Author: Jett Moreno

Visual Pinball: From Cardboard to Code

Initial Design Ideas

When I began planning the digital version of Sketchy Situation, my goal was to do a one-to-one adaptation of the physical version. I didn’t want to reinvent the machine, I just wanted to elevate it. My plan was to preserve the layout, theme, and game mechanics from my cardboard Pinbox while introducing one key feature missing from the original: a proper point system.

In the physical version, the game focused on a singular win condition, hit the monster’s mouth and you win. But in the digital version, I wanted the game to feel more like traditional pinball. This meant rewarding players for hitting different areas, encouraging replayability through score-chasing, and giving feedback beyond just winning or losing.

First Digital Design

This was my first time working with Visual Pinball, and while I had high hopes, my progress was slower than I expected. My first digital prototype was essentially a wireframe version of my Pinbox. I focused on function over form, mapping the ball flow, adjusting ramps, and adding invisible walls to fix areas where the ball would get stuck in the physical version.

I did make some smart mechanical tweaks during this phase. For example, the pencil cup at the bottom became a point bumper instead of a purely decorative element. I also ensured that the main ramp and top area had proper ball physics to avoid the jamming issues I had encountered during the Strong Museum event.

Final Digital Design

In my final version, I added visual elements to bring the game to life. Unfortunately, this is where I fell short. Rather than designing new assets specifically for the digital format, I scanned pieces of my cardboard pinball machine and used them as graphics. While this helped maintain the original art style, it didn’t translate well into a digital environment. The result felt flat and a little unpolished.

I also added drop targets to represent the monster’s attacks, giving players point-scoring opportunities that echoed the ink splotches from the physical design. While the functionality was there, the presentation didn’t live up to my expectations.

To be honest, this final version might be the project I’m least proud of in the class. I spent so much of my energy on the physical build that my digital one ended up feeling more like a rushed port than a proper sequel. I watched tutorials, explored Visual Pinball features, and tried to make the most of what I understood, but I struggled with the tool and it shows in the final product.

Playtesting Reactions

Playtesting for the digital version echoed the physical one in terms of layout and mechanics. Since I kept the designs almost identical, players immediately understood the rules. The new point system added a welcomed layer of engagement, and people enjoyed seeing their score rack up for different actions.

However, the most consistent feedback was about the visuals. Players said the game felt “unfinished” or “messy,” mostly due to the scanned cardboard textures. While the physical aesthetic worked great in real life, it didn’t feel intentional or refined when brought into the digital world. If I had more time, I would definitely focus on creating unique, stylized assets tailored for screen use.

Citations

Imagine RIT

My one-hour shift at Imagine RIT was surprisingly lively. Going into it, I expected just a few curious glances here and there, but our pinball table turned out to be extremely popular, especially with kids. It was fun, energetic, and a great trial run for what was to come later at the Strong Museum event.

Kids were pretty aggressive with the machines, but fortunately, nothing broke on mine during my shift. That said, by the next class session, I discovered some minor damage: the doodle monster at the top of my playfield had lost its teeth. I quickly crafted new ones and made the necessary repairs to get it back in shape.

Between the two shifts, I didn’t make many major changes to gameplay, but I did spend some time flattening out parts of the board where the ball tended to get stuck. These subtle tweaks helped improve the overall flow of the machine without altering the core design.

Strong Museum Pinball Day

The Strong Museum shift was a longer 3.5-hour experience. While it was a bit less populated than Imagine RIT because the event was indoors and the weather was rainy, it still had some great highs. There were plenty of families and kids, and seeing how excited they were about building and playing pinball machines was genuinely rewarding.

My shift was mostly spent stationed at my pinbox, ready to explain the design and talk about the class to visitors. Having already done Imagine RIT, I felt much more confident and relaxed. I’m typically a pretty shy person, but this event helped push me out of my comfort zone. I had real conversations with strangers about something I was proud of, something I built.

One of the first challenges of the day was addressing the rain damage my machine suffered during transport. Some components were slightly warped, but with a little help and quick fixes, I managed to repair everything before the event started. I even took the opportunity to make a meaningful upgrade to my design: I added walls around the ramp at the top of the playfield to prevent the ball from getting stuck, which had been a problem during earlier tests.

