(Topic ID: 86044)

WPC 2.0(tm) - Extensions to WPC 2.0 games (from TPF PPS seminar) ...

By PPS

9 years ago


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You're currently viewing posts by Pinsider ecurtz.
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#8 9 years ago

I looks like the Fast Pinball controller also uses the BeagleBone Black as its CPU. Are the two systems basically the same environment with different footprint / off-board connections?

-1
#89 9 years ago
Quoted from fastpinball:

The WPC 2.0 games will come as a hardware/software package. This enables the rights protection necessary for the proper licenses.

There goes my enthusiasm.

#104 9 years ago
Quoted from Aurich:

Why? Last time I checked, with the exception of a couple boutique projects America's Most Haunted, none of the pinball we enjoy is open source. It's cool that people like Ben want to release games that way, but it's not really something that's reasonable to expect. Even if Rick wanted to, I'm fairly certain the license terms for these Williams games wouldn't allow it.

Closed source is not the same as DRM "enabled". I couldn't care less if their emulator is closed source. However DRM says "our priorities are fundamentally different from those of hobbyists" to me. I'm sure there are other programmers who don't care at all.

Post edited by ecurtz: Added quote for page break

#121 9 years ago
Quoted from Aurich:

I understand the objection to DRM in principle, but in this case what's the practical ramification? It's not like it's a transformative media like audio files or video or eBooks, where DRM could unfairly lock you into a platform (say Kindle etc). You're not going to take the software and run it on different hardware, this is a pretty closed system.

DRM makes things more expensive and less convenient for everyone (including the poor sap who has to implement it.) For what? To protect some 30 year old bitmaps and audio files that have been trivial to extract for at least the last decade? I guarantee that it won't work and will cost the end user time and money. I honestly appreciate what Rick is doing for the community with PPS but DRM does nothing but hurt your customers to fulfill some clause in a contract.

#129 9 years ago
Quoted from m00dawg:

Talk about biting the hand that feeds with all this DRM nonsense. If you don't like it, it looks like there is an avenue to add your own rules from scratch with WPC 2.0 and there is always P-ROC. PPS is able to do some fantastically cool things having sealed this Williams deal and folks are looking at the worst of it. A kind of DRM was already on the original WPC platforms.

I don't like DRM either and I'm a huge open source advocate, but in this case, it sounds like PPS is already giving you an open avenue if you want to go do your own thing. Licensing sucks but it's not PPS's fault and I can't totally fault Williams for wanting to protect their IP.

If you don't like it, don't buy it. But PPS has done something amazing and I find it baffling folks are latching onto this DRM thing. Awesome updates done by PPS are better than absolutely zero updates, particularly on an aging platform with hard to replace components. I don't really see what the problem is.

Sorry, I think I'm the only one complaining about the DRM and I'll leave it be after this. I personally do already have a P-ROC and that's a great community for anyone doing their own machines. It's the community that spawned BOP 2.0 and CCC, two amazing projects that asked for forgiveness rather than permission when it came to building something on top of old IP. JPop can tell us what's missing from TOTAN, but he can't add it because he doesn't code. If WPC2.0 is locked up too tight we'll soon be seeing "where's the TOTAN2.0 update?" threads to go with along with all the Sterns.

#181 9 years ago

Clone is certainly a poor choice of words on Gerry's part, but can you elaborate on ways the Fast board is functionally different from a P-ROC installed in a WPC machine?

#223 9 years ago
Quoted from pinlynx:

It seems to me that there is a lot of gray area as to when a P-ROC\FAST game would cross the derivative work line.
Since no one in the pinball community would likely have the desire (and funds) to see a legal battle through to the end, we'll probably never know. Hopefully everything will shake out for the betterment of the community.

Don't use the name of a commercial game (these are usually trademarked) or audio files or dmd data from the ROMs of any commercial games (these are protected by copyright) and you'll be fine. Or if you want to add a DMD to Harley-Davidson (since BOP and Funhouse seem to be covered) submit a proposal for that. I personally don't see a lot of justification for rewriting code from scratch to support new modes or mods but maybe there are a few cases where that makes sense.

#250 9 years ago
Quoted from PPS:

seems like the pm's on the various boards of people who download the CCC code and need to get the special incremental dmd and sound packages seem to get their needs addressed just fine ... just hope that doesn't get explored too deep.

I'm sure they were carefully extracted by each end-user from their own personal ROMs. Just as I'm sure the emulator used in your Medieval Madness remakes was implemented entirely by "clean room" engineers who had never been exposed to any PinMAME code.

#282 9 years ago
Quoted from markmon:

Right. Because even looking at pinmame code makes the Mm emulator derivative work and subject to being open source.

Only for certain values of "looking at". Much like with a xenomorph infestation, the only way to be sure is for that value to be zero. It obviously isn't required for them to use programmers who haven't read the pinMAME code, it's just a simple proactive defense against somebody taking a shortcut and causing major headaches down the road.

#292 9 years ago
Quoted from fastpinball:

Now, in the Developer Program members would be able to access downloadable content which IP holders or other developers (I guess that is sorta also IP holders) have made available:
- "1.0" code, audio, dots in a "black box," w/ the audio and dots accessible from "tinker" mode.
- Be able to share their code which is dependent on the "1.0" code, audio, dots in a "black box," with others in the developer program.

