Space Station (Williams, 1987) VP8

VP8 Williams SS Recreation Space Station (PD) V1.0 Released v1.3

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Solid State Machines

PacDude

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I've uploaded V1.0 of Space Station to here:

http://pinballnirvana.com/Pacdude/files/

I've just noted that this is my 30th solo author VPM table release. :D


Note that until someone sends me footage of the Space Station rotating (Gravitar offered, but I haven't heard back from him), it currently doesn't rotate, although the diverter underneath does and is fully functional.

Enjoy.

Table Release Notes (Taken from "Table Info")
-----------------------------------------------------

-Press F6 for Options Menu during the game

-I recommend if you feel this table is worthwhile to play and that you'd probably pay money to play it if it were commercial or if you'd like to thank the author, that you consider making a donation to a reputable charity. Remember that not everyone is as well off as you are to have a computer to play games on. Some people don't even have basic needs in this world like food and shelter. Obviously, this is just a voluntary request by the table author who'd like to see some good come out of his time that he donated for free to recreate this table for the pinball community. Even if you don't like the game, consider donating anyway. You'll feel better about yourself.

Table Notes:
==========

-This table is a brand new version of Space Station, unrelated to any other versions of Space Station for VP. Note that like with all VPM tables, you should have legal copies of the rom sets to actually play the table. These do not come with the table and should NEVER be distributed with it. Use this product at your own risk. The author assumes no responsibility for this product's use or misuse thereof.

- There are two backdrops available in the game. The default is "back_glass" and is based on the backglass for the actual pin. The other is "back_room" and shows the table in a dark brick-wall type game room type environment.

- There are alternate cabinet rails and lockbars included as well. Select the side rails in the table editor in turn (e.g. select the left rail's image and change it from "Left Rail Dark" to "Left Rail Medium" for instance) and change the images for them and then the lockbar decal image to match (there are currently dark and medium rails available with matching dark and chrome lockbars). It helps to have basic editor skills to make these changes.

-Mods are allowed (as usual with my releases), but please label your tables as such, both in this table info section and the table and zip file names and leave my credits intact. I'd prefer you keep your own RevHistory file with a different name, but including the previous entries prior to your mod.

Note: This table uses VP "Reel" objects for animation and some lighting effects. They are known to sometimes not display correctly on some graphics cards and/or certain drivers. I've got such a card and have taken steps to work around this VP bug, but I can't be certain it will work for all PCs. Disabling DirectDraw acceleration in the Direct X prefs panel in Windows often solves the problem for most people, so you might want to try that if you see major glitches. Just remember to turn it back on when you are done or other programs may perform poorly. Using 16-bit color sometimes helps as well and usually results in smoother play anyway.

-The table looks best at 1600x1200 resolution, but may perform unsatisfactorily on slower PCs at that resolution. although disabling wall lighting effects (or eve sound) can help regardless of resolution.

Operator Menu
------------------------
This is a VPM based set of controls to adjust game settings as described in the manual for Space Station. For more information, please see the manual for Space Station (available at the Internet Pinball Database: http://www.ipdb.org ).

Space Station VP Table Options Menu Settings:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
This menu is accessed by pressing F6 during the game and controls actual VP table related options I've provided.

Disable Menu:
----------------------

GI Lights - This will disable the game's ability to turn the table's GI (general illumination) lights off and on during the game. Disabling the GI lights can also help prevent choppy ball behavior that can occur on slower computers when the lights are flashing.

Fading Light Effect - This turns off the fading light effect the table normally uses for most lights to simulate incandescent bulb cooling. Lights will immediately go dark instead of fading out. It will also use a bit less CPU power so the table should run a bit faster.

Yield Time - Turns off the Yield Time check in the script whereby Vpinmame 1.20 or greater gets yield time applied to it, which helps smooth the gameplay on most computers. Other (usually faster) computers will perform worse with it on and so it should be disabled if you get choppy gameplay. This requires an exit and restart for it to take effect. If you get choppy gameplay with it on and off you probably either have a slow computer or something else is wrong in your setup. The default yield value is 1 and can be found at the top of the table script. A setting of 2 sometimes works better on some computers, particularly if the computer is fast enough and there are sound hiccups.

