Your virtual example looks great. It's a good looking EM layout (and looks more fun as a '60s era design than as a flipperless '30s era game). Somewhat symmetrical, but with plenty of stuff to aim for or luck into. The playfield art looks spot on. Any preview of the backglass or cabinet?

I hadn't seen that microcontroller before. Looks neat. I'd think about trying it if I wasn't already down my own path.

Good luck on your build

You’re crushing it!

I think the reason why you had issues with the drop target bank resets is you are using a modern mech designed for 48V coils. But you got it figured out

You could lower the pulse time on the sling to make it a bit weaker and less likely to make an air ball. Or try a different coil strength or add a large resistor in.

Looking good. Have you thought about putting a one way gate (or controlled gate) at the top of the spinner lane? It may be more fun if the top saucer feeds the upper rollover lanes. Right now it looks like it mostly feeds back through the spinner lane, which sometimes goes SDTM.

The game looks plenty tough as is. Lowering the sling power really helped.

I don’t think the gate would prevent it. They require little force to open. A wire one way gate is even lighter than a flap.

Not sure about the flipper cracking but I did notice it. Best to order some extras. Maybe another rubber ring might help

How do you have your flipper mechs wired up? I converted an EM and my bats are plenty strong. I use a single hold transistor (no PWM) and use the EOS to make the switch from power to hold like a traditional flipper mech. 24V and 20-300/28-400 coils. They’re actually maybe too strong, but no knock down issues

What if it was a curved diverter gate? When not energized, it’s closed; when open, it curves a shot into it. Something like this
image (resized).jpg

The ball could land in the left lower saucer, the gate opens, the saucer ejects into this area.

Do you have some room in front of the pop for a standup? Assign it something low value, but occasionally high value? Sort like Aztec

5799C725-51CD-4D67-8DFF-0BB3B0A989AA (resized).jpeg

I guess I could see the issue with broken skirts from modern powered flippers. But I agree I have played plenty of late era EMs early SS with pops right in the way of the flipper. Something like a Dolly Parton or Eight Ball Deluxe.

I get why it’s less fun from a game design perspective than it being a reliability issue.

Although… My project has a pop out in the wide open. I like dangerous stuff and if you shoot it straight on, you should get punished for it.

Put his head on a spring and sell it to Stern

Speaking of fancy mechs, disappearing center pop bumper…just think about it.

Also in your video going over the new Heck wall, maybe move the one mini post to the right corner of the wall and use like a 1.5 inch rubber between it and the Star post for the lane.

Speaking of missing characters, where is the pig shop keeper?

Soon you’ll have another source for video assets for your project.

Painting the bottom gray is a nice touch, like how old EM games were done.

It's coming together very nicely. Any shows you plan to bring it to next year?

Nice little details. Maybe for the coin door price lense you can put a picture of the coins from the game

Coin (resized).png

I'm red-green color blind so I won't weigh in on the red plastics. All red looks subdued to me. If you have RGB lighting, maybe giving those GI lamps a slightly red hue may help it pop.

What if you put another Cup Head and Mug Man logo on each pop bumper cap? Kinda make it look like they're beating up on the devil. But agreed, match the font with the rest of your playfield for consistency if nothing else.

It may be the angle of the camera and shape of the plastics, but the dice man art above the left drop seems a bit smaller than the devil one above the right drops. Have you thought about swapping the art above the drops with the sling art? Further associate Cup Head and Mug Man with their target areas, and bad guys are the slings trying to end your ball.

Also just curious about the bonus ladder, do you progress in the same order of bosses every time through the game?

Kudos on all your progress. Seems like the finish line is within sight.

Oh one other small thing: on the plastics above the drops, the characters have a white background. On the slings, they have a muted color background. Consider making them all white for consistency. I also like how the bad guys spill out of their circles a little bit. Maybe you could make CH/MM a bit bigger and their straws stick out in a similar way.

I really doubt it. I know with some RGB inserts I can't always tell what color they are. It rarely ever matters though. If it's flashing, I'll shoot it. I can't think of a game where it's a serious detriment. Led Zeppelin's Icarus multiplier lights come to mind, but it's a pretty minor problem.

I can think of lots of video games I stink at because of it though. For example, I can't tell yellow and green apart in Super Puzzle Fighter.

It doesn't really matter because the order is always the same. Red on top, then yellow, then green on bottom. I have seen some international signals that try to address it by using a light shield so the lights form shapes. Like a red diamond, a yellow triangle, and a green circle.

Also I do see colors. They're just not as vivid due to me having less color receptors in my eyes.

I'm a traffic engineer so this is in my dominion...

If it's a standard signal with 3 lamps that flashes one at night, then you still know the order is red/yellow/green from top to bottom

If it's an always flashing single lamp, then if it's a stop they are still required to have stop signs present.

You did a great job. Hope to see it at a show some day.

I still got to find this at a show some day. Any future show plans?