pinball maniac or pinball addicted?

The reason for this website is to give you a chance to see screenshots of pinball-CD`s and of pinball simulations (freeware!) on the www like / VPinMame and Future Pinball and (to purchase) Pinball FX by steam. A personal review of the tables are added to give you an idea what pinsim is worth playing.

It all started in the 80´s until the late 90´s when I almost played every real pinball machine I could lay my hands on. When I first got in contact with a CD of a pinball simulation (late 90´s) I was surprised there already existed pinsims since several years. I wondered how real the feeling would be playing a pinsim on a PC.

Well, the most pinsims lacked in graphics, had scrolling screens and the ballmovement ranged from unplayable/ridiculous motion (particulary the older DOS pinsims) to pinsims under win95 with quite nice playing for fun but still far away from realistic good ball physics.
Still much better than the first steps in Pinball under pure MS-DOS games, that were far away from pinball fun.

The true pinball feeling started with the PRO Pinball series. My all time favorite pinsim is Timeshock, still the best pinsim ever on CD with a great videogame althoug I didn`t crack the pinsim yet.

My website was under construction when I stumbled over a programm called . A new era in pinball on the PC had started! You can create your own pinsims (layout, graphics, make your rules and counting ...) or play pinsims of others as well as recreations of original pinball machines with excellent ball physics!

The next step was the VPinMame-emulator that allows you to use the romsets of the real pinball machines in combination with Visual Pinball to share even the videogames that are used in pinball machines!

In 2004 a new pinball simulation   came into life basing on OpenGL technic. Both, Future Pinball and VP/VPinMame are comparable in physics. I guess the features of the individual programs are better be noticable by the users/tabledesigners. Both are constantly worked on so versions with new features and "better physics" were/are issued.

In 2009 the VP version 8 changed to 9. This new version with new physics and graphic engines isn`t fully backward compatible any more. Tables have to be worked over to run properly under the new version because of a wider ball that might get stuck on playing VP8 pinsims in VP9.
I guess in 2015 VP10 started (not backward compatible). All versions can be installed parallel. (Use the most recent installer that brings along VP 8+9!).
What I felt when playing was a faster ballspeed for the earlier versions of VPX (on my system), not always for my liking. The rebounce of rubber.. is very often deadly for the ball. The possibilities for graphical artworks are expanded for 3D models.... Rarely, but when happening usually with a good ball, the bug with the ball running through the flippers has been fixed!
Better and more tutorials on how to install, you will find in www. Best for VP is the actual VPinstaller that brings almost everything you need!

01/2023