8 ms·

Dual Coincidence is likely the most complex electromechanical game

127 points by jdlshore 4y ago

diydsp 4y ago
Heya, I worked for Andy doing most of the electronics on this project so if you have any questions about that, fire away! On the art side, I can emphasize some of what was probably too subtle in the article: A major part of this project was the sound. Andy is after all, largely a sound artist/sculptor! Look at this current piece "Whale" in the MIT Museum, his instruments, etc. https://andycavatorta.com/ https://andycavatorta.com/ He went through a lot of thought to come up with the frequencies/scale, and the playing pattern of the chimes. He also went through great trouble and expense to make this pinball game have no speakers/digital sounds. The sound all comes from the clacking of the pinball relays (which yes, are driven by RPi's running Mission Pinball Framework) and most important, the 25 giant metal chimes in the center! One of his other people in his studio did the crazy work of grinding them all to just the right lengths and tuned them with a stroboscopic tuner. It took days and though she wore a full freezer suit (because it was February in Brooklyn and the heat was being repaired in the building after the building owner died and his brother inherited it and had to take over), she would finish the day with aluminum dust embedded in all of her clothing. Also, the tangible nature of the piece was a stark reaction to the other pieces in the show, and in general, his experience as an installation artist in the Boston Museum of Science. Nowadays, so many installations are just tablets. Or maybe a PC with a mouse, etc. He wanted something more tactile than that, that moves, and makes its own side. Several people have commented on the acrylic displays and Andy's general overengineering. Yes, his style is almost always overengineered, love or it hate it, that's part of the work. He likes big, heavy, arduous things. personally theorize it has something to do with his gigantic muscle growth genetics, though he does not work out! The Acrylic displays were scaled up from some person's random Arduino project.... and it turns out the upscaling was full of surprises! We needed a ton of extra light to make them glow. There weren't many LED strips available that were narrow enough, and a bunch of them broke in transit to Mexico. This was due to the sharp edges of the acrylic vibrating and sawing through them! And receiving a package of replacements from DigiKey was not simple. He had to do a lot of paperwork and travel for hours in an Uber to get the package of replacements. Also, just keep those pieces of acrylic clean, dust-free and hand-grease free was a pain! Also here's another secret: Andy almost never uses CAD for his projects. This was his first, or one of his first big projects with CAD and he made the classic mistake of designing the container for the acrylic displays with no space for fasteners! Fortunately, he managed to make it work. Behind the rear of those displays are dozens and dozens of mini boards with FET drivers and constant current drivers... all driven from cascaded shift registers!
doctorhandshake 4y ago
I love the edge-lit acrylic score display. The depth effect when it’s changing is really special, and I say this as someone who really doesn’t care for acrylic.
ArtWomb 4y ago
Pinball Machines are Art. This reminds me of '/////////fur//// art entertainment interfaces' Painstation, which was loosely based on the scene in Never Say Never Again, in which James Bond has to defeat Max Largo in Domination, the world's most deadly video game ;) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PainStation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PainStation
- Traubenfuchs 4y ago
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PainStation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PainStation I am upset that this excites me.
- rspoerri 4y ago
  Students of our Game Design Bachelor were playing until they got bloody hands. Woman really do have a higher pain threshold...
  - scns 4y ago
    Which they need to give birth.
- uejfiweun 4y ago
  I've played this at the museum in Berlin. Very fun game. And it really does hurt, I remember my buddy's wrist was practically raw from getting slapped by the thing so many times.
amelius 4y ago
Imagine an online version of this game ...
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
eternityforest 4y ago
I'd love to see a virtual simulated version on 5 standard arcade cabinets, the physical aspect definitely adds something, but the concept is cool enough that it would still be amazing just as a LAN party type game.
cbm-vic-20 4y ago
This seems cool, but the article and the artists' web site don't show the game actually being played, only short snippets that don't provide much context.
- ajsnigrutin 4y ago
  Yep, and on those snippets it looks like a bland pinball with "something" in the middle of those pinball tables.
  - andy_cavatorta 4y ago
    To be fair, the playfields are pretty simple. But it's also my very first game. And it's nuts. I feel pretty happy about how it's worked out.
  - diydsp 4y ago
    That "something" also got kind of underdeveloped in the article. It's a crazy system for moving balls aka resources from any machine into any machine. If you look closely at it, there's a lot going on :) Each one is made from a bunch of layers of acrylic with channels for the zillions of lights inside, and the solenoids to push out trapped balls, and also inductive sensors to detect if a ball is in there. It would be neat to see this type of exchanger incorporated into other pinball games! Although, given pinball designers' sometimes overly serious nature, it might not happen any time soon...
- elsewhen 4y ago
  here is a video of the game in action: https://vimeo.com/784903495/2bcad6725d?embedded=true&source=vimeo_logo&owner=2340650 https://vimeo.com/784903495/2bcad6725d?embedded=true&source=...
  - junon 4y ago
    ... Which still doesn't really show any gameplay at all.
- michaelteter 4y ago
michaelteter 4y ago
It's all amazing, but that edge lit layered number display is really something special!
cwilkes 4y ago
