At MGC I was talking to some folks about my custom games and was asked if there was a thread on pinside, so figure I should at least start one for the machine I am working on now. A lot of the content of the first few posts I will make are edited version of what was on the pinballcontrollers.com forum, so at first it will look like I am making rapid progress on this game, when in reality, not so much.

Lets start with some background. After moving my first custom game “the Kugler family” to a larger full color display (it started with regular DMD, then color the same resolution and then to large screen full 24 bit color), I decided to start a new project.  My brother kept pushing on doing a gambling theme. While at first I was lukewarm to the idea, after I came up with some cool ideas for toys, I became more interested and decided to give it a try.

The game was at expo in 2014, but believe it or not, not a single game was played on it before bringing it to expo. I had not put the playfield into the cabinet until about 3AM Thursday morning of expo. So late in the day on Thursday after I fixed some issues with it, it was played for the first time.  I was actually quite pleased with how it played as far as the number of shots, the feel of the shots, etc. but I was not happy with how the rules for the different casino games came together. After expo I was pretty burned out and did nothing on either game for months. Then I got back to work on adding artwork and some playfield changes (needed to do a new version of the playfield to get the inserts where I waned them to go with the art) for the Kugler’s and Casino sat idle and I did not even bring it to expo this past fall, since I had done nothing on it. But, a week or two ago, when I drove past the Westin, it struck me that expo is just six months away, and if Casino was going to make an appearance, it was time to get back to work on it.

The game is running with a resolution of 450x900  (my other machine is running 96x192), which is then doubled when pushed to the LCD.  So the LCD is running at HD resolution. The actual screen size that is visible is 13”x6.5” so it still fits into a standard height speaker panel and between standard size speakers.   The game does not use a dot look, since the dots become just way too small and really just seems to darken the screen.  The game is currently running on a low end pentium processor, which appears to have no issue providing the necessary loop rate, even with the high resolution.

The color support comes from using the pyprocgameHD version that MOcean and I have been working on for a while.  Our work on that evolved from the standard 16 shade dmd to an 8 bit, 256 indexed color approach and then to full 24bit color.  To be honest Michael did more of the heavy lifting than I did.

The game features the five most popular games you will find in a casino (slots, craps, poker, blackjack and roulette) and then also has a set of 8 modes to capture other things that often occur in a trip to Las Vegas (bachelor party, all you can eat buffet, drunk and can’t find my room, etc). The original rules had all five of the casino games active at the same time, well, sort of, but I now have some playfield changes and rule changes to reduce that so it is not so confusing to the player as to what is going on. So while you still may be building towards multiple games at a time, the play of those gambling games is more clear. I’ll do posts on each of the casino games to explain how they are being implemented.

I should comment, that I did a lot of work on this machine before I was aware of High Roller Casino despite knowing over a dozen guys with anywhere from 10 to 50+ machines, I had never seen or played one. From the couple of times played it at expo, there is not a lot of similarity, although both have a Roulette wheel, but as I told Keith Johnson, I think mine better (I’ll explain who it works in a later post).

Here are a couple of photos of the playfield and cabinet. The first is after I finished routing (by hand) and then the inserts and the cabinet with playfield at expo.
This is the playfield after being routed by hand using a 30 year old hand router, using templates for the square and triangle inserts and Forstner bits for the round ones.

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Here it is with the inserts added.

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and here is the machine at expo, funny thing is you can see the Kuglers machine, which was much, much further along in the background, without cabinet art (which it did have this past year at expo, this is from 2014), yet Casino has art . . . .

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I'll do some other posts shortly that will cover the features, rules and toys of a couple of the casino games.

Happy to answer any questions.

recently heard about that, but have not seen it yet, wondering if they are using rfid or some other approach vs machine vision. In my game not too concerned if occasionally it gets the split of the dice wrong, which can occur if they are very close tougher that would be a much bigger issue in vegas. They also could be doing pattern matching for dice identification vs clustering analysis. I looked at pattern matching, but would require a lot more work to implement and the results I am getting are certainly good enough.

detecting the dots themselves is not too hard it is the clustering that is the most challenging. After I capture the image, I convert to grey scale, and to black and white using a threshold that will clearly separate the white pips/contours and then using clustering on those contours to get to what is on each die, two things cause challenges, the pips on a six are so close together that the code that identifies the pips can lump them together and think they are a single pip, so I use some 'dilation' after thresholding to shrink the dots slightly to be sure there is spacing and I need to adjust that slightly to improve the six handling. The clustering can then occasionally cluster wrong and assign a pip to the wrong die. Recently changed the algorithm I was using for the clustering and it seems to be have a very high accuracy rate, as I indicated above.

no doubt opaque would be more legible, as far as not seeing pips from the other sides, and typically the pips are not as big as on vegas dice, but I wanted real vegas craps dice and once I got the lighting consistent, I've been able to get the needed accuracy. Did take time to tweak all of the parameters at each step of the process.

