You gotta love mental blocks.. A good night's sleep usually fixes things. Of course I can do his Supr J! His character insert goes from solid to flashing when you complete by getting the super. But only once. For the other SJs I use the other playfield insert behaviours so you get the SJ effect each time if you collect it multiple times. Whiplash may be limited to once. But that's the thing with IM..Good luck getting anything more than once!! Bwahahahaha!!!

I have been building up an extensive toolkit. All my engines are parametric, so I just drop in the kind of pattern I want, then adjust things like flash rate, number of flashes, total time and what outputs are involved and away it goes.

Most of the time taken to get Metallica 1.0 out was me learning to code properly. Everything was manual and done line by line. It was basically just shit code, frankly. When I did the big refactoring of Met 2.0 I started parameterising everything to save me time.

I'm also now a deft hand at timing, counting and solving the problems of complex triggers. The only way to trigger fast scoring, for example is by measuring the different rates at which the iron man inserts flash. Then that number jumps around a lot so you have to debounce that before you have a reliable trigger. 2 years ago I didn't even know what that meant. Now I can build it pretty quickly.

There are only two strings of controlled new sockets and the white is the factory being controlled. So yes, less bulbs to put in than Metallica. I think there are seven each of red and blue. I am using my last spare output to provide independent control to the spots. I think this will actually be fantastic. I can blare the spotlights out onto a dim playfield during some of the darker effects, giving ball control back to the player without washing out the colours.

IM light effect priority at this stage is..

Outlane drains > DoD HU = Jericho > MB Super Js > Bogie > IM scoring > Mongr Hit > Drone hit > WM kick back > WM MB > Monger MB > Whiplash MB

..anything to the left will play over the top of anything to the right of it.

Just a heads up to AC/DC kit owners. My AC/DC VE arrived today so I can get to work on the refactored code. Should be up in a week or so. Thanks for hanging in there and sorry it took so long. I am going to be adding in some new effects too.

You would not believe how timely that question is! Just this morning, I received an email from a customer who bought the kit for a Metallica he was going to buy which never happened. He asked me if I was doing X-Men to save him from selling the kit. I do not have a pro X-men on site to do development work, but the tools I have built along the way leave me pretty confident now that I can code it without the machine, as long as I have a tester lined up to double check things. So, I asked him if he would like to test the kit in his X-Men as I do the code remotely. He hasn't replied yet, but if he agrees I will get onto it.

dupe

AC/DC Pro V2.0 code is up at the website. Major rebuild in the same vein as the Metallica 2.0 release. New from the ground up, with greater response and reliability, with a bunch of redesigned lighting. Go get it!

http://redshiftled.com.au/downloads.php

..and scroll down until you see AC/DC

And as a result, AC/DC kits are now back in stock.

http://redshiftled.com.au/new-store.php#!/GI-Theatre-Plug-and-Play-Kits/c/8760005/offset=0&sort=normal

and in my Pinside Shop.

Yikes, in my excitement I forgot to mention you need to rearrange your string connections at the main board for the new AC/DC code.
This is how it now connects..

IMG20170823094304 (resized).jpg

Sorry for the nine hours of mass confusion while I was asleep.

Here is a run through of the new code on my AC/DC Pro Vault.

Summary of effects..

General play.. Mode select colours replicate the Premium, Red pulsing loaded cannon, blue flash left ramp, red flash right lamp, blue/red outlane drain fades, ball-over playfield fade out, red bell-hit fade effect, 2X and 3X reinforcement with matching accelerated flash during end-warning time.

Mode specific..

You shook me.. red/blue flash on pop hits,
Rock n roll train.. ramp and bell effects all play in blue,
Thunderstruck.. mode-related shots cause lightning effect,
Rosie.. Pink! (red and white only, no blue),
War Machine.. Blue/white only PF with spinner blue/white cross-fade effect,
Back in Black.. This is a fade out effect with a little bit of gameplay added. The GI fades out as you collect target shots. If you trigger another lighting effect before you collect a certain number of hits, the GI will return to full brightness and start to fade with hits again. If you collect enough hits before triggering another effect and get the GI "Back in Black" it will stay locked at the dark level (Like Metallica Fade to Black) until the mode is over.