> "I'm growing corn, and at some point I'm going to need new shoes," explains Cavatorta. "And now I have to trade some of my corn – which is represented as pinballs – with the person who makes shoes. Pinball mixed with Agricola sounds like a niche product, so something I would expect from the MIT Media Lab.
sublinear 4y ago
The complexity for its own sake reminds me of some projects I've worked on before. Cool as art, but terrible engineering.
- andy_cavatorta 4y ago
  It's also the heaviest pinball game in the world. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
joering2 4y ago
Very awesome. But I am still waiting for someone to design video game machine like the one from James's Bond Never Say Never Again, where failure to protect your land from cruise missiles cost you electric shock to your hands! Call me odd, but I think such game would be tremendously popular!! Obviously before you play you will have to sign waiver but hey I guess YOLO!
- BlueTemplar 4y ago
  It's on its 2.5th version already, check out links elsewhere in this thread ! ;)
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
adamrezich 4y ago
there is still ample unexplored design space in the realm of pinball.
Animats 4y ago
Probably not the most complex. Look at some Japanese arcade games with jackpots.[1] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0OnmhhFk9g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0OnmhhFk9g
- rtkwe 4y ago
  Most of that will just be microcontroller driven instead of being electromechanical though.
relwin 4y ago
Building your own pinball game is challenging! Here's a site to get you started: https://pinballmakers.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page https://pinballmakers.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page
waltbosz 4y ago
My cousin used to collect and restoring old electromechanical pinballs. They're actually pretty neat to look inside up close. If anyone is interested, I searched up this video that explains the insides of an electromechanical pinball machine. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBI1taVj3tI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBI1taVj3tI
pbj1968 4y ago
Misuse of the term “electromechanical” in this context and honestly rather simplistic pinball playfields.
syntheweave 4y ago
I remember seeing the /r/pinball threads on this, replete with pin fans complaining about how simple the playfield was. Nice to see it reaching completion.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
mulmen 4y ago
Immediately reminds me of Joust [1]. But looks like this has a more unique ruleset. [1]: https://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=1316 https://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=1316.
patriciaaa 4y ago
[dead]
giuliomagnifico 4y ago
That’s massive (and cyberpunk)! But the description is not clear, or I don’t understand, all the 5 players play together or one against each other to reach the best score?
- andy_cavatorta 4y ago
  It was hard for the journalist to summarize without getting too wordy. Here's how it works. The game starts and scores like normal pinball. Each playfield also produces a resource [corn|carpentry|medicine|shoes|water] by playing. The carousel at the head of the game represents resources from others as balls. You need one of each in your carousel to be healthy and capable. These resources expire as you play, and you cannot get a new playfield ball until you replenish them by trading with other players for them. So you are playing and then having to stop and negotiate with other players.It's got an unpredictable social component. There is a second round in which everybody is using money and the transactions happen without social complications. This is mostly explained by just-in-time illuminated signage inside the playfield. It's fun to play. But it's missing a lot of things the pinball purists care about. It's not designed to be a superior pinball game. It's about getting inside of two different dynamics of production and trade. Also, the game is in a simplified state at the moment because I ran out of time dealing with the endless challenges. But this are the rules as designed.
- Cthulhu_ 4y ago
  I believe it's a demonstration of economics, in that... it could go either way. I do want to believe it's a game where if everyone works together, everyone will get a high score together - demonstrating selfish vs selflessness in economics.
- theelous3 4y ago
  You could read the article? Players each have a score. What they do with that is up to them.
  - andreareina 4y ago
    > Please don't comment on whether someone read an article. "Did you even read the article? It mentions that" can be shortened to "The article mentions that". https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
yunusabd 4y ago
With a claim like that in the title, I would at least expect a comparison to other electromechanical games and a discussion on why this would be the most complex one.
- ohwaitnvm 4y ago
  It actually doesn’t seem to qualify as an electromechanical pinball machine at all. Given the 17 computers in control and modern playfield mechanisms and sensors, it is almost certainly considered a solid state pinball machine. EM machines use much older tech - look at Gottlieb machines from the 40s-70s. Even they switched to SS by the end of the 70s
  - andy_cavatorta 4y ago
    Electromechanical as opposed to video, not meaning 'no computers'.
    - ohwaitnvm 4y ago
      I think y’all are both right and I appreciate the additional contexts. It’s just awkward to headline the article with a term that has a pinball-specific usage and not define it or dig into it a bit more. I’m super impressed though Andy, did you use MPF or something else to program it? I’m only just dipping my toes into building my own pin, it’s quite intimidating realizing the breadth of skills required. EDIT: another post clarified that it is on MPF - nice!
      - andy_cavatorta 4y ago
        It was prototyped on MPF. But I later refactored and used a more direct API for the P3-ROC. Because these games are nothing like typical pinball. And because I'm allergic to frameworks. The direct API isn't public but I can share it with you if you want.
        ohwaitnvm 4y ago

