New WIP Pirates of the Caribbean pup-pack

[Cliffy]

1 hour ago, kcirrick said:

I’m working on setting up the pup-pack in Desktop mode on my cabinet and to use its own PinupPlayer.ini.  I noticed the lines you mentioned on the Liars Dice topper video and was able to remove them by changing the size of the screen to a variable of 1920x1080 which is the size of the video.

 

ScreenHeight=640

ScreenWidth=270

 

I’ve also been making changes so the Alpha the ocean border and the rest of the backglass show up correctly.  Much of it disappears behind the desktop theme.  I recall a way to fix that, but what it was??  It was either from TerryRed or Nailbuster so I’m digging for that.

 

Thanks for your patience and help.

Yes in desktop mode you need to have nailbusters desktoppunnch.exe and pupinit.bat in the pup folder alongside the pinupplayer.ini. This makes all the overlays and videos pop to the top.  

Anytime you use movie clips (vs TV clips of old) they will be 16:9 ratio so regardless of screen size I always make my ratio 16:9. I use an online screen res aspect ratio calculator to help with that. Fulldmds also generally use 16:9 while slim dmd uses 4:1. If using old TV show clips they are 4:3

[kcirrick]

I have everything working in Desktop mode.  Just need to set up options to choose cabinet or desktop modes.  I temporarily replaced the topper video until I make one in higher resolution.  Expect a new upload this afternoon. 

[kcirrick]

Here is a link to the pup-pack.  I've added two options.  Option 1 is for three screen cabinet mode and option 2 is for desktop mode. 

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/13i14WqAuv6CdxITP3FKJPA-6RN_ihXlF/view?usp=sharing

Edited February 15 by kcirrick

[kcirrick]

20 hours ago, Cliffy said:

Yes in desktop mode you need to have nailbusters desktoppunnch.exe and pupinit.bat in the pup folder alongside the pinupplayer.ini. This makes all the overlays and videos pop to the top.  

Anytime you use movie clips (vs TV clips of old) they will be 16:9 ratio so regardless of screen size I always make my ratio 16:9. I use an online screen res aspect ratio calculator to help with that. Fulldmds also generally use 16:9 while slim dmd uses 4:1. If using old TV show clips they are 4:3

Thanks for the input.  I figured out the solution and got all those files in the right place.  I use DaVinci Resolve for all my video editing so changing ratios and frame rates and such is pretty simple.  The aspect ratio of that topper video didn't like the size of the window in desktop mode so I did a little tweaking.  Some of the videos still aren't the best quality.  Sometimes because I needed to zoom in to get what I needed, but mostly because I've been unsuccessful ripping my DVD's and so had to use - um, other sources.

[PIPAllah]

19 hours ago, kcirrick said:

Here is a link to the pup-pack.  I've added two options.  Option 1 is for three screen cabinet mode and option 2 is for desktop mode. 

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/13i14WqAuv6CdxITP3FKJPA-6RN_ihXlF/view?usp=sharing

Peace,

 

I'll take a quick look at your work.  If I can suggest anything, I will.

[Cliffy]

Your pupinit.bat is causing a windows error to pop up in the background "Can't find PupDesktopPunch.exe"

Use the one attached instead

pupinit.bat

[Cliffy]

Heres what I see in desktop mode with the better pupinit.bat.  Very nice! I see something punching through on the left behind the dmd and topper and making a big blank space. I'll need to tailor a pinupplayer.ini to move screens a bit I see.

[kcirrick]

2 hours ago, Cliffy said:

Your pupinit.bat is causing a windows error to pop up in the background "Can't find PupDesktopPunch.exe"

Use the one attached instead

pupinit.bat 63 B · 0 downloads

Lookin' much better.  I appreciate your help.  I'll give that bat file a shot.  Don't know if it matters, but I'm running Windows 11.  What's popping up behind the dmd looks like the animated ocean background that should be surrounding the alpha.  Get that moved over and Jack and Elizabeth won't be floating in space anymore.  I created that ocean using a mask so it fits like a puzzle piece and has to be located right down to the pixel.  Everything located correctly when I ran in desktop mode so I'm not sure what's up.  In the pinupplayer.ini that was included that ocean screen is info10.  It looks like the height and width are correct.  Just the location is wrong for some reason.  I'll check my zip file and make sure I included the right ini file.  I've been doing a lot of editing and moving files around.  Not only is this my first pup-pack, but it's the first time I've tried to set up desktop mode.  Another learning opportunity.