I am. I have changed my manufacturing a little and have outsourced assembly of another of the components of the LED pods in order to ramp up the volume a bit. Once that order arrives, probably a couple of weeks, I will be able to stock ramp kits for IM, Tron and Met in higher numbers.

I am also tweaking the IM code. I'm going to have a DIP switch selectable option to have the ramps off between effects.

Here's a demo of IM with the ramps off between effects. This will be a simple DIP switch selectable option..ramps either on or off between effects to your preference.

No current issues with OCD that I am aware of. Just make sure OCD is first in the chain.

Not enough channels at the moment. One block of three outputs for the ramps RGB. Two for the playfield red/blue strings. One for the factory GI, and one for the spotlights. Only one more available from my eight total outputs. I could do two ramp channels with no GI strings. Maybe that's an option. Not everyone wants to mess around with GI socket replacement, and might just want to do a Tron on their IM.

I do have three serial outputs with which I used to drive the addressable LED strips, so in the future I could activate them to do another ramp channel pretty easily, and more. I'd just have to find the time to do it.

Edit -- and what's not fun about "just" a giant flasher?? Jeez.

I'll try get a demo video up in the next couple of days with OCD installed.

I agree. I really want to get those serial outputs back into the mix. There's so much I can do there, like running servos etc as well. I did try to design in "what if" capacity into the original hardware, so that I didn't have to revise the board if a new use came to light..and I think I succeeded..I just have to get off my butt and integrate those outputs effectively.

If there are no balls in the trough it thinks you are playing a game. The fast strobe is the double scoring count down warning being triggered by the flashing 2x in attract mode. You shouldn't have to power cycle it. Once the balls are back in give it a few seconds for it to realise the trough is full and trigger the game over sequence.
I will add a start button filter to game in progress to prevent it happening.

I've gone back and forth on using the start button lamp as part of the gameplay status, and landed with the final arbiter of whether a game is being played or not being the status of Trough_4. There's no reason I can't add the start button in there with it, but I just try to not use a trigger if I don't need to. As a general rule across all the code this helps to keep the logic as robust as possible and minimise conflict and ease debugging/troubleshooting.

There is also a moment in time when powering up with no balls in the trough that lets you know that everything is at least working ok before closing the glass. The weird behaviour indicates the board is reading the trough switches and driving the outputs, without having to do specific testing. I have actually come to expect that during development, but maybe that's appropriate for me and not necessarily for an end user. And with ramp light variants, it's a quick chance to be sure the LED pods have been plugged in the right way around.

I'm agnostic either way, and for the sake of looking more professional, it's probably best to limit episodes of weird behaviour at all costs?
I also have a tendency to overthink these things. Can you tell?

I'll put together today a detail of every effect.

That's right. It would just be another option. I would NEVER take away the ability for maximum lighting!

For AC/DC

General play..

Mode select colours cycle as modes are chosen, replicating the colour scheme of the Premium,
-Red pulsing loaded cannon,
-Red bell-hit fade effect,
-Blue flash left ramp, Red flash right ramp,
-Blue/red outlane drain fades,
-End of Ball playfield fade out,
-Red bell-hit fade effect,
-2X and 3X reinforcement white GI pulse with matching accelerated flash during end-warning time.

Mode specific..

-You shook me.. Red/blue/white flash on respective pop hits,

-Rock n roll train.. Ramp and Bell effects all play in blue,

-Thunderstruck.. mode-related shots cause lightning-flash effect,

-Rosie.. Pink! (red and white only, no blue),

-War Machine.. Blue/white only PF with spinner blue/white cross-fade pulse effect,

-Back in Black.. The GI fades out as target shots are collected. If another lighting effect is triggered before collecting 6 hits, the GI returns to full brightness and begins the fade sequence with hits again. If 6 target hits are collected before triggering another effect the GI locks "Back in Black" at the dark level (Like Metallica Fade to Black; Blue with a touch of red) until the mode is over.

