Visual Pinball madness

[S1500]

So, continuing on my pinball kick, I thought I would venture into trying Virtual Pinball or PinMAME.

 

Wow.

 

I have never seen a more complicated, error-prone install process to get something going. There's having to download several files to patch this & that. Why isn't there an updated installer?

Here's the instructions:

 

http://www.vpforums.org/index.php?automodule=downloads&req=idx&cmd=viewdetail&f_id=2990

 

 

Tried on my laptop last night to no avail. One of the install instructions says there should be 3 lines displaying, showing what version of something installed. No such 3 lines show up. Trying to go through the rest of the instructions, any table I try gives me a handful of errors. Changed a video setting, and it bluescreened the system.

 

This makes some of the things I have installed in linux seem real easy.

 

This is a great concept. Pinball machine emulation. But when it's spread out across 3(?) apps, and differences between versions a patch-heavy installation, AND trying to get the roms, data files(ie images), fonts & such, it stands a low chance you'll get it to work right.

[Rybags]

It's a PITA in that they used to make it a time-expired product to ensure people kept their installations up to date.

 

I've not used it in a while but I'm pretty sure the thing has stalled somewhat.

 

Future Pinball has come along and it plays tables with proper 3D rendering, so Visual Pinball is looking kinda dated now.

Problem with FP though is that I'd guess it's somewhat harder to develop tables for, so the number of simulated games is way less.

 

Supposedly the recent version/s of VP don't have the annoying time expiry on them so that takes one worry away.

 

From memory, it's a good idea to ensure you're on a later Service Pack if on Win XP. Not sure if you need to install any Visual Basic Runtime stuff.

 

Also, no idea what OS support they carry. It's heyday was in the WinXP era so there's no guarantee that it'll work properly in Vista or Win 7.

 

 

Might be an idea to hit the VP Forums, they might have info on what prerequisites you need for the thing to work for you.

[S1500]

It's a PITA in that they used to make it a time-expired product to ensure people kept their installations up to date.

 

Might be an idea to hit the VP Forums, they might have info on what prerequisites you need for the thing to work for you.

 

What time-expired product do they use?

 

I noticed I had to register for the forums to do the downloads. No biggie, but it's as if sourceforge would be a better place to download the core files. The project could really use some consolidation. Okay, a TON of consolidation.

 

I would hit the forums, but I have a gut feeling it would be just like trying to solve a problem on the dingoo forums. A lot of the info would be out of date, or referencing other threads, which reference other threads. You then would have 20 tabs open on Firefox, but not closer to getting your problem solved.

[Rex Dart]

Yeah... I really wanted to give Visual PinMAME a try, but I gave up after a couple of hours of frustration and frickin' mysteries.

[Austin]

Wow.. Thanks for posting this. I am on a pinball kick right now as well and thought about looking into PinMAME. I guess I will pass and stick with my console pinball titles instead..

[ComputerSpaceFan]

I've managed to get Visual Pinball working, but I agree it's a pain. I stuck with version 8 because although I heard they fixed some frame rate issues in version 9 there were more tables created for version 8.

And although my first installer for version 8 expired, about a year ago there was a "new" version 8 installer that no longer expired. I'm not sure how that happened but now my program works fine.

 

I am running it on a dedicated XP machine that is not online and therefore never got any updates or service packs.

 

I might be able to answer some questions you might have about getting it up and running (I hope).

 

There's also Hyperpin but I don't know much about that one.

[S1500]

So I got a reply off the forums. I felt stupid. it was the line telling me if I installed PinMAME or whatever. So I install 3.0(just hit the install button) where it said 2.3 on the instructions.

 

I now just installed 200+ fonts, over half of them come pre-installed with Windows XP. Real smart!

 

Now Visual Pinball bluescreens my laptop. Now I have to start all over again on my main desktop. Who thought this thing had insanely high system requirements?

[S1500]

Somehow I got it to work. Just somehow, I did. Started all over again on the desktop, and with some creative guessing of where files go, it works. Not bad. Wonder if I can just zip-up the whole directory & try it on another computer.

[S1500]

So I torrented a bunch of recreation pinball tables. It is REALLY hit and miss. More miss than hit.

 

First off, on several tables you have to start 'em up, and then restart them. Some pins don't work right at all without NVRAM written to. That means having to go through that stupid pinMAME yes/no disclaimer. It doesn't seem to remember that unlike MAME. Ugh.

 

Some games work okay, some are complete abominations. Taxi has barely any of the sounds, instead a ear-piercing high/low tone set that basically ruins the game. The colors are off in some aspects. Almost as much of an eye sore as those homebrew tables where people just slap a JPEG onto the playfield and that's it.

 

Some games have no sound at all! Makes a game from 1995 as quiet & boring sounding as a game from 1955.

 

Some games were never just meant to work, being an early work in progress.

 

I know there's limitations as to what Visual Pinball can do. Many of the later tables are 3D where VP is moreso 2D. Trying to recreate a later machine involves a lot of optical illusions since you are looking at a flat playfield image, but in fact there's loops & other toys that VP seems to have no way of recreating.

 

Crave Entertainment really has their work cut out for them.

[rockman_x_2002]

I managed to get it going some years ago in Win XP, and have tried under both Windows Vista and, later, Windows 7. It works, but both versions had framerate issues for me, which is quite unfortunate.