127 points by jdlshore 4y ago

Heya, I worked for Andy doing most of the electronics on this project so if you have any questions about that, fire away! On the art side, I can emphasize some of what was probably too subtle in the article: A major part of this project was the sound. Andy is after all, largely a sound artist/sculptor! Look at this current piece "Whale" in the MIT Museum, his instruments, etc. https://andycavatorta.com/ https://andycavatorta.com/ He went through a lot of thought to come up with the frequencies/scale, and the playing pattern of the chimes. He also went through great trouble and expense to make this pinball game have no speakers/digital sounds. The sound all comes from the clacking of the pinball relays (which yes, are driven by RPi's running Mission Pinball Framework) and most important, the 25 giant metal chimes in the center! One of his other people in his studio did the crazy work of grinding them all to just the right lengths and tuned them with a stroboscopic tuner. It took days and though she wore a full freezer suit (because it was February in Brooklyn and the heat was being repaired in the building after the building owner died and his brother inherited it and had to take over), she would finish the day with aluminum dust embedded in all of her clothing. Also, the tangible nature of the piece was a stark reaction to the other pieces in the show, and in general, his experience as an installation artist in the Boston Museum of Science. Nowadays, so many installations are just tablets. Or maybe a PC with a mouse, etc. He wanted something more tactile than that, that moves, and makes its own side. Several people have commented on the acrylic displays and Andy's general overengineering. Yes, his style is almost always overengineered, love or it hate it, that's part of the work. He likes big, heavy, arduous things. personally theorize it has something to do with his gigantic muscle growth genetics, though he does not work out! The Acrylic displays were scaled up from some person's random Arduino project.... and it turns out the upscaling was full of surprises! We needed a ton of extra light to make them glow. There weren't many LED strips available that were narrow enough, and a bunch of them broke in transit to Mexico. This was due to the sharp edges of the acrylic vibrating and sawing through them! And receiving a package of replacements from DigiKey was not simple. He had to do a lot of paperwork and travel for hours in an Uber to get the package of replacements. Also, just keep those pieces of acrylic clean, dust-free and hand-grease free was a pain! Also here's another secret: Andy almost never uses CAD for his projects. This was his first, or one of his first big projects with CAD and he made the classic mistake of designing the container for the acrylic displays with no space for fasteners! Fortunately, he managed to make it work. Behind the rear of those displays are dozens and dozens of mini boards with FET drivers and constant current drivers... all driven from cascaded shift registers!