Here are some images of the results of each step in the process . . .

Original image taken by camera . .

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converted to greyscale

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Thresholded and inverted

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dilated to shrink dots and remove noise . . .

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Original image with clustering results mapped on top of image for debugging.

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I am working on a mini-playfield with five drop targets, with an LCD display mounted above it to show a card for each drop. I had looked at one small LCD per card/target, but the cost and complexity of that was greater and with the one display it will be easier to provide instructions, etc. It will be used for draw poker and black jack, and who knows what else. It will require me to do new ramps so it can fit where I want it, but I've got Matt lined up to help with that. I need MOcean to get me the code snippets he did for curbfeeler on pinbot2.0 for the support of a second display on the pyprocgameHD framework so I can start to play around with it, while I also build/modify the mech for the drop targets, which I want to have full up/down control but with a single solenoid to minimize the footprint.

Made some progress over the weekend on the roulette wheel. I have changed the way the optos are set up. Originally I had a horizontal set for the upper ring/magnet, and then a verical set to detect where the ball was and then a U shape opto under the 'spoked wheel' to detect the home position. The U shape opto had not been implemented due to challenges with getting that postioned, wired, etc. So decided to also make that a vertical pair. When I was looking at that change it struck me that I could also make the magnets optos vertical, which would allow me to make the bracket that holds them much smaller and less obtrusive.

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Now that I had the 'home position' opto implemented, I was able to finish up the number detection piece. The opto is looking down through the number cover, where there is just one opening which allows it to detect the home position. Once it finds that, it advances the wheel one section at time (36 or 37 pulses to the stepper) to determine where the ball is, it is timed such that it transparent that it is doing this a slot at a time since the wheel does not stop at each section. The timing is key so that a 'spoke' does not make it seem like a ball is in that slot.

Here is a video with the changes, and a test of the number detection. I've tested it about a half dozen times so far, and it has gotten the correct number each time. I've added chunks of code to handle various failure scenarios (ball falls into lower portion early, ball does not exit correctly, home position not found, ball slot not found, etc.). I'm sure there are a few others that will come to light when I do testing during normal game play.

No, I prefer to 'fit on site' for that, based on which type of post I end up using.

Heck, now it even has a finial.

I'm using pdb-led controller boards from Gerry (multimorphic) and then led boards that I designed that have a lot of flexibility to how you use them, which can also speed up wiring. I'll post more info on them when I start to install them.

I am not a huge fan of the serial type for inserts.

about 10 minutes into a 5 hour routing?

Yes I did it, with my limited self taught CAD skills. It is an updated version of the original cad done for the first white wood, which I used for the manual routing (printed to scale and spray adhesive to the wood). Big issue we ran into is the blocks for the inserts that someone else made and shared, were not the correct sizes and way off for the shape of the arrows (maybe Scott will post a photo of the wood from those test runs). Hopefully we now have them all correct (and properly updated in the CAD).

For the manual routing I had created templates for the routing that were basically perfect, I had found a great method for creating templates for different inserts by using the actual insert and popsicle sticks to get the spacing right for the bushing on the router, and then a flush bit to cut the template -- it worked great. In two cases I used some tape to tweak the sizing. So the reality is, it sets a pretty high bar relative to quality and fit for the CNC routed one.

I don't think you saw the manual one, it really was surprising good as far as fit and finish, the biggest drawback to the manual is there is less accuracy around positioning and alignment than with the CNC, since I have to position the template over the insert and hard to get that perfect. Other routes and cuts that were not the inserts, should be much better with the CNC, since I typically did not create templates when routing those and for various cuts, not like I am that perfect in cutting with a jigsaw. Also, a lot less stress relative to the routing, when doing it manually you know that any mistake of significance, could wipe our hours of hard work.

