Virtual Pinball VPX

[peterrrjr]

Hi, I need helpt setting up VPX in BigBox.

 

I am not getting my BigBox to launch pinball properly. The tables load fine from the launchbox, but never from bigbox. I need to use the mous to get it working, then no score is showng up. I know it can be done, but I am not figuring it out.

 

I also wnto to know if anyone knows where I can find this theme from this video:

So I need:

 

1) Properly launch the tables. Tried a lots of different approaches, to no avail.

2) Properly quit the table. I need a way to quit VPX and return to bigbox. Nothing worked so far. I still need to use the mouse, and this is really annoying.

3) Disabled the backglass. Now I need to figure out how to display the scores. Some tables have it built in, most do not.

If anyone could help, it would be awesome!

[sundogak]

Not sure why they wouldn't launch without seeing snaps of your setup in LB.  VPX tables launch fine in my Bigbox setup and also exit out according to whatever command you have in LB (or via Pause menu in LB). 

I assume you have the following default commands in your setup for the VPX emulator:

-minimized -exit -play

Other things to try: 

1. In BigBox, might go into Options and try turning off the Mouse (shouldn't matter, but something to try).
2. Make sure running VPX 10.6
3. In VPX try turning toggling Windowed Fullscreen to Exclusive Full Screen (or vice versa). 

On your question on which theme: in the first video that is Unified Refried theme. 

On your question on backglass issue:  that can get complicated with VPX. First off,  I would go to the VPX table sites and download the most recent version of the one of the tables you are having issues with to make sure the script hadn't been modified. Make sure it is the desktop version and not the cabinet version of the table (if given an option).  Many of the newer tables are coded to detect if two or more screens are turned on and will turn off the DMD on the primary screen since logic is it is cabinet and will have a separate backglass screen. 

There were a couple VPX "sets" floating around that had all been modified for dual screen cabinet (but didn't indicate that) so the script code had been manually altered from original to turn off DMD on the main screen along with backgrounds. Makes sense for cabinets but for single screen not so much.  If you know your way around the script code in VPX you can alter the code for the DMDs. You can also download the DMD Extensions program  which allows you to place a floating DMD wherever want. However, it can be a pain to setup and you have to manually indicate coordinates of DMD.  If want a simple "in the upper left corner" setup not too bad otherwise means each table has an entry in the ini file with coordinates that have to determine manually. Most tables should have desktop setup with background and DMD on main screen if not using B2S server (backglass program).  So more than likely, my guess is that the table set you have is a cabinet version.  In most cases, likely will be easier to download the current table rather than fiddling with the code. 

This helpful Google Spreadsheet tool lists all VPX tables along with links to table site.  Also useful to keep up on updates to tables for bug fixes. 

 

Edited December 30, 2019 by sundogak

[sundogak]

One other thing to try that I noticed on my setup. I don't use BB much for pinball so hadn't notice prior.  I was getting script errors ("Index out of Range") on some tables in VP (Fireball, 24, Fish Tales) that would cause VP to halt and BB to hang.  It only occurred in BB and only if the back glass settings were set in B2S Server to launch the EXE rather than standard startup and only for some tables. I didn't want to fiddle with my back glass settings though.  Upon searching there were some threads on the GamEX site for similar issues when running their front end that noted odd crashes, hangs, and screen issues.  The fix was to check the program compatibility setting. 

So in LB case, go to the BigBox.exe and right click on it for properties.  Select the compatibility tab and see if "Compatibility Mode" is checked.  If so, uncheck it.  I don't recall ever checking this but apparently it was. Once I did that the oddball tables worked with no crashes or hangs in BigBox.  If the above doesn't work, then try checking the "Disable B2S" box in Visual Pinball. Since you don't use back glass function, then not a big issue to check it.  B2S appears to be the program that isn't playing nicely with BigBox so before I did the above fix, disabling (or turning B2S Server to run in Standard Mode versus EXE Mode) also fixed the sporadic table crashes.