I'm putting a DIP switch selectable option into the Tron code to be able to set the ramps to off unless there is an effect playing. Code should be up in a day or two.

I'm also tweaking my LED driver boards a bit. The video exaggerates it, but the white could be about 5-10% "whiter" I have determined. For those who already have kits, if you are not satisfied with the "whiteness" of the white I will mail you replacement boards at my cost. Let me know by PM or return email on the email that your ordering traffic has been on.

New Tron code V1.1 is up at the website. Use DIP 1 on the Matrix Interceptor to choose ramp lights on or off between effects.

http://redshiftled.com.au/downloads.php

Kits that ship from today onwards will have this code installed.

Here's a quick run through to show you the difference.

Small update of Metallica V2.20 to improve the factory GI strings' behaviour during attract and Blackened. They are now tuned better for overall effect.

http://redshiftled.com.au/downloads.php

I'm just going to do a bit of a lab report here, for no other reason than I am really proud of this little snippet, and it's just sort of interesting. To me, anyway, and perhaps a few other nerds.

I run with the view that my Matrix Interceptor can detect any mode or state of gameplay from reading the states of lamps and switches. And that there are very few instances where information about those modes or states isn't conveyed to the player in some way, and are therefore undetectable by the Interceptor. Well, one had me stumped. I had all but given up on finding a trigger for Zuse active on Tron.

The only clear signal for Zuse being active is for the FIRST time it's active. The centre Zuse insert starts flashing. Yay, simple. But after that, the centre insert is ALWAYS flashing, unless it is lit solid if Zuse has been completed. Whenever the mode is activated again, there is no new behaviour from the centre insert. So that insert is now useless.

There are also no other inserts that give it away, as there are no special shots to hit. The ZUSE inserts themselves all flash together the same way during normal gameplay as during the mode. There is absolutely no giveaway. Execept... for the tiniest tell, which only came to me after hours of staring at the playfield.

During normal play, the Zuse inserts are all flashing away, in total sync with all the other flashing inserts, such as the light cycles and Quorra. But, when the mode is activated, the Zuse inserts keep flashing as a group at the same rate, but the activation of the mode causes the whole group to re-start flashing from the moment the mode starts, which is unlikely to be exactly on an "on" event of all the other lamps, and so the Zuse inserts as a group are now out of sync with the rest of the playfield.

It's not always the same amount of "out of sync" each time, because the group just becomes independent of the rest of the playfield. But the frequency of the flashing is still the same, so they stay at the same phase shift for the duration of the mode. So, all I had to do was build a "sync engine" that determines when Quorra and Zuse_U, for example are in and out of sync, plus a few other rules for robustness, and I have a trigger for Zuse active.

In this test video I have set the red status LED on my board to be on when these two inserts are in sync, and the green status LED for when they are out of sync. You can see that it is red the whole time during normal play, except for brief moments that Zuse_U flashes fast because it has been directly hit, and then goes all crazy flipping between red and green during Zuse. I ran it over two instances of Zuse active so you can see that it is slightly different on each case, but the overall disruption is clear, which means the trigger will work.

There is no effect currently linked to ZUSE. I am thinking a pulse, like the IM fast scoring, in white, to let you know it's running. I then have to work out the priority.

I generally will prioritise a timed mode over a multiball because then it is supportive of the information to the player. So if you have lcmb going and start ZUSE, the cool amber/blue ramps will give way to the fast scoring prompt. At first, you feel like you want the cooler colored multiball ramps all the time, but it makes more sense for them to return after the fast scoring if you still have the mb going. It's more interesting and rewarding.

I just got another batch of Comet twin 2835 smds in, and they seem to be even better than before. The casing is different, so something has changed with their supplier, but I'm super happy with them. Rich colour and great brightness.