Hextech (Original) VPX with B2S

VPX EM Original Table Hextech (Original) VPX with B2S 1.2.0

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Electro-Mechanical Machines

Neo

Pinball Nudger
Joined
Dec 30, 2004
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Favorite Pinball Machine
Medieval Madness
Hey all,

Not sure who all is left around here...it's been a while (about 4 years since I released my last table). ANyway, after about 4 years, I just recently came across this new VPX, which is quite different from previous versions of <acronym title="Visual Pinball" class="bbc ipSeoAcronym">VP</acronym> I'd worked with in the past. So in an effort to get familiar with the new VPX, I have started working on this little table. The script and the playfield art is pretty much done at this point save for debugging and some tweaking.

This table is inspired by the PC game League of Legends (not sure if anyone here plays). For those who haven't, one of the city-states in the League world is called Piltover, a city that is one of the most technologically advanced (with some magic mixed in for good measure) of all the city-states in that game. The champions in the game from there and images I've seen of the place strike me as having a steampunk feel to it. I tried to picture someone in Piltover building a pinball machine. What would it look like? This is intended as my interpretation of what such a machine could look like.
This is intended as an EM-style game (first EM game I've attempted) with some more recent features. Currently the features I have planned are: A captive-ball target, two multiballs (2-ball and 3-ball), a dual bonus-count system, multiple drop and stationary targets, a couple of rollovers, three kickers outside of the drain and ball release, and a single gold ball (targets hit by the gold ball score double) mixed in with the standard silver balls.

Being as VPX is new to me, I'm keeping the layout pretty simple, so there are likely a lot of similarities with the default table you get just by selecting "New." Hopefully I can still come up with a table that's fun to play.

Anyway, let me know what you think, any suggestions for improving the playfield, things I could add, things to maybe take out, etc. All I ask is just to keep it constructive.

Take Care
 

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Neo! Ye gads but you made some fine tables! Bubblegum Crisis is one of the best originals ever! And you've got VP9 tables? Are these uploaded over at The Evil Empire? Serves me right for not visiting more often!
I like the dual-scoring system. Kinda like that old Bally race car machine... Nitro Funny Crash? Something like that. And ooh! ahh! A Xenon Scoring Hole! The scoring font looks a little crazy, but that table looks good enough to eat! I do think it could use a 5X multiplier. That's what civilized people do... they eat with knives and forks and they always include a 5X multiplier on their pinball machines.
 
hi, neo. i remember you from the original VPF.

so what is VPX about, anyway?

are there a lot of VP versions these days?
 
hi, neo. i remember you from the original VPF.

so what is VPX about, anyway?

are there a lot of VP versions these days?

VPX, is the latest VP or VP10 and is a new development stream, VP9 and earlier tables are not playable with this new version.

It also introduces more 3D rendering/modelling options and scripting/rendering changes to many basic VP elements along with the default rendering there of whilst including more improved physics/options.

Hardware requirements are higher, so is the the need to understand and use other extenal programs such as inkscape 3D programs to import/export and adjust 3d objects.

The end results can be and are a cut above anything pre VPX, though not always, the potential is definitely there.

As for hardware I can run VPX on my 2 year old rig, with a 3.4GHz intel i3 and a GTX660 2MB, W10 all up to date, can I build or update any tables I have released in the past, well most likely I could perhaps, though I doubt I'll be doing that anytime soon if at all.

A screenshot of one of the best examples of a current VPX table for your appraisal..
 

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My 2008-or-so single-core 2.67GHz Celeron machine with 2gigs of plain DDR and ATI Radeon HD4670 AGP8X, which struggled with multiball in VP8 and was hopeless with VP9---until being rejuvenated by DX9/VP990 and now does great with VP9---will soon be tested on VPX.....but should I wait until the laughter stops?

That Dirty Harry example really looks crisp, and who knows whether my CRT is correctly reproducing what's there?
 
My 2008-or-so single-core 2.67GHz Celeron machine with 2gigs of plain DDR and ATI Radeon HD4670 AGP8X, which struggled with multiball in VP8 and was hopeless with VP9---until being rejuvenated by DX9/VP990 and now does great with VP9---will soon be tested on VPX.....but should I wait until the laughter stops?

That Dirty Harry example really looks crisp, and who knows whether my CRT is correctly reproducing what's there?

Well I dunno Greeg what resolution you are running there, though the screenshot I posted was reduced to 1600x900 and 85% .jpg compressed with a sharpening filter applied.

Here is how it actually might look, still compressed to .jpg at 85%...no sharpening filter applied...so yes it actually looks slightly worse in both cases, then in actual VP game mode here.
 

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that sounds pretty unfortunate, the way these new builds break content on the previous generation.

so do i have this right-- VP7 tables are not generally compatible with VP8 / VP9 tables, which are not compatible with VPX tables?

FFS, it was not the graphics that needed an overhaul, but the physics.
 
Thanks for the second view, Steve; my 4:3 CRT sports 1024 x 768. I superimposed both Dirty Harrys (Harries? XD) and toggled repeatedly, but couldn't discern any difference that wasn't various playfield lamps being on or off. Looks fine, though!

