Announcement: Visual Pinball 9.0

[Phoenixx]

Gee, youre right, the NT exe is in deed much older. (How come?)

Well then perhaps i should do what i actually wanted to do when Nanotec first contacted me; namely make a special version of the VIP for the PinballWizard. Might be the best way after all, or i do the same with the NT version of 8 as i wanted to do with 9, namely pack it in a ZIP and add a ReadMe that describes what its purpose is and what the risks of using it are.

How does that sound?

 

[SunWizard]

or i do the same with the NT version of 8 as i wanted to do with 9, namely pack it in a ZIP and add a ReadMe that describes what its purpose is and what the risks of using it are.

How does that sound?

Yes that sounds best along with directions on how to run with multiple versions of VP. Maybe even name them VPinball8-1593.exe and VPinball9-02.exe to make it clear they are special, and so users don't have to rename in order to unzip in the same folder. (and so users who don't read or follow directions don't overwrite their VPinball.exe with a version that could cause trouble.)

 

[Devvy]

I'm sure I'm going crazy, how come all the overlay graphics are outta position, doesnt matter what table or what screen resolution I use in windowed mode, they've all over the place... help?

 

[Meecro Hyperion]

Since most existing tables definitely work in 8.1, plan B gets my vote, associating .vpt files with the 8.1 exe.
9.x competley breaks my favourite original (NOVA by starman7007).

When did 'backwards compatibility' become outdated as a development concept? Thought Intel vs Motorola 16 bit war in the 1980's was proof of the pudding....

Nice to have the stuttering and ball-through-flipper problems fixed. Lot of work redoing the old tables, though....

BTW - Does anyone else have an intermittant problem in 8.1 where the flipper fails to respond when you hit the button? Happens about 1% of the time.... Is this a known problem?

 

[TheMcD]

The stuttering flipper is a known problem, dunno if we got a solution for it.

On that backwards-compatibility: What people need to understand is that VP9 comes from Nanotech, the company that develops Ultrapin and that made a VP version fitting for their purposes. That includes a larger ball, which breaks most of the old tables. Now Nanotech decides to release the version, and now we're working with it.

It'd be a major pain in the neck to rework VP9 back to be compatible with VP8 tables, and since there's nothing that stops you from keeping VP8, we didn't mess with that and worked on fixing video card incompatibility or things like that.

The McD

 

[Meecro Hyperion]

Thanks.
Yeah, backwards compatibility needs to be worked into new development/enhancement from the start.
Is the 8.1 code available for others to work on? I can imagine quite a few programmers would contribute to a sourceforge style enhancement project...

 

[destruk]

I can't think of anything nice to say save for this - Mr.PacMan and a few other people wanted the newer exe with working physics, for free, well, now they have it. Doesn't mean that anyone absolutely has to leave what they're used to. Backwards compatibility with a broken/worse physics engine that you've used forever, is not going to happen. non-negotiable, as it'd require basically removing all the physics code there is now, and replacing it with the old broken physics code, which is shooting yourself in the head. VP8.1 still works...

That's about all I'll say on the subject here.

 

[Hierophant]

Thanks guys for the information i also wrote on the mame area at Vpforums.org and Valamir said that those games are very powerful and you will need a very powerful computer, so eventually i'll just upgrade my computer.

Interesting. I hadn't noticed that there is a MAME section here at PN. Valamir is absolutely correct. Here is a quote from one of my fellow site mods, Maxrage, at www.mameaddicts.com. Max writes:

it was estimated that it would take a 10Ghz CPU to run most everything that MAME properly emulates at full, playable speed, So until that day comes, you can forget about games like Gauntlet Legends, Carnevil, and other large CHD-based games. Sorry bud

It would be really cool if some of you guys ever decided to come and post at our little site sometime. The only thing to remember is that foul, abusive language, etc. is not tolerated there for the sake of younger members. There's plenty of scope for letting off steam here though, so it's all good.

I've been trying to contribute something back to the pinball community by promoting VP over at MameAddicts. I go by the same name there as here. Hopefully a little friendly cross-pollination can occur.

 

[Meecro Hyperion]

I see.
Well, without knowing what's under the hood, the physics seem indistinguishable apart from ball size/weight.
I like the export capability of 9.
Haven't looked too deeply into table implementation (yet), but is there a way to change the ball diameter/density in the new physics engine as a quick fix to some of the existing tables?

 

[faralos]

but wouldn't that be like dropping a steam engine into a corvette? vp9 is a far better program (when it runs) than vp8. so lets keep the old with the old and the new with the new. I looked into crossing my tables over into vp9 and for me it's just not worth it. WAY too much stuff in the coding alone to switch it over, not including the table itself (wider ramps, taller plastics for that bigger ball etc.) i just have both folders on my desktop for the (occasional) download of a vp9 table

 

[Meecro Hyperion]

OK, so vp9 is to vp8 what the 68000 was to the 6800 - generational improvement Unconstrained by previous architecture. Fair enough. Always thought the 68000 was much better than the 8086, anyway.
What Motorola didn't bank on was what won the processor war for Intel. All that expensively developed software won the war. Intel-compatible processors still suffer from compromise design decisions made back in the late 70's.
Anyway, this is pinball and I can live with the old alongside the new.
Thanks for the info.

 

[faralos]

Oh gawd lets not get into the Intel computers. I own one and so wish I could upgrade my graphics, but alas I am stuck with intel integrated graphics which to put it nicely, suck! Ok, i got a real good deal on my computer ( so the salesperson insisted), but I can never upgrade the graphics nor put in a better card as my computer has no slot for such a thing. it stutters horribly trying to run the newer tables like any pin that uses fading lights or (shudder) multiball! at times the ball just starts to blink (just like the NES games of old) and disappears every other second, forcing me to think where the ball SHOULD be and (hopefully) hitting the flipper at the right time, ah well, can't beat the price though, right I got (4 yrs. ago) a pentium 3 for under 600$ with a 17" monitor (crt no less!) and a printer woop-te-do. well live and learn...

 

[Phoenixx]

Short Progress Update:

Ive been testing a couple of things and i might be able to accomplish some kind of 'DualInstall' after all. Now i have to see how reliable this works,...as soon as i have something definite enough i will let you know.

Otherwise it is going to be just a VPM update,...

 

[Meecro Hyperion]

Phoenixx, what tools are you using to generate your installer? Curious since I need to write a package installer for a bunch of tools(which have their own installers) and files for a resource package for my radio show production team. Was just going to use a com script....