I see you grouped the craps targets to all be on the second half to be sure the spacing between them stays precise, glad you remembered that. So, looks like it is about half way there.

Just got back from vacation today, things will be picking up pace quite quickly. Picking up the routed playfield later today, first run had an issue, but sounds like the latest one is good to go.

you will find some info here . . .
http://www.pinballcontrollers.com/forum/index.php?topic=843.msg7492#msg7492

For creating the templates, I take the insert and then use 'popsicle' sticks as a spacer between that and strips of wood to create the outline. This gives just the right spacing that matches up with the size of the router bit and the collar.

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Then I take the 1/4" hardboard and use a flush bit to create the template. I first drill a hole in the template material, then center that over the insert shape I created the wood strips to create the shape. I clamp the template to the scrap wood with the wood strip shape.

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I believe, that for most of the templates I use a 1/4 inch bit with a 7/16 collar. I use 3/16 for slots for switches. Somewhere I have some notes on the different combinations.

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If you read the above thread, you will see that I drill out the inside of the insert before routing so there is less material to route out, but then use the route of the outside of the insert to act as the template for then removing the rest of the 'hole' and leaving the necessary lip. It may be the same 7/16 + 1/4 combo, but not sure, I'll see if I can find my notes, It may be a smaller difference between collar and bit.

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I've used tape on one or two to refine the template to give a nice tight fit.

Hope this helps, let me know what questions you have.

Picked up the playfield last night, here is a photo of before I started to removing the waste material (well a few of the inserts have been removed). I finished that up last night, so will now start to get the inserts in. I am missing the small white opaque arrow insert, and pinballlife is out of them, so I'll either be switching that to a larger arrow or making the insert myself. Also have to make the insert for the 'vegas sign'.

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1/8 may not work, since the 'collars' for the router can be 'taller' than that, you need to be sure the collar is no 'taller' than the template, if it is the router won't sit flat on the template. I don't recall the depth of the collars I ended up using, I think there were three different tempts and some are really tall, but I did not need those. Pretty cure I found 1/8 hardboard was not thick enough, but been awhile so not sure.

the pieces of wood I was using, where taller than the popsicle sticks, I then had other pieces of the same wood further out to act as spacers when clamping the pieces tougher (later that was not needed as I had the 'strips' from earlier inserts already stapled to the base board that provided that 'balance'.

As you can see in the photo, I stapled the strips into the baseboard, it is important that those are 'sunk' below the surface so that the template can sit flat when creating it.

be nice if I had easy access to laser cutting. The one small insert was easy enough with a belt sander (I did it with white translucent acrylic which matches well with the white opaque inserts). Tonight I'll do the big one, and as long as I am patient it should come out fine. In the meantime, just picked up the epoxy, so time to start glueing inserts.

Needed inserts created, all glued, playfield sanded smooth and three coats of lacquer.

Needs a day or so to dry and then I can start assembly . . .

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Not much, the lower area where the multipliers are, will be stacks of ships, the area where the stand-up targets are for craps betting, will shocking be, a craps table. The 'totem pole' of limps will track progress towards victories for each casino game. I'll start to give more thought to the art after this whitewood is built and I decide if I am happy with the game play.

The lamp boards I am using on the first PCBs I've designed. The idea was to create a board that could have multiple LEDs on it to minimize wiring and to be able to handle a range of spacing. Most games will have sets of inserts in a row, two, three, four or more, so the goal was to make to these could be done with a single board. The PDB-LED boars that Gerry sales, are design for 84 LEDS or 28 RGB LEDs, and then those are set up as 4 per 20 pin header. so I designed my boards to match that, so that is just a simple ribbon cable connection between his board and my lamp boards.

Since four in a row is not all that common, I designed the board, so that you could 'snap' off either end and use it as a 'satellite' board. So the main board has a place for a header as does the two snap offs. This then allows two of RGB LED to be located nearby with just a short 4 wire jumper. if you look at the images in my last post, you will see various examples of this. In fact, there is only one case where I am using all four 'slots' as a single board, and that is in the long row of stand-up targets. You will see in the middle of the playfield, where there are five boards using three and a few of them then have the satellite boards. I also have six or seven spots where there are two square inserts and an arrow, so in those cases as well there is typically a nearby satellite board. There are also places were there are two satellite boards.