 

There's a better program that does a better job in rendering pinball games, called Future Pinball. However, Future Pinball does not have support for Visual PinMAME (or didn't the last time I tried it). If it had that, it would be an effective replacement for Visual Pinball.

 

Visual Pinball needs a major update. It needs a more simplified push-button install process, and they need to really test it out on all OSes to make sure it works across the board. That would help draw me back to the program.

[S1500]

Alright. There is a divide with these machines. A great deal of the tables I torrented are just abominations. Many don't work, whether it's no sound, ultra-weak plungers, or general bugs. The same broken tables I dl'ed from the vpmame forums are a VAST improvement. They actually work! There's 2 versions of Fun House I have. One can't even get the ball on the table, the other is almost as good as the Williams Pinball collection. I scored 20 mil on it!

[Austin]

The more you talk about this, the more I DON'T want to try this.

[S1500]

The more you talk about this, the more I DON'T want to try this.

 

The latest & greatest tables downloaded from the forums changes my opinions. The tables are refined & working, unlike the torrents. The torrented tables seemed like early betas, or tables for the sake of making tables.

 

It's worth your time. There's an initial steep curve to get it going, but no differently than the hassles you go through for the other emulators. Okay, more. But still..

[Austin]

LOL!! I hope that's emphasized lightly, because I've rarely had problems running on other emulators outside of typical ROM pack issues...

 

Anyways, I don't plan on going anywhere tomorrow on one of my days off, maybe I will give this a shot.. if anything, just for shits 'n giggles.

[Rybags]

IMO it's still a great product, free, and well worth investing the time into.

 

But yeah, it can be a right pain in the arse and give you similar nightmares to maintaining a MAME system.

 

Some of the tables are crappily done, but many are very accurate and will keep you going for hours.

 

Terminator 2, Simpsons, Pinbot, Getaway: High Speed 2 are just a few of the ones I used to play all the time.

 

Also I believe there's a front-end available that can take some of the launching annoyances out of it. No link for it - I've not really played around with VPinball for a couple of years.

[Bob Bytchin]

Once you get Visual Pinball and PinMame installed, make sure to get a frontend. I use VPLauncher myself. I personally didn't find it hard to get everything running. And of course, http://www.vpforums.org/ is the best resource to use.

[Austin]

So, S1500, is this still working well for you? I've been contemplating trying this out again. I've been playing real pinball every weekend for the last several months now and I need something a little bit closer to the real deal (The Williams Pinball HOF isn't doing it justice anymore with its floaty physics). Last time I tried installing PinMAME though, I ran into issues. I could get the sound and so forth for a few tables, but could never get a playfield to load and actually play (Last I remember, I got a visual on the Black Knight table, but it just sat there, no keystrokes worked).

[Rex Dart]

Yeah, I gave it another shot after reading this topic. I still can't get jack $#!^ to work. At least I can get a tiny little sound-less window of a table up, but without playfield pieces... that's no fun.

I know it's against The Rules to distribute an actual working copy of this mess, but... does such a compilation exist someplace?

[Wntermute]

I would say if you're on a pinball kick.. you should give Flipnic: Ultimate Pinball for PS2 a shot. The tables are technically physically impossible, but that's what makes them so awesome.. vertically, upside-down, iced over, thawed out.. with a hefty dose of "What do you mean it wasn't made on drugs?".

 

Other games to try are: Marvel Pinball & Zen Pinball / Pinball FX2

[Austin]

Yeah, I've got Flipnic as well as Pinball FX2 on the 360. They are cool, but aren't what I am looking for right now.

[+remowilliams]

I've put in the effort from time to time to get all the Visual Pinball/PinMAME stuff working/updated and though it can definitely be a hassle, it is so awesome when it's all said and done.

[Austin]

I've put in the effort from time to time to get all the Visual Pinball/PinMAME stuff working/updated and though it can definitely be a hassle, it is so awesome when it's all said and done.

 

Must you rub it in?

 

I may wipe out what I've currently got (that's not working) and start fresh with a new effort tonight.

 

It will be especially great to be able to practice some of the pins I play regularly at the nearby location, as well as try out some of the classics I do not have access to.

Edited September 30, 2011 by Austin

[S1500]

I played Visual Pinball just yesterday. Most tables run just fine on my main system.

 

With the torrent I downloaded of a buncha tables, I think some were meant for VP 8.x, where things don't work right if you run it in 9.x.

 

Occasionally I download some tables here & there(desktop only), and some games, even if I download the latest version, still won't work. Such is life.

 

If there's a Future Pinball version of a table I want, I get that instead. Regardless of the crashies, Future Pinball tables blow their VP counterparts because of the app around it.

[ComputerSpaceFan]

I'm going to load Visual Pinball on my new computer sometime soon, I think I'll document what worked and what didn't. I do have VP 8 running just fine on my MAME machine and as mentioned above when that program works, it's amazing. But then again, my MAME machine is not connected to the web and therefore the version of XP I have on that machine is fairly old and not updated. That might explain why VP 8 runs just fine.

 

For my new machine, I want to mess around with 16x9 tables with the backglass displayed on a second monitor. Having done a little bit of research, it seems that VP 9 would be the way to go for that. I really like the visuals of Hyperpin and Future Pinball but there are certain "must have" tables I want to play and at least so far, I have only found these tables in Visual Pinball so that's the route I will be going.

[Austin]

I fooled around with this last night, but, still no go.. Maybe I will try Future Pinball and see how that works..