, since it drained from the mini pf) ... Dropping the left & right main pf tagets lites the captive ball, hitting the lit captive scores the ac/dc award, which is a random award, as lit on the pf (anywhere between 25,000 - 50,000 -100,000 - Awarding Outlanes - Bonus Hold - Extra ball - Special). Ball locks on left & right are just that. Multi ball is started with one or more locks, dropping AC/DC targets once, then shooting the lit scoop. Background music varys from Start to Stage - 1 lock - 2 lock - Multi - Tri ball - Bonus scoring - Match seq, end of game, etc, etc. Kind of the rules in a nutshell. It's not too deep, that's for sure ... but then I'm no PLD or SR either
I'll upload the video to Cooke, who will post it someplace.
(It looks better than this pict in real life, since I have been unable to take a decent photo of the DMD when it's in shading mode ... only seems to capture one frame every time, instead of all four blended shades).
Turn the flash off on your camera. Try not to move and click away!! You'll get all the frames.
Mike
Currently owning: ============ MAME in Sega cab with 25" arcade monitor (Has a 12" Bazooka powered subwoofer in it) - Not for sale Williams Civic Center Shuffle Alley (Puck Bowler) (1973) - 350$ Seeburg LS1 "Spectra" Jukebox (1967) - 300$
Currently babysitting =============== Heavy Metal Meltdown SOLD - leaving soon
Previously owned ============= Hot Tip, Countdown, HS, WWF, TFTC, T2, RS, Pinbot, Laser War, LOTR, Flinstones, FH, DM, STTNG, Getaway, Silver Slugger, Laser Ball, Bad Cats, Batman Forever, Meteor, TZ, Galaxy, 6MDM, TSPP, MB.
It's not too deep, that's for sure ... but then I'm no PLD or SR either
Bullshit ToMMy! THEY have resources... you improvised, and in the end came up with a pin that I am sure every single member is dying to play!!! Don't sell yourself short... this pin accomplishment is nothing short of incredible!!!
ok just checked out the video i really got to play this game I am impressed (as many of us are). thanks Tommy for including the MAACA gang in your DMD art your biggest fans are here.
That is just simply an awesome accomplishment in my mind! Epic! Well done and nice choice in soundtrack as well! When does production Start . 10 stars and a happy face for you!
Current Pin Roster: Monster Bash, Cirqus Voltaire, Theater of Magic, Champion Pub Currently seeking:Medieval madness and Big Bang Bar
Current Vid Roster: Carnevil, Wizard of Wor, Power Drift, Mortal Kombat, MAME(Kinda)
ok just checked out the video.......thanks for including the MAACA gang in your DMD art your biggest fans are here.
Hey .. don't thank me, thank Meat Popsicle & CyBORG for that .. without their hard work on the display applications, this part of it would look pretty bad .... read back about 6-7 pages ... I was trying to get a dot-to-ROM relationship done with notepad, and a Qbasic conversion app. Dot-to-display graphics had me worried until then. They quickly added that "professional" touch I think ......... ...without MAACA .. this thing would not likely ever got completed.
Whats that Shap pain in my back Oh it's a Knife Complete MAACA-Wacko!
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OMFG That looks dam amazing and looks like some good fun. Congrats on a really nice project completed. Also pretty amazing time wize to get the product runnign pretty fast i find. At least you have something to show with all that time look at pinfactory there still just promissing
Life is like Pinball!! You never know where you will bounce or where your going but sometimes you have that one amazing shot But on the other hand you have those darn gutter ball where you just get frustrated.
ToMMy and cooke - thanks for putting together the video for us to see. I hope to see this machine sometime (maybe Allentown afterall). I am sure that there are a lot of fans on RGP newsgroup that would love to see what you have done (and for the technical guys - understand how you have programmed it). Some industry guys (like IPB or STERN employees) might give you their compliments also....
Vids: Crystal Castles, Gauntlet/Gauntlet II, Donkey Kong Jr., Ms. Pac-Man, Vs. Super Mario Bros. (other Vids in storage - for now) Pins:White Water [WH2O]
WOW!!!! That is absolutely amazing. I can only imagine the work that went into that. You should contact some of the magazines/sites and get some exposure for it. I know not everyone loves Gary, but what about doing an interview on his Radio Show? Your pin is an amazing accomplishment and could really inspire others to do similar work.
Hey OH my god.., I have never seen this link until now..this is amazing.....I would love to do this!! no skills to do it though. May I suggest selling kits??????
thx JIM
Life like a video game, a good one never dies.........
ToMMy
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While I can hardly find time to shop a pin, you are able to MAKE a pin. That is absolutely incredible. Like Steph said, when you complete it, you are going to have a following 
Who knows, some rich guy guy's family may ask you to make a custom pin for them (like Spelling's family did with Data East). 
I also wish I had even half the skill required to re-theme a pin complete with mp3 sounds etc. Somebody should invent a generic pin interface sort of like what the mame community has for encoders etc. You get 10 solenoids, light matrix etc....but I can't even begin to wrap my head around having user configurabe rules etc...
There's an MAACA banner
... nice touches on the animation... love the THANK YOU GOOD NIGHT! Man, I sincerely hope you bring it to Allentown!!! 
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