In addition, I designed the board that each of the four locations, actually has 5 different locations you can put the LED. This allowed me to handle wide range of spacing between LEDs. I believe I am using 7 different 'spacing' arrangements.

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The boards are designed of the piranha style RGB LED. I also have some standard format RGB LEDs that I expect to use, but have not tested that out yet.

There are a few tweaks/fixes I would make to the boards in the future, but fortunately there were no show stoppers and the first batch I had made got the job done.

I described the boards I am using above, the piranha style LEDs I got from adafruit.com, since I was purchasing a mini display from them, it was convenient to get them from them. There are other sources and I'm not sure how much difference there is between them. I should have gotten the diffused ones https://www.adafruit.com/products/1451 since I'm now basically sanding them to make them diffused. These are just plain RGB LEDs, not the type with the chips that you use serially.

Not sure I understand the questions, are you meaning before playfield art or DMD graphics or ???

yes, the whitewood design was completed before assembly, with the exception of some post locations and some mounting points for some mechs, where I wanted to be able to confirm placement. In addition, ball guides, which I just finished installed (photo soon), did not have their post holes drilled when the playfield was routed. That was also done after since it I prefer to be able to have the ball guide positioned appropriately before finalizing mount points.

Mantis is now selling ball guide material, either 3' strips or a set of various sizes or he will cut to spec. http://www.mantisamusements.com/bgkits.htm

As far as how to attach, I use a combination of the spade bolts as well as L brackets, that Mantis provided with the ball guide material. Right now I am using pop-rivets to attach the brackets and spade bolts, but will eventually change those out to the nice looking rivets (need a rivet press).

been too long since last update, but progress has been made. The new mini-playfield for draw poker, that features a small LCD above drop targets has been completed, but will need some fixes. In addition almost all of the ball guides, posts have been installed. Areas not done for that are where I still have mechs to install first. Now that the mini-playfield is securely attached, t he Roulette wheel will be installed next.

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Below is a photo of the ramps and rails being built -- not by me, not my skill set . Once those are done, I can then mount the dice popper, want to confirm that everything lines up as expected before mounting that. That will need a different mount than in the first white wood, since it has been refined to have a smaller footprint.

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not as tight as you would think by looking at it, it is just as wide, if not wider, than the scoop shot. It certainly requires some skill to get the right angle on it, not a shot you can make from the lower portion of the flipper. Hitting the red target is bad, since you lose a kickback (green adds one), and no doubt some of the shots that will make it past the opening, if not at the right angle, will end up getting stuck in the pops -- which is a good thing, to many games the pops are meaningless as far as affecting game play.

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contemplated a normal size, but I think you need the mini to have the right level of difficulty. Hopefully it turns out to have just the right amount.

Posts 7 and 15 (I think), in this thread have some info on the 'dice popper', which is sort of like what the game 'trouble' had. But the idea of a flipper to roll the dice is cool. Would need to give it a pretty good jolt to get it to really 'roll' vs just 'slide' and would certainly need more real estate. You would then need a way to bring the dice back to the flipper for the next roll.

The upper playfield is for playing 'draw poker', (similar to video poker) and blackjack. For poker the display of the drop targets will show the cards, you then hit the drop target for the cards you want to replace. You can then either hit it back out past the targets, to draw cards or you can get bounce it back into the scoop, which will draw cards AND start another hand. If the ball drains past the flipper, the hand ends without drawing cards. At one point I considered still drawing cards at that point, but I got feedback that you should really only win a hand with skill, you should not be awarded by letting the ball drain. Although I may do draw and reward on a drain if you are playing on 'easy' difficulty.

Progress continues. The roulette wheel has been installed and appears to be working as desired.

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Also have started to install the ramp and returns, which are in three sections, this photo shows me doing the first fit of the main ramp, it is not attached and I've not put the entrance flap on yet. Have to decide best way to handle switches to detect entry and successfully getting it up the ramp. Now that I have the ramp, I can finish up the ball guides around/below it, as well as install a spinner. Once the ramps are fully installed, I can then do the dice popper.

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37 Days to expo.

I'd listen if any of them called

Test fitting of ramps and returns (not fully screwed in). Pretty pleased with how they are fitting. Need to now remove them so I can finish up what is under them (there are two more mechs that go under the playfield near the pops and lots of missing posts and rubbers as well as the dice popper). Then I need to make real brackets for the attachment of the rails to the plastic junction as well as add switches.