Perhaps the most inspiring part of the day was getting to see the pinboxes made by Ben and the other workshop leaders. Their machines featured some truly clever ideas such as fidget spinners as bumpers, ball bearings for dynamic motion, and other imaginative mechanics. It really encouraged me to think more creatively about what pinball can be. Seeing their work made me want to go back and push my own machine further.

Takeaways From the Class

Before this class, I wouldn’t have considered myself a pinball fan. I had played it a few times, but I held the same general opinion that a lot of people probably do: that it’s an old arcade novelty. This course completely changed my perspective.

Not only did I learn the rich history of pinball, but I also got a glimpse into a passionate and dedicated community I didn’t even know existed. There are people out there keeping this game alive, not just as a form of nostalgia, but as a living, evolving design space.

And now, I get it. Pinball is far more than just flippers and bumpers. It’s a blend of artistry, engineering, playtesting, and iteration. It’s storytelling through mechanics. Thanks to this class, I feel like I’ve joined a small part of that world. I’m leaving this experience not just as someone who knows how to make a pinball machine, but as someone who actually enjoys doing it.

Pinbox Pinball: Sketchy Situation

Initial Design Ideas

When I started brainstorming for my Pinbox 3000 pinball machine, I knew I wanted to build a sketch-inspired game. I set out to create a game that looked like it had been sketched by a kid during class. Every part of the game would lean into that vibe from the lined paper backdrop to the handmade cardboard elements designed to mimic school supplies like rulers, pens, and erasers.

Originally, my win condition was going to be super specific: the player would guide the ball up a ramp to hit a “guard” holding a pencil sword. This pencil would be attached to a spinner, and if the ball hit the tip just right, the pencil would spin out of the way, revealing a hole beneath the guard’s legs. Sink the ball in the hole and you win.

That was the plan for weeks. I moved straight into sketching a rough outline on my cardboard playfield.

This design features 2 eraser themed bumpers at the bottom on the playfield, a ramp on the right side too simply add some more action, and finally the big ramp in the top left to hit that pencil and get you that victory. In Hindsight this design was very empty and didnt have much gameplay past the ramp. But I continued with it yet again and made a rough physcial design.

The phyiscal prototype pretty much matches the planned outline without many deviations. The main one was that the soon to be erasers were moved slightly. However as construction went on with this design, I realized I was falling behind. The guard mechanism was tricky and I couldn’t get the win condition to work the way I wanted. Everyone had compelted boxes and this was the state of mine.

So I pivoted.

Rough Physical Design & Major Pivot

After days of struggle, I brought the pinbox home and redesigned the game in one night, 9:30 PM to 4 AM. I kept the notebook sketch theme, but ditched the knight guard. Instead, I designed a doodle monster that lurks at the top of the field. The goal now was to hit the ball up a ramp and into the monster’s open mouth, damaging it like a boss fight in a video game. It felt like a natural evolution, still cartoonish and creative, but way more fun and less finicky.

The board featured a hand-drawn lined paper background, a monster made of scribbles and cardboard, books actaing as the borders and a cup on pencils as an obsticle. My loose design rules were simple: everything on the board could be made out of supplies a kid might find in their pencil case or on their desk.

Iteration & Playtesting Feedback

While I was happy with the design, it still felt more like a novelty than a full pinball experience. That’s when I got some great advice during playtesting from my Ta Kai: having only a win condition wasn’t enough. Players need ongoing feedback, reasons to keep playing, trying, and improving. A scoring system would help with that.

So I got to work on the final iteration. I added:

  • Scoring zones: Black blobs across the board represent the monster’s attacks. Hitting them gives you 100 points.
  • Point bonuses: The previously useless ramp now leads to a block worth 500 points.
  • Combat scoring: Hitting the monster gives 2000 points. Getting the ball into its mouth? A satisfying 10,000 points.

These additions made the game feel way more dynamic, adding the replayability and engagement it was missing before.

Final Design: The Sketch is Complete

The final version of Sketchy Situation is bold, colorful, and fun. The ramp mechanics work smoothly, and the monster’s dramatic presence at the top of the playfield gives the game a clear focal point. The layered cardboard build gives it depth, while the notebook-themed backdrop and hand-drawn elements sell the idea that it came straight from a kid’s imagination.