When you refer to "1.0" code are you talking about the original Williams source code, or compiled ROMs/images? That is, if I was feeling generous with my time could I join the developer program and fix issues from the "WPC Bugs" thread and then share new ROMs with other people in the program? Or is it only that a machine upgraded with a Fast controller board will still be able to run the original ROM in emulation?

#296 9 years ago
Quoted from altan:

Fwiw, the text at the end of the Twilight Zone manual raises this topic: "BECAUSE THIS GAME IS PROTECTED by Federal copyright, trademark, and patent laws, unauthorized game conversions may be illegal under Federal law.
THIS 'CONVERSION' PRINCIPLE ALSO APPLIES to unauthorized facsimiles of BALLY equipment, logos, designs, publications, assemblies and games (or game feature not deemed to be public domain), whether manufactured with BALLY components or not."

That wording was just added so they can imprison anyone who adds too many tacky mods to their TZ.

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#301 9 years ago
Quoted from fastpinball:

Right now, I am referring to the compiled ROMs/images. But in reality, this is a scenario that we anticipated. To where the community wants fix the original games. A new modern code version of the original game could be produced within the developer group. I am not certain that editing the original source code is something that could be done in the arrangement Rick has and for the long term value of the time spent, modern code might have more of a life to it.

There's a massive difference between spending a couple evenings fixing bugs that can then benefit anyone for the cost of a ROM versus spending weeks or months reimplementing an entire game from scratch that can only be run by a few people willing to add a $300 upgrade board to their game.

#302 9 years ago
Quoted from TomGWI:

I am just trying to get this straight.
So if say TOTAN 2.0 is done, it will be a complete rewrite. There will be no use of old code or modes or animations.

There could be a commercial rewrite that did include the old modes and animations (although these would presumably be re-implemented in new code), or there could be a non-commercial rewrite that didn't (but that couldn't be called TOTAN2.0 because Tales of the Arabian Nights is trademarked in the context of pinball machines.) I guess you could use the audio calls from the original even in your non-commercial version because the audio board and ROM would still be accessible, but that's less clear.

#333 9 years ago

As someone else mentioned you can thank Disney, but WPC games would still have active copyright even under a sane system.

So if the WPC2.0 games are separate commercial products what's the status of the code developed by members of your Fast Developers Program? What happens if somebody (or worse, the community as a whole) has developed a project to the point where Rick decides it's a viable WPC2.0 offering? Are you going to tell us which games are being rewritten commercially to avoid wasted effort?

Rules aren't copyrightable, so if Eric isn't interested in porting CCC to your new platform what are you going to do when a clone of his extended rules is submitted with remade dots? (I have no inside information about CCC this is just an example.)

#337 9 years ago
Quoted from PPS:

don't know what I'll do ... why do you care.

Because I'm a software developer deeply involved in the custom pinball community. There are a bunch of different products being discussed in this thread and I'm trying to figure out how they all fit together in the pinball ecosystem and whether I should be participating in the Fast Developer Program.

#399 9 years ago

Wait, there's a TechShop equivalent in Tacoma that's been open for a year? Nobody ever tells me anything.

#402 9 years ago
Quoted from fastpinball:

Yep. Ecurtz are you local? Do we know each other?
Aaron

I'm in Olympia, but I don't think we've met, since I don't go to tournaments or anything, and if they take my stapler I'm going to burn the building down.

1 week later
#428 9 years ago

What are you using for a distro on the BeagleBone? Every once in a while I get a little tempted to work on an optimized minimal system for the BeagleBone or Raspberry Pi for home-brew machines, but I pretty quickly remember how much I hate hacking Linux.

1 month later
#440 9 years ago

Newark claims to have 100 Beaglebone Blacks in stock (manufactured by them, but identical.) Other places have a handful in stock, but for bulk buys there are still 3500 backorders at Mouser and 0 stock plus unknown backorders at Digi-Key. Maybe since PPS is ordering 1000+ they can just have them built, or maybe they planned well ahead and stockpiled them.

#442 9 years ago

They seem to be kosher - https://groups.google.com/forum/#!msg/beagleboard/cwRP7JC7lM0/g6ZRDYUL-bcJ but since Newark is only producing 500 a month it's probably moot.

3 weeks later
-1
#452 9 years ago

Assuming only rule changes and a DMD, but no other hardware modifications, you're looking at around $300 for the Fast Pinball controller board, $130 for the DMD and mount, plus a licensing fee to PPS and whatever the software itself costs. My "educated" guess is $750.

#454 9 years ago

Yeah, but including a (much) more expensive computer, color display, and new sound system. They list the software as 250€, but that doesn't really seem to match the package cost.

#459 9 years ago

A plasma one is under $150 from Terry at quantity 6, and I assumed the LED ones in bulk were in the same range because Stern has switched. Apparently not. Although anything over $175 or so and it's hard to argue against just using an LCD so it doesn't make a huge difference in my ballpark estimate.

I guess that's a sign you believe my number is too low, but I assume you can't give us more direct pricing information?

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