doctorhandshake 4y ago

I love the edge-lit acrylic score display. The depth effect when it’s changing is really special, and I say this as someone who really doesn’t care for acrylic.

ArtWomb 4y ago

Pinball Machines are Art. This reminds me of '/////////fur//// art entertainment interfaces' Painstation, which was loosely based on the scene in Never Say Never Again, in which James Bond has to defeat Max Largo in Domination, the world's most deadly video game ;) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PainStation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PainStation

Traubenfuchs 4y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PainStation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PainStation I am upset that this excites me.
rspoerri 4y ago
Students of our Game Design Bachelor were playing until they got bloody hands. Woman really do have a higher pain threshold...
- scns 4y ago
  Which they need to give birth.
uejfiweun 4y ago
I've played this at the museum in Berlin. Very fun game. And it really does hurt, I remember my buddy's wrist was practically raw from getting slapped by the thing so many times.

amelius 4y ago

Imagine an online version of this game ...

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

eternityforest 4y ago

I'd love to see a virtual simulated version on 5 standard arcade cabinets, the physical aspect definitely adds something, but the concept is cool enough that it would still be amazing just as a LAN party type game.

cbm-vic-20 4y ago

This seems cool, but the article and the artists' web site don't show the game actually being played, only short snippets that don't provide much context.

ajsnigrutin 4y ago
Yep, and on those snippets it looks like a bland pinball with "something" in the middle of those pinball tables.
- andy_cavatorta 4y ago
  To be fair, the playfields are pretty simple. But it's also my very first game. And it's nuts. I feel pretty happy about how it's worked out.
- diydsp 4y ago
  That "something" also got kind of underdeveloped in the article. It's a crazy system for moving balls aka resources from any machine into any machine. If you look closely at it, there's a lot going on :) Each one is made from a bunch of layers of acrylic with channels for the zillions of lights inside, and the solenoids to push out trapped balls, and also inductive sensors to detect if a ball is in there. It would be neat to see this type of exchanger incorporated into other pinball games! Although, given pinball designers' sometimes overly serious nature, it might not happen any time soon...
elsewhen 4y ago
here is a video of the game in action: https://vimeo.com/784903495/2bcad6725d?embedded=true&source=vimeo_logo&owner=2340650 https://vimeo.com/784903495/2bcad6725d?embedded=true&source=...
- junon 4y ago
  ... Which still doesn't really show any gameplay at all.
michaelteter 4y ago

michaelteter 4y ago

It's all amazing, but that edge lit layered number display is really something special!

cwilkes 4y ago

> "I'm growing corn, and at some point I'm going to need new shoes," explains Cavatorta. "And now I have to trade some of my corn – which is represented as pinballs – with the person who makes shoes. Pinball mixed with Agricola sounds like a niche product, so something I would expect from the MIT Media Lab.

sublinear 4y ago

The complexity for its own sake reminds me of some projects I've worked on before. Cool as art, but terrible engineering.

andy_cavatorta 4y ago
It's also the heaviest pinball game in the world. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

joering2 4y ago

Very awesome. But I am still waiting for someone to design video game machine like the one from James's Bond Never Say Never Again, where failure to protect your land from cruise missiles cost you electric shock to your hands! Call me odd, but I think such game would be tremendously popular!! Obviously before you play you will have to sign waiver but hey I guess YOLO!

BlueTemplar 4y ago
It's on its 2.5th version already, check out links elsewhere in this thread ! ;)
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

adamrezich 4y ago

there is still ample unexplored design space in the realm of pinball.

