I’m for anything that stimulates interest, but it’s not real pinball, it’s something different”. In the January 2011 issue (#268) of GamePro Magazine Gary Stern was quoted saying “It’s a good educational tool for learning the game, and I’m all for it. Frankly, we are all lucky that Pinball manufacturers like Gottlieb, Bally, Williams and Stern allow Virtual Pinball to exist. Tables are free to download, contributors cannot legally charge you for recreations of existing tables. All beautifully laid out by contributors like Terryred, Michael J Roberts and more recently, TheWayOfTheWrench. The depth of skill and dedication was not fully appreciated until I was able to fire up tables on my own machine, working through the series of programming steps required to get things working. Both camps are filled with extremely talented hobbyists who build masterpieces for our enjoyment. Traditionalists, focused on the accurate replication of real world pinball tables and Modernists, who are looking to push the boundaries of Virtual Pinball – creating new tables and game modes that would not be possible on traditional pinball machines. Virtual Pinball is evolving and two schools of thought appear to stand out. The hobby is well developed, and for the right combination of determination, price and patience it is possible to achieve astonishing results. Virtual Pinball is traditionally played on a machine that is similar in size and shape to a real pinball machine and the goal is to mimmick the feel of a real pinball machine. This is not to be confused with pinball games designed for virtual use (anyone remember sonic pinball for Sega?). Virtual Pinball is a digitally simulated version of real pinball. I will also pepper in some “clever” ways to cut down on costs, without sacrificing what I feel to be necessities given the recent developments of Virtual Pinball. Their is no “right way” to build a virtual pinball machine and budgets for the project are often all over the map. I hope that this information helps you make an educated decision on what to do with your own machine. Most importantly, I will attempt to outline what I consider to be fundamental needs for a modern machine, as well as my opinion on things that are optional or not necessary. The goal of this post is to summarize the years of research that I put into my machine, to provide an overview of the current options for Virtual Pinball Machines along with their pros and cons. Advice from a few years ago may actually cause more harm than good, I have come across many situations where a complicated workaround was explained in great detail but further research showed that some smart person wrote the solution into code and a much simpler solution existed. This is because the hobby has existed for over a decade and it is regularly changing. In fact, the plethora of information available can be overwhelming and sometimes confusing. There are dozens of decisions to make, and deciding which path to walk was one of the most daunting parts of the entire process. I will not attempt to explain the build process because that has been done by remarkable people that are more capable than me (google MJR, TheWayOfTheWrench) there are also extensive and extremely helpful forums that very likely have answers to questions that you may have along the way, including troubleshooting. From building the entire virutal pinball machine from scratch to purchasing fully built and assembled virtual pinball cabinets that use real pinball parts. The fantastic thing about this hobby is that you can enter at whatever stage you are comfortable. I spent years and countless hours of deliberation on this virtual pinball machine. Before I get to that, there is some lengthy and necessary topics to cover for those who decided that they want a virtual pinball machine but have yet to decide how to obtain one. While I will leave the full DIY build instructions to extremely capable people like Michael J Roberts and TheWayOfTheWrench, I am going to share my process and how I was able to build a fully capable, 4k 120hz blazing fast Virtual pinball machine with real pinball parts and Surround Sound feedback (don’t worry these terms will quickly become staples in your brain). Even do it yourself builds can cost upwards of $5,000. In reality, virtual pinball tables range from $700 to over $10,000. The virtual pinball cabinet is the only thing in the arcade that I obsessed over more than the Secret bookcase door (It’s technically a secret doorway bookcase but I really think that sounds dumb, roll with me on it). If you aren’t married then you could assume that the above means that virtual pinball machines can be expensive. I may have narrowed my target audience here a bit.
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