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by phreezie 1000 days ago
If there are any pinhead game devs out there, we're still working on the next generation of Visual Pinball, called VPE[1].

However, given the current drama around Unity, we're currently looking into Godot to evaluate how much effort it would take to port, and how Godot will support our needs.

[1] https://github.com/freezy/VisualPinball.Engine

2 comments

I have a VPX cab that but I've been out of the loop for a while because it just works. A refresh of my cab is on the agenda, though, and VPE looks great!

Are you targeting Linux compatibility, by chance? My biggest complaint about the whole VPX scene is that it's locked to Windows.

Yes, we're targeting all the desktop platforms, i.e. Windows, Linux and macOS.

But thanks to recent efforts, VPX also runs on Linux now! It's on the standalone branch[1], under actions you can download a build.

[1] https://github.com/vpinball/vpinball/tree/standalone

And it runs pretty great! I just found out about it the other day and was impressed how well it worked.

By the way prheezie, thanks for all the work you put into VPX. I hope to see VPE get some momentum behind it once again now that your DMD stuff is finished off. What do you think the likelihood is of moving to Godot, and what would you estimate as the impact on VPE?

Aw, thanks :)

TBH I just started looking into it, together with a few other developers from the community. I'll post something at the usual place as soon as we know more.

Sounds good. Thanks for the update. I'll keep my eye on the usual place :-)
Is Visual Pinball the pinball emulator of choice these days?

(Asking because I want to build a cab this Winter and not sure where to begin.)

It depends on the effort you want to put in, and the tables you want to play.

VPX has the largest table collection, and the good ones play very well. But there is also Pinball FX which is a lot easier to set up, and they are catching up in terms of cabinet support (we're helping them, the next thing is force feedback support).

There is also Future Pinball which runs a few original games with mods pretty well now, but it's still closed source.

You’ll probably end up primarily running Visual Pinball. Some of emulations are nearly perfect if you disregard nudging; I’ve never been able to get convincing nudge physics.

Pinball FX is pretty fun too, but it definitely feels more like a video game than VPX.

Oh, and if you don't know where to start, check this out:

http://mjrnet.org/pinscape/BuildGuideV2/BuildGuide.php

Yes. I don't even bother with anything else on my cab anymore. Good VPX tables are the best looking and best playing and there are a ton of them now with more being made by the community all the time.