Stepping Stone to the Digital Version

This machine is just the beginning. As I move toward building a digital version of Sketchy Situation, I see so much potential for expansion:

  • Real-time score tracking with animations and effects
  • Combo multipliers if you hit multiple scoring blobs in a row
  • Dynamic visuals (scribbles that animate when hit, explosions, pencil-drawn UI, etc.)
  • Sound design to emphasize hits, bonuses, and boss fight moments

This physical build helped me test ideas quickly and solidify a theme, but in a digital space I’ll have more freedom to go wild with feedback systems, progression, and flashy polish.

Conclusion

Building Sketchy Situation was both chaotic and satisfying, just like a real sketching session. What started as a cardboard mess turned into something that feels cohesive and playable, and I learned a lot about how to pace a game, when to pivot, and how to turn feedback into stronger design.

And now? I’m ready to make it go digital.

Pinbox Bagatelle: Control

Initial Design Ideas

Coming up with an initial design for my Pinbox Bagatelle game was a challenge. I spent a lot of time looking at various bagatelle designs for inspiration, but I didn’t have a specific reference in mind. However, one element remained consistent throughout my iterations: I wanted a single win hole rather than multiple point-scoring holes.

The first draft of my design featured a symmetrical pin layout with three circular bumpers disrupting the ball’s path. Additionally, two flaps at the top were designed to redirect the ball toward the center. One of the most distinct features in this version was the use of rubber band bumpers at the bottom. At this stage, my idea was to have a game that continued until the player won. The rubber band bumpers made it almost impossible for the ball to exit the playfield, allowing players to keep bouncing it back up. However, as I refined my concept, I realized that this mechanic strayed from the traditional spirit of bagatelle.

Rough Physical Design

Once I built a rough prototype, I really started to explore the concept of control in gameplay. However, at this point, I still hadn’t figured out a concrete theme for my game. The rough physical design maintained the symmetrical pin layout from the initial sketch and included a curved top inspired by traditional bagatelle boards. The disruption flaps at the top also remained.

One significant change I made in this iteration was modifying the rubber band bumpers. Instead of using them to keep the ball in play indefinitely, I turned them into additional ball catchers alongside the win hole, introducing a losing condition. This opened up the bottom of the playfield, allowing the ball to exit. Another major alteration was the removal of the round bumpers. I initially made this change due to a lack of suitable materials, but it turned out to be a happy accident, one that would later help define my game’s theme.

Playtesting and Iteration

While I didn’t get the chance to have others playtest my game, I conducted extensive solo testing. As soon as I finished the rough prototype, I started experimenting with how the ball moved. One of the first issues I encountered was that the ball struggled to reach the top of the playfield, which led me to add a shooter lane.

However, after adding the shooter lane, I encountered another unexpected problem: the transition between the right wall and the curved top wasn’t smooth. The ball would hit a wedge and lose momentum rather than gliding smoothly across.

To address this, I extended the curved top further down along the right wall, creating a seamless surface that allowed the ball to flow as intended.

Another major discovery during playtesting was that my pins were too closely spaced, which caused the ball to get stuck in unwanted places. To fix this, I removed some of the pins, which led to a surprising realization. I had unintentionally created three distinct lanes:

  • A left lane for when too much force was used
  • A right lane for when too little force was applied
  • And a middle lane for when the player used just the right amount of strength

Then, during one particular playtest, I pulled the launcher back with just the right amount of force, and the ball landed perfectly in the win hole. That’s when it hit me, my game was all about control. The core challenge wasn’t just getting the ball into the win hole but mastering precision and finesse to find the perfect balance of force.

Final Design

This is the final design for my game, Control, a game all about self-control. To effectively communicate this theme, I implemented a speedometer-style visual design. A fully filled bar to the left represents pulling back too hard, while a barely filled bar to the right represents pulling too weakly. In the center, players see the game’s logo, featuring a speedometer pointing straight to the middle and the winning hole positioned below it, reinforcing the idea that the goal is to shoot with just the right amount of force.

Unfortunately, in the final physical version, I didn’t get the chance to fully realize my intended design. The playfield is missing the two power bars on each side, which would have further reinforced the theme. However, if I were to revisit this project, adding those elements would be an easy improvement to make my game feel more complete, along with finishing its logo.

I’m excited to move on to designing a pinball machine, incorporating the lessons I learned from making this bagatelle. While the plain brown cardboard look worked well for a bagatelle (since traditional bagatelles often had simple wooden designs) my pinball machine will need a much more eye-catching aesthetic to stand out among real machines.