Rev History:
==========
V 1.0 (Released 7-01-06)
- First public release
- Still needs a Station Animation (need footage)
 

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I never took notice of that table. Now it's time to try. Thank you.
 
The upper area (the entry lanes/rollovers) looks very fake.
 
SS Pac'd

Overall I have to say that the table looks and plays real good for a beta. Now that I've seen the table I know which angle to shoot the vid of the station without a doubt. Will also get you a shot of the upper playfield so you can see it in better detail and color. Yours is a little dark compared to the real deal. Of course maybe VP limits the color in some way that i dont know about and it cant be fixed.

Will shoot the vid today along with a couple pics. Let me know how/where you want them sent to when you can.

Further comments regarding gameplay and such will come at after I've played it a few more times so I dont miss anything.

GravitaR
 
RE: SS Pac

Very nice, you sure build a mean pinball, oops wrong pinball, though this is heaps better, always liked the ol' Space Station, SS pinball at it's finest and always good for extend gameplay when you were down to your last few coins.

Thanks PD, top notch.
 
RE: SS Pac

Congrats for the 30th solo table. I still remember the first......No Fear at VPFF.....quite a feat. I hope we'll see the next 30 as well. ;)

I'll definitely give this a go tomorrow and report back. Looks absolutely fantastic!!!!!

Thanks for another masterpiece.

Edit: Gave it a go....and got this issue in my very first game:

clipboard012lq7yr.jpg


The bumper just keeps shooting the ball...trying to hit it all the way up but it looks like force value "8" is too low...or the "ramp 12" is too narrow....or has too edged shape.... But then I couldn't duplicate the problem in my next 5 games....the ball got kicked properly to the station. But I guess it's still worth checking out...?
 
RE: SS Pac

I've never seen that happen, but once in awhile I think the station gets slightly (1 spot will do it) out of position and that can make the ball trajectory not quite work right (I think it rotates a bit during multiball which given VP's 'no effect' moving wall physics, it can do odd things there, although it just usually means the ball ends up going down the main ramp shot from the popper or something.

Let me know if happens again, though. I don't do much for 'one time' odd behaviors. Believe me, it has more than enough power for an aligned ramp shot there.
 
RE: SS Pac

I've had the same thing happen here also in regards to the ball not getting enough steam to make it to through the diverter to the lock. The station only moves in 3 situations that I can recall at the moment.

#1. When the ball ends up in the VUK above the Rollovers (Left One) and its aimed at the spot where it detects a ball already locked while one lock is empty.
#2 During a ball search
#3 When machine is turned on / attract mode

I think thats all of them. Will play a few games on the real deal and report if find new instances.

GravitaR
 
RE: SS Pac

Hmmm, it seems like some other game had an issue on some computers in terms of ball speed also. It's simple enough to crank the kicker up, in any case.

If you want to see what the diverter is doing in the table, just remove the station reel from teh backdroip editor and the cover wall from the table view and you can see the drop walls actually spin around. I probably should have left the toy position display on the table (off the view). It's what I monitored during test games to see if the toy was in the right position when it stopped and it always was during that phase of testing so I removed the monitor and let it be. Of course, sometimes balls can fall through drop walls under certain conditions in VP, so it's possible it's not out of position, just moving too slow near the diverter (increasing power to the kicker could help there once again).
 
RE: SS Pac

edit...
remarks didn't belong here..
 
RE: SS Pac

Congratulations for that mark pole,PD
and thanks for release.Marvellous work
again. :thumleft:
 
Re: RE: SS Pac

JonPurpleHaze said:
Looks neat but you seem too Much like the TMFP dude...

Assholes find it difficult to change...

See Ya!

I thought he was more like StevOz, but at least not nicolas.b, but they are all so close anyway.
 
RE: Re: RE: SS Pac

You should know, Jon. You are one. I thought you were my kind of asshole, though, but apparently you are Shiva's kind of asshole. You two butt buddies have fun together. ;(

As for Space Station, people can look for it at VPF in the future, once I get a slot for it. This place is now dead. Goodbye.
 
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