Could you hook it up to monitor flipper button activity?

that is ambitious.. reminds me of this but the next level..

PING 192.168.1.73 (192.168.1.73) 56(84) bytes of data.
64 bytes from 192.168.1.73: icmp_seq=1 ttl=128 time=8.30 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.1.73: icmp_seq=2 ttl=128 time=7.08 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.1.73: icmp_seq=3 ttl=128 time=1.00 ms
64 bytes from 192.168.1.73: icmp_seq=4 ttl=128 time=5.26 ms

...and these two are sitting on the same desk. If you think Farscape flippers are laggy, running webcam video over even a local network would have to be maddening.

The only way to do this is to have a closed-circuit video and serial control system that does not utilize a LAN.

Can you wire it to detect if it is in attract mode or not?

Do it to the power of the coils.

The pop bumpers or flippers will not have high power if the game is not running. Tap a relay off it and you have a low voltage signal.

Off the top of my head I'd say to key off a switch in the ball trough. If there are multiple balls in the trough, key off of the last switch.

That wont solve the problem of stealing the game in the middle when you drain the ball, but it will stop mid-game stealing.

Why not tie into the start button. Make it discrete 1 or 0. At the same time have a second line keep count of how many times the drain hole switch is activated.

If startBtn = 1
No go
If drainHole switch == 3 (or 5)
startBtn = 0

Several problems with that. What if the start button is pressed more than once in a game? What about ball saves/ball searches? What about multiplayer and entering initials? The best way to really see if a game is running is to tie in to the logic that enables the flippers. On pre-fliptronics games you can monitor the state of the flipper relay. On fliptronics you can intercept communications between the CPU board and fliptronics board (this will of course require a little reverse engineering).

So what if its pressed more than once. Does nothing. But yeah forgot about ball saves/searches. I guess I didn't know how deep he was going into it. Was trying to make it quick and dirty. I suppose you could tie it to any active switch and force a waiting time. If no switches are activated, then the person could play. Wouldn't solve multiplayer or be the best solution.

I suppose also you could define in your web app or however you are interfacing over the Internet the number of players and force a login. If somebody is logged in, nobody else can play depending on player number.

You could attach a magnetic probe to a coil.

Good idea, this should work.

You could sense the 'game over" or "insert coin" bulb too on many games.

I think the easiest missed...use the coin return lock solenoid. Wire a relay in parallel. Done. Assuming of course there is one on this game.

castlesteve and vid1900 and best is robertmee as its simple as pie (great ideas here)

I never really captured why you would do this... but yea the many stages of video buffering, packet buffering and playback streaming will make this unplayable. I bet there's a 3 second lag at least.