Final Physical Design – Starting Point
Here’s a picture of my finished physical design, complete with two bumpers, two rubber band bouncers, the curved music staff ramp, and the blue meanie ears elements.
From Physical to Digital – Changes
Something that I struggled with while working on the physical version of the machine was the spiral ramp. From the very beginning, I wanted to have a ramp that led into a spiral-shaped rail encircling the titular yellow submarine. However, due to physical limitations, I couldn’t get the ramp to work properly without either the marble getting stuck on the spiral or the marble not being able to make it up the ramp.
However, in the Visual Pinball version, this is no longer the case!
Something else that I wanted to include from the beginning but due to the physical limitations of the coardboard I couldn’t make properly were the Blue Meanie “pop-up” targets. These targets drop down once they’re hit, so through the power of your pinball you can defeat them and help save Pepperland.
Initial Digital Design
Playtesting Reactions
People enjoyed the theme and were excited that I got the spiral ramp properly implemented into this version of the game! I also recieved some great feedback to help improve my final design:
- The back bumper should be changed to either be closer to the middle of the back wall or further to the left, since it dumps the ball in a strange spot.
- The ramp is very difficult, and even more so to get enough power in order for the ball to make it around.
- If the ball went down the right side of the ramp, it would always go into the gutter. (People liked the rubber triangle near the bottom left of my design, and wished it was on both sides)
- When the meanies are finished being knocked down, there doesn’t feel like there’s much else to do.
These comments helped inform the version of my final design.
Final Digital Design
For my final design, I made some changes in conjunction with the comments from the playtest feedback.
- The spiral ramp (and the submarine) were moved forward.
- I added the triangular shape to the right side of the playfield as well to help prevent too many gutterballs.
- I replaced the two larger bumpers with three smaller black bumpers to represent more of the Sea of Holes. If I were to continue working on this project, I would instead make these kickers.