Animats 4y ago

Probably not the most complex. Look at some Japanese arcade games with jackpots.[1] [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0OnmhhFk9g https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i0OnmhhFk9g

rtkwe 4y ago
Most of that will just be microcontroller driven instead of being electromechanical though.

relwin 4y ago

Building your own pinball game is challenging! Here's a site to get you started: https://pinballmakers.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page https://pinballmakers.com/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page

waltbosz 4y ago

My cousin used to collect and restoring old electromechanical pinballs. They're actually pretty neat to look inside up close. If anyone is interested, I searched up this video that explains the insides of an electromechanical pinball machine. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBI1taVj3tI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YBI1taVj3tI

pbj1968 4y ago

Misuse of the term “electromechanical” in this context and honestly rather simplistic pinball playfields.

syntheweave 4y ago

I remember seeing the /r/pinball threads on this, replete with pin fans complaining about how simple the playfield was. Nice to see it reaching completion.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

mulmen 4y ago

Immediately reminds me of Joust [1]. But looks like this has a more unique ruleset. [1]: https://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=1316 https://www.ipdb.org/machine.cgi?id=1316.

patriciaaa 4y ago

[dead]

giuliomagnifico 4y ago

That’s massive (and cyberpunk)! But the description is not clear, or I don’t understand, all the 5 players play together or one against each other to reach the best score?

andy_cavatorta 4y ago
It was hard for the journalist to summarize without getting too wordy. Here's how it works. The game starts and scores like normal pinball. Each playfield also produces a resource [corn|carpentry|medicine|shoes|water] by playing. The carousel at the head of the game represents resources from others as balls. You need one of each in your carousel to be healthy and capable. These resources expire as you play, and you cannot get a new playfield ball until you replenish them by trading with other players for them. So you are playing and then having to stop and negotiate with other players.It's got an unpredictable social component. There is a second round in which everybody is using money and the transactions happen without social complications. This is mostly explained by just-in-time illuminated signage inside the playfield. It's fun to play. But it's missing a lot of things the pinball purists care about. It's not designed to be a superior pinball game. It's about getting inside of two different dynamics of production and trade. Also, the game is in a simplified state at the moment because I ran out of time dealing with the endless challenges. But this are the rules as designed.
Cthulhu_ 4y ago
I believe it's a demonstration of economics, in that... it could go either way. I do want to believe it's a game where if everyone works together, everyone will get a high score together - demonstrating selfish vs selflessness in economics.
theelous3 4y ago
You could read the article? Players each have a score. What they do with that is up to them.
- andreareina 4y ago
  > Please don't comment on whether someone read an article. "Did you even read the article? It mentions that" can be shortened to "The article mentions that". https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

yunusabd 4y ago

With a claim like that in the title, I would at least expect a comparison to other electromechanical games and a discussion on why this would be the most complex one.

ohwaitnvm 4y ago
It actually doesn’t seem to qualify as an electromechanical pinball machine at all. Given the 17 computers in control and modern playfield mechanisms and sensors, it is almost certainly considered a solid state pinball machine. EM machines use much older tech - look at Gottlieb machines from the 40s-70s. Even they switched to SS by the end of the 70s
- andy_cavatorta 4y ago
  Electromechanical as opposed to video, not meaning 'no computers'.
  - ohwaitnvm 4y ago
    I think y’all are both right and I appreciate the additional contexts. It’s just awkward to headline the article with a term that has a pinball-specific usage and not define it or dig into it a bit more. I’m super impressed though Andy, did you use MPF or something else to program it? I’m only just dipping my toes into building my own pin, it’s quite intimidating realizing the breadth of skills required. EDIT: another post clarified that it is on MPF - nice!
    - andy_cavatorta 4y ago
      It was prototyped on MPF. But I later refactored and used a more direct API for the P3-ROC. Because these games are nothing like typical pinball. And because I'm allergic to frameworks. The direct API isn't public but I can share it with you if you want.
      - ohwaitnvm 4y ago