Hey there!

This is my first Pinside post, so please let me know if I can improve in any way!
I have been looking to build a homebrew pinball for a very long time (accumulating ideas for a few years) and really aim to build my own machines as passion projects. The topic of discussion here is not quite about if my ideas are feasible, or to talk about the complexity of building a pinball machine from scratch, I am well aware of that. The discussion I aim for is more related to the actual "game design" phase: taking ideas, and creating a layout and rules that fit hand-in-hand with these ideas and theme. And I am having somewhat of a mental blockage.

I have been collecting ideas in a google doc for well over a year, and I have my theme nailed-down. The theme I chose is the "Incas". My wife is Peruvian, and we both love the Peruvian culture, and I'd love to make homage to this culture by building a very unique machine for her. I am very happy with the level of research and ideas that I was able to come with, and it makes me very excited about this project, but I am having difficulty transforming these ideas into an actual playfield layout. I have been searching all over the internet, and watch pretty much all of the videos about "creating your own machine", pinballmakers, etc, but haven't found relevant information on the process of taking a 10-page list of ideas and transforming it into an actual game design / playfield design. I find information about the basics of a pinball layout (shots shouldn't be too narrow, flow vs stopngo, fan layouts, what not to do, etc), but I find that there is a lack of resources about designing layouts and modes around ideas, focussing on the creative side of things. I felt that starting with a theme, and brainstorming about it to come up with interesting ideas would probably be a good 1st step, even before thinking about layout (as opposed to coming up with a layout, and adding a theme to it afterwards), but it is definitely challenging to say the least!

If you're interested, free to take a look at my notes (I would LOVE feedback):
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1OND4lqxVXjkcKN6XI5OvdXnak9rI2vY7R9QuXz8HkdI/edit?usp=sharing

I would love to have some feedback on how I could take these ideas, and transform them into a layout. I do not have as much experience with pinball as others may have, so I am still in the learning phase of "figuring out the ruleset, gamemodes, and layout".

Any tips, help and feedback would be greatly appreciated!
And if anybody is very interested in this, I am more than happy to bring people on and collaborate on this passion project!

PS: I work in software engineering, so as you guys might spend time helping me, please let me know if I can do anything to help you as well, with your projects!

First of all, massive thanks for all the help and tips you guys provided above, I am truly appreciative, and it gives me a very solid idea of my next steps in this journey. Here are some recurrent elements that I see in all of your tips that I need to focus on next:

- Decide on the playfield size (standard or widebody)
- Decide on what controller (p3, fast)
- Get started on prototyping asap, and test a lot of different layouts

A while ago, I was leaning towards P3, but recently, after looking at "thepinballroom" youtube channel, he's using fast, and it seems to be a very solid system as well, and their starter bundle could help get a lower 3rd setup quickly, and start prototyping (Any thoughts on which controller is best?). As for the code, I am aiming for MPF. I like that you can also go out of their config files and write your own code (so if ruleset becomes very deep, I won't hit a wall). As for playfield size, I went to my local pinball arcade yesterday, and still can't quite make my mind to my preference. I personally like pins that are focussed on hitting specific shots, even if it doesn't quite "flow", so maybe a widebody could be a good fit for this game, but TBD.

Very good point jackd104 , I appreciate your input as a designer!
I appreciate your feedback snowy_owl , helps me a lot!
I like the ideas of the blocky pyramid being an upper playfield Cmartin1235 !
And @mbecker, very good point on the lower playfield, I played "Munsters" pinball yesterday, and the "window under a glass" situation was really not that great, and made me rethink if it's worth giving up a lot of playfield space for artwork and inserts to have a lower playfield... Maybe not anymore. And I have not checked the "Escape from the lost world" pin yet, but will make sure to check it out!

One thing for sure, I will update this thread regularly, and post any kind of updates, and prototypes, so you guys can also provide some feedback on those, if you're interested

Mbecker Thanks for the info! I am leaning towards a widebody, just for the sheer amount of things I am looking to integrate. Even if that slows the pace a little bit, I feel I could cover much more ideas and concepts. And thanks for letting me know about the Doom pinball, I did not know about it, and it looks incredible.

proco Thanks a lot for the idea and images! I'll definitely start inspiring myself from elements I love from existing machines. I followed your tip, and went on printing around 15-20 playfield plans from manuals (monster bash, iron man, ghostbuster, baywatch, ToM, totan, dialed in, deadpool, etc), and planning to do a deeper analysis on what shots I like.

I went ahead to my local hardware store, and got myself a basic mdf 2'x4'. I'll make it the proper size for a widebody, and will start drawing some layouts on it. For a widebody, the playfield size would be 23.25'' x 46''? I wasn't quite sure on the width or length, due to the varying widebody playfield sizes from different manufacturers.

Hey! I was initially planning to buy a virtuapin widebody cabinet. I live downtown Toronto, and haven’t yet seen many cabinets I could salvage from an existing game. Something like this: https://virtuapin.net/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=2&products_id=4&zenid=frp7aoct95l14mi99mdlm7fmr0

If I go with a wpc-style widebody cabinet, would the playfield dimensions I posted above be correct? (23.25x46)? Thanks in advance!

I appreciate a lot your feedback! It will indeed be a very long journey. I am very dedicated to take the time needed to get it done, most likely making a lot of mistakes along the way too! I have been focussing on designing the layout in these last days, will update my progress soon. I really love a wide range of things, and love to pick up new skills, and pinball seems to be a wonderful "medium/canvas" to fulfill my creative, design, music, woodwork, electronic, software cravings.

I think I'll go for Fast to start with, seems like a good boarset to get started, and combined with MFP, I would be able to start working on a whitewood early in the process (in comparison to pure pen/paper like right now).

And yes, I really see your point with "not putting too much". I need to keep my ideas focussed and avoid adding "the most I can". Already starting to rethink some ideas, and keeping some stuff for potential future games as well.

Thanks!