Download the latest Tech Beta of Visual Pinball from the official site (http://www.randydavis.com/vp/download.htm). Unfortunately, it’s a Windows-only program. More unfortunately, you also need the latest versions of DirectX, Windows Script (available with Internet Explorer 5.01 or above, Windows 98/ME, or Windows 2000/XP), and also Windows Media Player to install the audio runtimes.

Some versions of the game were limited betas, so if you grab one of those, it’ll say that your time is up, and you can’t play. However, the author decided to take away this limited-time status, so just hunt around on sites such as VPForums (http://www.vpforums.com/) for an executable without the time limit. This is perfectly legitimate and creator-approved, not a time-crack of any kind.

After installing the program, run it. Because it’s really a construction kit into which you can load games, you’ll see that it opens straight into a blank construction screen. This feature makes it even more fascinating, because all the tables you download are completely open; you can fiddle with them, tweak the locations of objects, and then test your changes right away.

In the blank editor screen, go to the File menu and select Open, then load one of the example tables created by Randy Davis himself. Choose Alien Reactor. You’ll see a rather smart top-down grid view of the table appear, looking something like Figure 7-2.

Figure 7-2. The Visual Pinball editing screen

Before we mess up anything, let’s try the table as originally loaded. Hit the F5 key or the Play icon on the left side of the screen. Within five seconds, the table will pop up in a pseudo-3D view, completely playable. Hit the Escape key after playing for a while to return to the editor screen.

Click on any of the individual items on the board, and drag them to move them around. If you really want your flippers in the middle of nowhere, go ahead and move them. Click the Options button on the left side of the screen to see the specific settings for that object, including its colors, physics, size, and orientation.

Also click on Script to see the script for the table. As you can see, it’s actually pretty straightforward Visual Basic. Here’s an example:

Sub CheckTargets
    If Target1.IsDropped And Target2.IsDropped And Target3.IsDropped Then
        Target1.IsDropped = False
        Target2.IsDropped = False
        Target3.IsDropped = False
        PlaySound "FlipperUp"
        PlaySound "GotLight"        
        mainsoundtimer.Enabled = True
        AddScore 10000
    End If
End Sub

This code checks the drop targets, which adds to the player’s score, plays sounds, and resets them when the player has hit all three.

Creating your own pintable with Visual Pinball is actually fairly straightforward, although some of the Visual Basic can be a little tricky. Check out the VPForums gurus and Q/A areas if you get stuck. You can learn a lot from existing tables by opening up their scripts and checking out exactly what they’re doing; open source is a good thing indeed.

ShivaSite has several great templates and FAQs, though you’ll need to register in order to download or view any of them. Check out http://www.shivasite.com/modules.php?modid=1&action=cat&id=5.

If you’re interested in some more exotic flipperless tables as found in bagatelle and pachinko machines, see the Sahara Sales page (http://pinballnirvana.com/) In particular, be sure to read the tutorial that explains how to replace the default plunger with a variable velocity kicker.

Although there are many faithful reproductions of existing tables, plenty of other people have made completely original pintables (some of which are based on licenses they may be particularly enamored of). There’s no good central download source for these, but the VP Original Tables Releases forum (http://www.vpforums.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?forumid=88) handles announcements and reviews of new original creations. If you make a table of release quality, announce it there.

As of press time, a new resource has appeared at http://www.public.asu.edu/~checkma/pinball/originals.html, with links to all new or updated originally designed homebrew tables. This may also be worth checking out or submitting information to; however, because it uses third-party links, it won’t host your files for you.

The following sections describe a few notable homebrew tables.

Inner City Life

This intriguing oversized pintable has some really nice custom graphics, gigantic ramps, and a much more synthetic look (Figure 7-3) than many other tables that really try to look like actual pinball machines. It works great nonetheless. Look out for the massive ramp through the skyscrapers on the right side of the playfield, as well as the mini-playfield with the mini-flipper up in the top left. Download it from http://www.scholzroland.de/VPStuff/.

Figure 7-3. Roland Scholz’s neat Inner City Life Visual pinball table