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Me too!

Latest and greatest . . .

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31 days to Expo.

Now that the ramp diverter, disappearing post and dice popper have been installed, all of solenoids are now wired and working.

Have tested that the dice popper pops (a little too strong) , but have not tested the camera since the popper was installed. This new version of the popper has a base that is more compact and gives it a cleaner and more open look then the original, which you can see in this old test clip. In addition the floor of the popper is designed a little differently, that gives better action and also eliminates the chance of the plastic cylinder contacting the floor. Still need to add a bracket to hold the cylinder/camera assembly in place.

Old version of popper . . .

Lots and lots of little bits of construction left, but I think all of the major stuff is done. A few areas of concern, but not too many and none that seem unworkable.

A few missing switches, but will probably not worry about those until after Expo, since I can use other switches to compensate. Need to get focused on most critical needs as well as the software. Massive amount of work still to have it playable with software that is at least as complete as when Stern ships a new game

I Have a little concern with that, but when the playfield is in the cabinet and at the right pitch (right now sitting higher and slightly flatter than it would be), I think it will be fine, and it should not be blocking very much other than possibly the exit from the vuk -- well, that is my hope. The flipper on the mini-playfield is clearly visible. Down below it is blocking the view of exit from the mini playfield and the view of part of the pop bumpers, but certainly not a critical thing and pretty common in many games to not see all of the pop activity, regardless, in neither case would that impact the ability of the player to make shots.

The issue with moving it to where you suggest, which I did consider, is that the closer it moves down towards the flippers, the big the issue with clearance with the glass. I'm already concerned with the current location as far as clearance and may have to cut down the cylinder, but that opens up a huge can of worms I really, really hope to avoid. If it was above that upper right flipper, it would interfere with the view of the ball feeding to that flipper. There is also a plan for a non interactive toy to go over the magnet area.

The green felt is kind of key for the overall look as you commented, with the real red vegas dice (the outer portion will be felted as well), A big challenge with moving it below would be the clearance underneath for the ball to bang around the pops, the whole mech would have to move up to have room for the camera, which then defeats the purpose of putting it below, although I guess it could below the playfield and have a clear window through the playfield to a clear bottom of the opper. Plus it would be very, very difficult to find a camera that would have a wide enough field of view and be able to focus at that close a distance (the one I am using was custom made to handle it).

The other issue is there is a mech that does the popping, that 'hits' the floor right in the middle to make it pop which would block the camera view, so a new method would be needed. The mech is basically a lever that is triggered via a control rod near the stand-up targets that gets pulled from by a solenoid, this offset leaves the space under the popper clear.

I've looked at lot of different options and suggestions and so far the current method has been the best option. Time will tell if the view obstruction is a real issue/concern or not. Hopefully not

I did experiment with using a mirror at one point, but that was to deal with focal length

Thanks. Having done two machines, with this being far more sophisticated, I look at what Jpop did, and there are just some really obvious mistakes he made, that really get back to him having zero business sense. One of the most critical things, given the incredible complexity around making a machine, is to use as much stock stuff as you can and avoid the 'not invented here syndrome'. You have to be so careful about wasting time and resources on the wrong things -- like custom cabinet designs that then need custom glass, creating your own control system (or really copying someone else's) vs just buying theirs. Dozens of re-do of art, when you don't have a working whitewood (which could likely then result in changes that affect artwork). Focusing more on the look, then the playability. Now the reality is, if you plan to do a 1,000 machines, well, then you can afford more custom things, but if you are going to 24, you just can't. You have to wonder how much time and money was wasted designing and creating things that could be bought instead. Probably a full years worth of the salary he was drawing.

Even understanding the time value of money, and my desire to use stock when I can, there are times I will fabricate my own mech, etc., which could possibly end up costing more in time, than buying, but sometimes I just can't bring myself to pay the price for some piece of metal or sometimes I have not patience to wait for a part. Bottom line is you have to make comprises, and you have to accept that, so you then need to make good choices around those.

Curious as to the reasons why you think it is not 'practical'.

