Hey, thanks for continuing to support my little projects, I love hearing that, means a lot.

By all means, post away! Feel free to link anything you put up here in this thread too.

I'm going to cut you a little slack for not installing it right away like ZEN but only because you'e been ill.

I know you both got them around the same time because I was feeling anxious about their status and checked the delivery tracking just a bit ago. I knew you'd message me after it arrived, I heard from you like 20 minutes after I checked heh. I let myself get spoiled by the UPS ground speed on the first batch because they were all West Coast and one that was 2-day to Australia.

I've cut all the parts for builds 7 & 8, so I'll just keep making steady progress on the list.

Done!

Nice video! Thanks for taking the time to make it.

The way the interactivity works is pretty simple, I'm not tracking gamestate or anything complicated, I'm just watching some of the flashers and responding in various ways to them.

So for instance when the scoop flashes the arcade cabinet to let you know it's ejecting the ball the FLYNN'S sign on my topper will flash in a color that matches the current idle state palette.

The 'neon' ring in the middle responds to the ZEN flasher. But because that flasher can go off repeatedly at times it will only do the middle ring animation once until another flasher has triggered, reseting things so ZEN can go again. That keeps it from getting stupid.

I'm watching some of the ramp flashers to do a little effect too. This is what I had to adjust because of the differences between the Pro and LE flashers, they're set up for the ramps differently. I chose to do it in a way that's universal, rather than have two versions of the topper. That way if you have an LE and decide you want to sell your topper to a Pro owner for instance it just works. Making little subtle differences you won't notice during gameplay didn't seem like a worthwhile tradeoff.

On top of that I'm also monitoring general activity. So when you get a light show where all the flashers are firing repeatedly, at the start of a multiball or end of the game etc, I've got a special animation sequence that combines all the effects into something flashier, that also advances the palette so it will rotate through the colors as it's firing off.

All of these effects respect the current idle state, so the different color palettes and animations it does without input will combine with the effects in various ways to keep things a little more dynamic.

I need to look at my code, but if I'm remembering right there are 8 different idle state palettes, that cycle through 6 different animation loops, and some of the animations also have variations they use a certain % of the time. Like how the center sphere is sometimes in color and sometimes pure white.

too long, didn't read: The interactivity is pretty simple, but I combine it all in various ways to make it feel a little more complicated than it really is.

I've built 7 and 8, but I need to travel this weekend, so I'll contact their buyers and get them packed up next week after I'm back.

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I've been working on optimizing my build process, got some little bins and made labels for the various lengths of screws since this uses several different sizes, and today I made some super helpful little armatures from cardboard and foam that let me support and flip things around without the screws falling out. Makes things a lot easier to handle in the tricky mid-assembly part when there are a lot of pieces that need to stay put but aren't ready to be locked down until the final stage.

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Getting more of a flow with the builds, will just keep them coming.

I'm home again, we had a really nice trip for parent weekend at UC Santa Cruz, which is also where my wife and I went, so very nostalgic to be back on campus. Saw a satisfying amount of banana slugs.

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I'm packing up these two I built before I left and I'll work on making up for the lost time not having the weekend to build cost me.

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Slug costs extra!

Me too, I have that same shirt.

No problem Tony, I've added you to the list.

I have #9 boxed up, and just finished building #11 while listening to Super Bowl post-game highlights. Waiting for Kyle to drop by in about an hour with more PCBs for me so I can pack up these next two.

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I used up all my acrylic today so will put in an order tonight so I can work on the next set. Appreciate people's patience with the hand-built process, trying to keep the output steady, I'll get to everyone.

I was talking with Kyle last night when he dropped off more PCBs for me about what our "end game" strategy on this project is. I didn't make it limited, because I'm honestly sick of that model. The fake FOMO feels tiresome to me.

But at some point I'll manage to catch up to the pre-order list (trying!) and there will be a lull. And we'll try and buffer spare PCBs to have on hand for orders after that. But once they're used up it won't be as easy to just randomly make one out of the blue.

So just fair warning, I'll try and help everyone who wants one, but if you wait until I'm out of stock on parts it may mean you have to wait until it makes sense to make more.

I will do my best to accommodate everyone, just being realistic about where this project may end up after this initial interest dies down. Lot of parts go into building each one and there's only so much we can just keep in stock. But there's always a solution.

In the meantime I just ordered enough acrylic to build out the rest of the list with a little extra, and I need to get an order in to Hong Kong for more LEDs, starting to run low.

I really had no idea how the response to this project would be, I know it's expensive, appreciate everyone who's supported it. And the responses have been really gratifying!

Aww, miss you man, hope I can make the next gathering.

Thanks!

I've got more acrylic coming in today, so I can start cutting more. I think I should have enough to do the rest of the list, they had to put it into 4 separate UPS shipments to get it all here.

Just FYI I have all the acrylic and LEDs to build out the rest of the pre-order list and I’m back to production. We’re about to order more PCBs because we’ll be out soon but we should have them in time to keep moving I think.

So if you’re next on the list I’m starting on you now, writing this while babysitting the laser.

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Just as an update to my above post, it looks like there will probably be a couple week delay for the PCBs. I'm about about to ship 12 and 13, and then I'll build 14 and then I'm out of stock. So there will be a little gap when I can keep working on everything but won't be able to pack up boxes until they come in.

But once we have PCBs again I'll have a backlog of builds for them, so won't really hold up too much.

Heh, it's not exposed that often, but it is something I've thought about. The perils of garage collections!

The board with my topper is a pass through, yes, all signals should work exactly as they did before.

By the way, as long as I'm around, we're just waiting for more board parts to arrive and then I'll be back to building. Will update when that happens, but in a temporary pause still.

Will get back to production soon, PCBs are in. FYI I'm under the gun for some real deadlines for work so will have to fit building toppers in around my schedule, will do my best to keep things flowing again though.

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I kinda miss my Party Monsters tbh, what a great game.

I apologize for the lack of updates, my day job has hit a "nights and weekends" phase and been short on free time and energy to assemble toppers. Will try and get back on track.

Hi, if you'd like to be added to the list I still can. Just behind on my process of making these at the moment.

I'm sorry to have gone dark, beyond my job turning crazy busy I had to put out several fires in a row (the kind where you're dealing with lawyers and HR and pitchforks) and then I got covid and that wiped me out, and well, it's just been a time lately.

I'm recovering enough to be back at my desk and trying to play catchup. Wanted to at least post to this thread and make sure people know I'm still alive.

Thanks. I'm finally mostly free of covid, just a little more tired than usual, and a residual cough. Bleh, stupid virus.

I'm traveling this weekend, and when I get back I'll try and get everything back on track again.

Done. I'm obviously behind, so I don't have a time estimate for things right now, will just build them as I can.

Obviously I don't take any money until yours is finished, so it's only about patience at this point.

Will do. Every time I think I'm going to get free some other crisis comes up, I've just come off a hellish week of work that was first thing in the morning until midnight for way too many days.

I think I'm done with that part, but I'm honestly just mentally fried. Need to find some energy for fun projects, but I just want to be a lump and maybe play a little Street Fighter 6 at the moment so my brain can feel less like mush.

Coming into all this after covid was just too much.