Ike; VP7 and earlier (maybe back to dogfood or whatever it was called---Steve should know much better than I) can play in VP8, which stopped being refined in its present state, while VP9 was similar, but with differences. some VP8 tables work in early VP9 sub-versions, but by VP911 or 912, new features began being added that enlarged the gap in compatibility and when scilexer.dll showed up in VP915(?), the jig was up. A brief spurt to 916, then 920 and finally 921 ended porting to DX7, as an alchemist named Mukuste decided that DX9 needed a new home.....and in less than a year, VP990 / 991 became the latest version. For a while; VP-ten is its own animal, and will take over soon enough.

And that's...the way...it was...unless I'm wrong. Thanks for reading.
 
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Steve explained VPX far better than I probably ever could since I've been out of the loop for the past 4 years or so...still trying to figure things out which is why I'm keeping this one simple. I know pretty much nothing about 3D modeling, so that'll be something I'll eventually have to learn (maybe not for this table per se, but future ones).

I'd thought about going to 5x on the multiplier, but I decided to keep the max at 3x mostly due to the slower bonus count I'm using. IMO it would take too long to count out the bonus at 5x (after much playtesting I've found that getting 3x is not particularly easy on this table :) ). As I recall, a lot of 70s EMs only have 2x, some with 3x.

I was going for a steampunk-type look, so I got the numbers for the score reels off an image I found of an old Seth Thomas mantle clock, which I felt matched what I was going for pretty nicely.

Take Care
 
Good to see you Neo. Yu-Gi-Oh! was brilliant. Any plans to update the older gems?
 
Damn, gregg... you know your VP! Now I need you and Steve to quit screwin' around and talk about the Important Matters... nudging: better, worse, same-old?
Neo, I leave matters of score multipliers in your very capable hands. Hey, I have faith that you could design a table with nothing but two flippers and one bumper and still make it original and fun. Brown-nosing completed. Pistoles!
:pistoles:
 
[SIZE=+2][size=+1]Yeah LVC, the nudging is much improved the visual shake is also back for desktop users and is adjustable. Also the ball / table physics are improved with the ball having real spin physics, adjustable table friction, object collision friction, table slope, table gravity, improved flipper action with 10x the number of steps involved in the flippers animation and hit checking....so does that answer your question?

All that said it takes a talented author to get all those parameters adjusted and working together to produce a truly excellent simulation, though it can certainly be done, producing results vastly superior to anything earlier versions of VP were capable of.[/size][/SIZE]
 
Man, you had me at "visual shake"! Yeesh, now I have to try to remember how to install it.
 
Man, you had me at "visual shake"! Yeesh, now I have to try to remember how to install it.

Adjust the visible nudge as you please....Preferences > Video Options

As for an install...

http://www.vpforums.org/index.php?app=downloads&showfile=11573

I should be uploading this open source software here really sometime or better yet I'd like to see Ike download it then upload it here, then I or some admin here will approve it. ;)


xpxn.jpg
 
Good to see you Neo. Yu-Gi-Oh! was brilliant. Any plans to update the older gems?

I may...in the end it'll ultimately depend on what I feel like doing and what I'll have time for. I'm kind of torn between updating the older stuff and moving on with new stuff (I have 1-2 ideas for new tables for VPX I'm toying with).

If I were to update my older tables to VPX, chances are I would probably do them in this order: BGC 2035, Initial D, and then either Zone Fury or Yu-Gi-Oh. I would probably be looking at full rebuilds for any of my older tables to convert them to VPX so they will not be small projects.

Take Care
 
Hey Steve, is the Blender program workable for VP and 3d modeling? I like how Blender can import 2d graphics for conversion to a 3d model, though I think the image has to be converted to the .svg format first. Not sure about that though.
 
This is nearing completion. Playfield and plastics are pretty much done. Script is pretty much done. I made the metal bits in the table brass after a suggestion from one of the vpf guys...they came out pretty well and the brass is more in line with the steampunk theme I'm going for. I also tried to tone down the lights (both playfield and GI) on the table.

How's it look?

Take Care.
 

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Not sure if we lost this one in the forum transition, but it's been uploaded, or reupload, here:
Hextech VPX 1.0 with B2S

Also PM'd Neo to double-check all this.
 
Neo updated Hextech (Original) VPX with B2S with a new update entry:

Hextech 1.2

Hextech 1.2.0

Updates:
  • New playfield lights modified with neutral-colored lenses and colored bulbs (modification made by EpeC). Many thanks.
  • Added some dynamic lighting for the HEX drop targets and slings (also courtesy of EpeC)
  • Increased back nudge strength to 6 from 2, increased side nudge strength to 5 from 2
  • Partially applied JP's physics settings for VP 10.7 (materials, some settings
  • Adjusted a...

Read the rest of this update entry...
 
I think the zip file for the 1.2 update is corrupt. It throws header errors when unzipping the file
 
I can confirm also that the zip file is corrupt.
 
weird, I just tried the d/l from PN and it worked for me. let me try rebuilding it and re-uploading
 
weird, I just tried the d/l from PN and it worked for me. let me try rebuilding it and re-uploading

It does download.
But when extracting it, it shows errors.
And it does extract.
But the table file has 0 bytes file size once extracted.

I checked VPForums, and downloaded from there, and same error.
 
okay, not sure what happened...the extract also worked.

I rebuilt and reposted the zip file. actually reduced the file size by close to 20 MB for some reason. try it now
 
okay, not sure what happened...the extract also worked.

I rebuilt and reposted the zip file. actually reduced the file size by close to 20 MB for some reason. try it now
Working now.
All good!
Thanks for sharing this great table!!
It is appreciated!
 
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