VPX WIP Crazy Cats Demo Derby VPX WIP

Neo

Pinball Nudger
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Hey all, here's a look at my current pintable I've been working on the past few months, Crazy Cats Demo Derby.

Crazy Cats is my second table for VPX. It's intended as an 80s Williams System-9 style game with LED score displays as well as a running jackpot on the backglass. This table is dedicated to longtime friends who have effectively become family to me who are or have been part of the Crazy Cats demolition derby team out of the town of Monroe, WI. These guys have been running derbies for over 30 years spanning two generations.

The theme is running in a demolition derby, something I personally haven't seen much of in either real or virtual pinball. The idea in Crazy Cats is to acquire, build, and run a derby car to run in the next derby. Completing these heavily involves shooting the blue Garage targets on the mid-right portion of the table to open up the Garage itself. Then you put the ball into the Garage to progress. These are indicated by the Stage lights on the playfield. Progression through Heats are indicated by the Heat lights on the playfield.

Stage 1: Acquire your derby car by opening up and shooting the Garage for 50,000 points and adding 50,000 to the Heat Jackpot.
Stage 2: Build and set up your derby car by shooting the garage and starting a 2-ball multiball. Shoot lit shots for jackpots. Complete a certain number of ramp shots and spinners for additional awards.
Stage 3: Run your next derby heat by locking three balls to start a 3-ball multiball where you can score the running Heat Jackpot on the jackpot display.

Complete two Heat Multiballs and go through the Stages to set up the table for the 4-ball Feature Heat. Score 2 Heat Jackpots during the Feature Heat to light the Trophy that must be collected before losing the ball. The Trophy currently scores 1,000,000 points plus the total of all main jackpots scored during all multiballs (50,000-point jackpots or higher) in Heat 1, Heat 2, and the Feature Heat (I may change what goes into the Trophy award prior to release). The maximum award for the trophy is currently 8,000,000 points (also something I may change prior to release). There are also two other multiballs to play (a 2-ball called Salvage Multiball and a 3-ball called Boogie Multiball) that have score objectives and can help build the Heat Jackpot..

Hopefully I am able to convert this basic demo-derby idea into a fun-to-play pinball.

By design, the table has 7-digit score displays, but score rollovers are very possible in the right conditions. The table will accurately retain the player's true score internally for purposes of high scores and stats in the event the player's score exceeds 9,999,990 points.

Pretty much all the code and functions are done at this point. I still have testing and debugging/tweaking/adjusting still to do. I'm also still thinking of things to possibly add. Currently I'm looking at releasing sometime this summer.

Take Care
 

Attachments

  • Crazy Cats DT Screenshot.png
    Crazy Cats DT Screenshot.png
    4.1 MB · Views: 25
  • Crazy Cats FS Playfield.png
    Crazy Cats FS Playfield.png
    3 MB · Views: 24
  • Crazy Cats B2S Backglass.png
    Crazy Cats B2S Backglass.png
    3.2 MB · Views: 24
So great to see you around again, Neo, and working on fun stuff like this.

Hope I'm not intruding by asking how you've been, and what's been going on in your years away from the dreaded pin-sim scene. :p
 
Been doing all right, just been busy with a bunch of things I can't even remember now. Lotta PC and console gaming. I tend to go in phases when it comes to VP. Work on stuff a bit, step away as I lose motivation for whatever reason, do other things (sometimes poor decisions lol), then come back.

Only got back into VP with the advent of 10.7.0 and found Hextech no longer worked properly, so I was like "this will not do. time to update." Got the idea for this table when I was up visiting those same Wisconsin buddies of mine last summer, and now I'm thinking of doing VPX rebuilds of my Bubblegum Crisis and Zone Fury VP9 tables after I get Crazy Cats done. Bubblegum Crisis is gonna be quite a project to build in VPX. Zone Fury may be a little more straightforward conversion. Still play those in VP9 and feel they deserve a VPX rebuild with the shiny toys and physics VPX offers. I just hope I can keep up the motivation to complete these.
 
Still workin on this one. Made a few changes. The biggest so far was make the score displays 8 digits in length, also some bugfixes and tweaks to scoring. Also implemented limits on how many extra balls one can get in a game as well as how many one can get in a single ball-in-play which are adjustable in the options, as well as a limit on the number of specials one can get in a game.
 

Attachments

  • Crazy Cats DT Screenshot.png
    Crazy Cats DT Screenshot.png
    4.1 MB · Views: 11
  • Crazy Cats FS Playfield.png
    Crazy Cats FS Playfield.png
    3 MB · Views: 11
  • Crazy Cats B2S Backglass.png
    Crazy Cats B2S Backglass.png
    3.1 MB · Views: 11
This one is pretty much done. Barring any last-minute issue, I'll be releasing 1.0.0 about this time next week. Made a couple small adds to the playfield, and added an indicator to the backdrop (and B2S backglass) that activates when you're in Boogie or Salvage multiball to show what the jackpot display is actually showing when you're in either of those modes (It shows "Boogie Total" if you're in Boogie, and "Salvage Total" if you're in Salvage. The jackpot display in these modes show the total points you've scored in that mode so one can see their progress towards the goal scores. It'll show "Boogie Total" if you're in the combined mode where both are running at the same time. Also made some tweaks to overall scoring, added a "houseball" ball save where the table returns the ball to the plunger if you've scored 1000 points or less in the ball (basically no more than one bumper or one sling), even if the ball save is off.

Take Care
 

Attachments

  • Crazy Cats DT Screenshot.png
    Crazy Cats DT Screenshot.png
    4.1 MB · Views: 8
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