That is indeed what's going on... sort of. The playfield is at least 1/16" thicker than standard, due to the plastic overlay, and it has messed with the functionality of the bumper to absolutely no end. Everything I do to adjust the switch or the ring ends up fixing one problem and causing another.

The last thing I did with it while the playfield was out of the game was pull the switch entirely and re-mount it at a new spot, so I could be absolutely sure the spoon was centered on the skirt. The biggest problem up until then was when the bumper would be hit off a ball launch, most of the time it wouldn't register. Realigning the switch did improve this issue, but it still happened once in a while, so I adjusted the ring to account for the playfield thickness by adding a couple washers near the yoke. With the ring at a decent height, the ball was more able to push the skirt down as it should. However, raising the ring also made the bumper's kick on the ball weaker, to the point where if the ball is barely touching the skirt (stuck behind) sometimes even a ball search won't push it out far enough.

As far as the skirt's sensitivity, there seems to be a weird balance where if the switch blades don't have enough tension, the bumper fires on its own from vibrations alone (particularly a hard slam to the Grillby scoop). But if I bend the blades to stiffen the switch and prevent those misfires, it ends up requiring too much force to press the skirt, and then you get a bunch of stuckies behind the bumper.

The REAL fix to this issue would have been to design the Snowdin area differently so the ball is never allowed to come to rest behind the bumper. That's basically bumper area design 101 right there.

You're welcome, glad to help!
Pay extra heed to any part of this thread where I said I made a huge mistake. Don't do those things and you'll be golden.

The bumper is the standard Williams model with the Skype-logo-shaped base hole cut. I would imagine the routing solution would work (along with a fresh new unbent switch, probably), but if it's generally considered okay, I'll probably leave it - after all, it's far from the only flaw in the design.

I think if I were doing a new playfield, then rather than do a routing fix, I would produce the playfield correctly in the first place. Plastic inserts in a solid piece of wood and then a thin layer of art on top. One of the biggest hurdles to making a playfield similar to factory is my sign shop could only do a full white backing or full clear, which more or less took decals off the table as an option to print the playfield art.

I checked their site - it's not totally clear whether they can do actual custom playfields or just rethemes, but the pricing is definitely on the high side. I'm pretty sure I could do some passable-quality custom work for a lot less - after all, anything is better than the overlay method I used for this one.

...do you even proofread, bro. Game was leaning to the LEFT.

Thank you so much! Seeing this post fills me with determination.

Necro time!

Midwest Gaming Classic approaches nearer and nearer, so once again it's time to make some improvements. Now, that said, there isn't much for this year. I was busy with a lot of other things, and to be honest, for right now I think the game has reached "good enough" stage. I mean, until I build it a new backbox with new art, but that's a future project.

I did implement a few software improvements, mostly bugfixes over last year, and FINALLY the ability to hold down the start button to force-end the game. Hopefully that will address those pesky abandoned 4-player games.

One of the first things I did with the debut of the new speaker panel was, of course, fold up the game with inadequate padding and scratch the paint off of it. Great look, very professional. So this week, I removed the panel...
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...sanded it down, and hit it with a fresh flat-black spray. Gave it a day to cure and then reinstalled. Looks MUCH better, and this time all my games will get nice blankets for their trip to Milwaukee.

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You know... I think this game might have been a bit popular this year?
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Had a weird software issue on Friday, possibly early Saturday, in which the game just gave up on trying to eject balls from anywhere. It appears to be related to ball handling registers because it would last through a forfeit/"restart", but clear up if the software or game was rebooted entirely. The great thing about this problem is that it was not only random, it never showed up for any of my own testing at home or at the show.

I'm giving serious consideration to redoing the code on this game, probably building off the Volcano Blast codebase still in progress. Sprite handling, particles, screen layers, operator menu... a bunch of extra stuff that would bring this game to the next level. I am already planning on building a new backbox that isn't crooked, maybe with a better monitor, and probably new art, so new code would really complete the refresh.

In the meantime, the game needs a good cleaning, a bit of tuning up, and a retrieval of the show stats before it gets packed right back up for a pop culture convention at our local college!

Napstablook. He wanted to be part of the show but thought he'd ruin it if he tried to interact with anyone.

(Honestly though, I suppose I could've come up with a better place to store moving supplies and personal belongings than under the game.)

That may not be a bad idea if storage keeps being an issue.

Plus, then I already have some equipment if I ever branch out into another form of entertainment!
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Looks like a pretty awesome show. I'd love to go, but at this point I'm still recovering from MGC - and it would be a ten-hour drive one way.

NINETEEN BALL SEARCHES. That was the record in a single game at the show as per my saved stats. If that was any of you, I'm so sorry. This code is going to get an overhaul, and I'm giving some serious consideration to removing the pop bumper at the same time, unreliable and a horrible ball trap.

Each flipper took on about 20K more flips over the show, 333 plays total. The ramps got hammered nearly 900 times, a few people managed two skill shots, and thanks to my updated pricing card that mentions the secret soundtrack, 10 people played OMOtale.

Difficulty tweaks are probably in the future as well; nobody got more than 5 boss monsters at the show. Mode totals averaged around 80K points, aside from pretty consistently higher scoring on Toriel (as usual). I might tweak Toriel's mode as a result of this; cutting the award in half would put it more in line with the other modes.

Shot frequency is pretty much fixed from past years, with side shots being hit around 250 times and moving up towards around 600 in the center. However, one outlier was Grillby, at 1,319 hits. People are constantly shooting for that scoop. I need to make it do something of value when it isn't awarding modes.