Wasn't as much an excuse to do machine vision stuff, but that certainly was a fun intellectual challenge and pretty satisfying once I got it to work. It really came about from thinking about what kind of cool toys could I have (which is also what led to going forward with the theme). Using real dice had a natural appeal, and when I though about the old 'dice popper' from the kids game Trouble, then it sort of came together. Once I decided on real dice, (and I wanted real vegas dice), it led to variety of ideas on how to read them (including some that have subsequently be suggested here), but the machine vision seemed to be the most practical (although extra challenging with transparent dice). I certainly felt it would have a pretty high cool factor having the real dice and having the machine be able to read them.

I'd rather say 'spending time' vs 'wasting time' since I am not sure if I said to my wife "I'm going downstairs to waste time on the pinball machine" that would play as well as "I'm going downstairs to work on the pinball machine" -- even if she knows the truth. Of course it is really a tradeoff, I end up playing a lot less pinball when I am focused on building.

I think we all decide, in homebrew, on certain things we want to "roll our own", based on our experience, skills and interests. There was at least one guy who built is own boardset, but after that ended up going to one of the off the shelf products, since the software support was already there. Not to say that you can take either of the current frameworks and create the necessary drivers/interface for it. You can also pick and choose and use part of existing solutions in combination with your own. Other factor is just around the shear amount of things that are needed, some of which you can't just buy off the shelf or hand to someone else do it. Ultimately there is a lot more than one way to go about it. In reality, no two people approach it exactly the same.

A a live ticker would be pretty cool, not quite enough surface area and with the curve be tricky to pull off, but i do like it.

Right now the short term plan is to have it be labeled 'CRAPS' with white lettering and black background, when Craps is 'open' the lamp would turn on and the word CRAPS would be illuminated -- at least that is the current plan and hopefully I get to that by expo, getting to the point where I have to prioritize which of the 763 items on the punch list I focus on.

Very true, I'm sort of a jack of all trades, so I enjoy getting to do most of it. Needless to say I am better at some things than others, and certainly leverage other people and options where it made sense to me. For example, I did have a buddy build the ramp and returns for me, from my designs, as welding is not a skill I have. I also had a friend do the routing and 3d printing from my CAD drawings, since I have not invested in that type of equipment. I also had a someone do a bunch of callouts, since I really don't want to use (hear) my voice if I can avoid it. Cabinet art was vector art I purchased and that was then modified and pieced together. The hydrographics done to make the roulette wheel look like wood, was done by another buddy who had done something similar for his machine (Buffy the vampire slayer)

Not surprisingly I had to learn some skills along the way (like doing CAD), but all of that is just part of the journey. But one of the best parts are the people I've gotten to know who are my fellow build your own enthusiasts. A great group of guys, who are all very supportive and willing to help each other.

I believe this will be the best and biggest year yet at the P-roc booth at expo.

I've not worked on it or even tested it yet in this new build, but the issue was just with sixes and only on occasion. Pretty sure I can tweak it to solve it, time will tell. Bigger concern is how it handles radically different lighting conditions.

The 'state' of the game changes when a shot is made, so only option would then be to delay all aspects of the completion of the shot/objective. Since other things light and flash there is an indication when it happens. I may extend the insert 'light show' to be a touch longer so that the start of the flashing of the slot machine toy is closer to when the inserts finish their show. Ultimately I can ditch its little circuit board and just control the lights myself, but this was a quick and easy add -- took maybe five minutes to install it after I changed the graphics.

There is a spinner in a different spot, that earns you spins for when you open and play the slot machine (also a stand-up target near the slot machine awards more 'lines', which are really more valuable then spins). Have thought about changing behavior so that once the spinner is hit X times, instead of earning a spin, the first reel would stop then after X more the second reel stops. But I decided that it would be almost impossible for the player to really see what was happening with it (the inner loop where the spinner is, is incredibly fast). Plus, some awards are better given when the ball is being held.

Added lighting to the top of the craps dice popper. It is an LED ring and it turns on when craps is open. The text needs to be a touch smaller so as not to have the darker band at the bottom and the top needs to be covered.

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Below you cans see that the base has now been fully covered in felt (vs just the dice area), I had saved some left over scraps of felt from when I re-felted a pool table a year ago. The cylinder has been cut down by .75", which I did in anticipation of issues with clearance of the glass (and hopefully I will be okay now, since can't really cut it much more without running into an issue with range of view of the camera). I also felt the height was a little too big compared to the width and this is more in line with the original vision/sketches I did.

