Pinball is booming in America, thanks to nostalgia and canny marketing

This page summarizes the projects mentioned and recommended in the original post on news.ycombinator.com

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  • APC

    Arduino Pinball Controller

  • When you do find one to restore, look up these resources to swap the old processor for an Arduino, download the framework with all the rules for missions and points and so on, and still emulate the old hardware interface:

    https://missionpinball.org/

    https://github.com/AmokSolderer/APC

    There are a number of machines up for sale, priced at around $4,000:

    https://pinside.com/pinball/machine/star-wars

    https://pinside.com/pinball/machine/star-wars-trilogy

    Might want to start with a cheap, older Bally or Williams machine instead of the late-model licensed Star Wars machines, but they can be found for a lot less if not (yet) in working order!

  • VisualPinball.Engine

    :video_game: Visual Pinball Engine for Unity

  • Pinball on computers is thriving too.

    Visual Pinball X ("VPX", see https://www.vpforums.org/index.php?app=downloads&showcat=51) runs community authored recreated tables with ROMs dumped from the hardware. The physics engine has good performance and authenticity.

    Another project, Visual Pinball Engine, ported the C++-based physics engine to Unity (https://github.com/freezy/VisualPinball.Engine) through its DOTS & "HPC#" (C# with manual memory management extensions) approach. Unity adoption means you can play high fidelity tables right in your browser (https://appmana.com/watch/pinball).

    Then there's commercial platforms like Pinball FX and people building VPX rendering in VR.

    It's maybe the biggest simulation scene I know of. The community fills many niches. Rigs of Rods & Beam.ng for the idea, "Microsoft Flight Simulator, but for cars." XMage & Spellsource for "Magic the Gathering or Hearthstone but you write your own cards." Unreal Engine for Fortnite is a big entry for the open world community authored content dominated by Minecraft, with submarine stuff like Facepunch's S&box (think Garry's Mod 2.0) coming up.

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  • pbm

    Pinball Map

NOTE: The number of mentions on this list indicates mentions on common posts plus user suggested alternatives. Hence, a higher number means a more popular project.

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