IMG_1928.JPG-2 (resized).png

The reduction in size did require adjustments to the software parameters used for the machine vision and based on some testing getting very, very good accuracy on the read. Also ran into unexpected issue when moving the machine vision software over to Linux from my mac (thought I and previously tested it, but apparently not). The issues were around color formats and some supported parameters for the image capture, an unexpected issue, but fortunately was able to work through it, but was time consumuning.

I am happy with how the dice popper has come together, and almost ready to move on to other stuff. Time getting short, 21 Days and counting, and playfield still not in the cabinet nor have I done any real play testing. The list of what won't be ready for expo is growing.

I have considered it and it is still very much a possibility. The reality is that to really play draw poker, you want to do a catch and cradle when the vuk puts the ball into play, so you can be precise on your shots, and that would also give you the chance to review the cards and strategize. The goal is for to be about skill and not just keeping the ball up on the mini-playfield and smacking the drop targets. In addition, there is a pause after the cards are dealt and before the VUK fires to give you a chance to review. Regardless, changing the cards is still a possibility, but I'm also considering adding a large two char label above that would just be the number and suit info, and It is likely I would try that before changing the cards, since I like having the real cards.

Three possibilities . . .

1) The ball falls out the bottom, e.g. drains from the mini-playfield, you automatically lose the hand

2) after hitting the cards you want to toss, you shoot the ball past the drop targets, cards are drawn and a payout is made if you win (win also counts towards completion of draw poker objective)

3) after hitting the cards you want to toss, you bounce the ball back into the vuk, cards are drawn and points awarded if a winner, then a new hand is dealt and the ball put back into play. However, only one win 'per visit' counts towards the completion objective.

The craps table also will let you have multiple wins 'per shooter', but only one counts towards the objective until you lose and then re-open craps.

There is an opportunity to win 'just spades' via the slot machine. If you win that award, the next time you play poker the deck will only have spades in it, so it guarantees you a flush (as long as you don't drain), and you are then playing to get a shot at a straight or royal flush.

I'm also considering adding a feature where if you get all of the drops down, when you draw cards, it will guarantee you at least a pair of jacks or better. This sort of changes the skill required, but at least if you mess up and knock down the wrong target, you can still improve your chances of getting a win. I'll consider this further down the road, since it is not a quick add.

Blackjack will also be played on the 'card table', but will require a little less skill. You will have two targets for 'hit' and two for 'stand' and occasional a double down or a split option. You hit the 'hit' target to draw another card (and target resets), then you need to hit one or more of the stand targets and then shoot through (or just drop it back into the vuk to have the dealer finish up the hand).

Right now once the ball is shot past the targets, it goes right back into play, possible in the future I'll use a disappearing post to hold the ball while the hand is finished up.

Was so busy working on the machine and talking with folks playing, I did not take any photos or video, but when I get it back up I'll do so.

Game was up and down first twos days due to a column short issue, but was solid on Saturday, but did keep the glass off most of the time due to a couple of ball hang spots. Suspected it would be an issue, but took a wait and see approach, and well, it was, so bad call on my part.

Seemed lots of folks liked it, especially gamblers who really like how craps was really craps and not some psuedo "you rolled 11, so 11,000 points". Craps worked nearly flawlessly as did draw poker except when Craig knocked down all five and the drops would not reset, until I figured it out. I had switched from a 70v to 48v supply a day or so before expo and some things I had not adjusted correctly for the lower voltage, and roulette did not work nearly as well as It did with 70 so that will require some attention/modifications

The three non gambling modes worked well and as it turns out were just as appropriate for expo as for Vegas. "Find parking", (an homage to move your car), "can't remember my room number" and "all you can eat Buffett". In hindsight should have made first shot easier on "find parking" so more would hear the voice call outs and see the "breaking bad" meets "move you car" animations. Almost any time someone started a mode there was a smile or a laugh at what the mode was or its sound track.

Probably be a week or two before I even set it back up, pretty fried from the rush to expo.

Thanks again to all of those who stopped to play, was great meeting and talking with everyone.

Thanks, one of these days I'l get around to posting some video of game play, have not booted it up since Expo, too busy with other stuff.

There is a plastic shield in front and small gap to absorb a hit. In addition, since it is such a short playfield, the flipper power is not all that strong.

It is totally doable, it is sort of an optical illusion due to the odd alignment of the opening, but it is actually wider than you think. If you go back to this post . . .

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/casino/page/2#post-3307593

you will see the actual width, which is close to 2".