[Cliffy]

Yeah I just haven't had a lot of time to fiddle with the ini but will in a while. Heres the thing- everyone will have their own default pinupplayer.ini in the \pinupsystem\ root folder. I create one in each games pup folder because so many pups use different screens, some with fulldmd, some with toppers, others with flasher based dmd. sorry to warn you but there is no one size fits all solution

Edited February 16 by Cliffy

[kcirrick]

Well, that's not encouraging.  All my games use the pinupplayer.ini in my pinupsystem folder too, but the pinupplayer.ini in the pup-pack should override that as long as pinupplayer is up to date.  Don't quote me, but I think it needs to be at least ver 1.4.  I'm using ver 1.5.0.12.  I hit option 1 and it copies the three screen ini file to the pup-pack root and all the screens are placed properly for cabinet mode.  I hit option 2 and it copies that ini and all the screens are now set for desktop mode.  I have to change the full screen option in visual player of course, but no one else should be switching from cabinet mode to desktop mode.  

 

By the way, that pupinit.bat file worked fine.  I guess all the junk in the one I had was old news and not needed anymore. 

 

When you get your pinupplayer.ini set I'd appreciate if you would shoot it to me so I can see what it does on my machine.  Meanwhile, I'm going to work on upgrading that topper video.

Thanks again for the help.

[Cliffy]

Ok so I had to make screen 8 and 10 force on. The slimdmd vids might be too high of bitrate or resolution as you see white area blotting out the videos at times. All looks good on the backglass vids though. Here's my pinupplayer.ini

PinUpPlayer.ini

[Cliffy]

After all that I must say bravo for a really very well done pack! You put a lot of time in creating a ton of audio callouts and music as well as all this video clips. Great job for a first timer! I would not have known that if you didn't tell us!

[kcirrick]

Thanks much!  I think I actually started this in the end of September.  At first it was a lot of trial and error.  Once I got going, something would work well and then a particular pattern would cause an issue.  I had the Fight the Kraken looping until you lost a ball or killed him and it worked fine.  Then I set up Jack the Monkey as a splashresume so when all four lights were lit he would repeatedly interrupt other videos for a for a few seconds multiple times until those four lights were out.  That worked too.  Then I was fighting the kraken, Jack the monkey started screaming and I lost all the balls.  Jack stopped screaming and a ball lost video played, but when that was done the looping kraken video resumed and kept looping even though there were no longer any balls in play.  It kept going until another trigger interrupted it.  The kraken battle no longer loops until I figure it out.  I've dealt with lots of things like that.  It works until it doesn't and then figure out a different way.    The videos were very time consuming.  I couldn't successfully rip my DVD's so I had to do with what I could find elsewhere.  Lots of zooming in, cropping, major editing, sometimes rearranging scenes, editing and adding music to match my video edits, adding sound effects.  yadda yadda.  I was just able to get some digital copies of four of the movies including Dead Man's Chest so I should be able to improve some of those videos.  First on the list is that liars dice.  (I took a break for a bit to fix dinner and work on my AK-47.  It was stove piping at the range the other day.  Don't know if you know much about firearms.  Stove piping:  A new round enters the chamber, but the spent casing gets stuck and not fully ejected.  Guns, (I'm kind of a professional amateur.  I don't know all guns, but I know my guns well.), and my game room are my two hobbies.)

 

When I get this pup-pack posted I'll be sure to give you credit for your help.  Thanks for the file.  I'll give it a try.

[Cliffy]

Yeah we didn't call it stove piping. we called it cheap chinese junk 'cause their barrels expand and contract too much- soft steel.  I was raised on a homestead outside of fairbanks, ak so, yeah.

 

really admire your dedication to making a great puppack!

 

[PIPAllah]

Peace,

 

On my cabinet, everything is squeezed on Screen 1 which is my FullDMD, because of the pinupplayer.ini.  I removed it and got part of the pup backglass on my backglass.  It's going to take a minute for me to configure this pup to fit in my cabinet.  Most people who want to plug and play are going to delete your pup before they figure out how to configure it.

 

The little I could see, this is an ambitious project and a worthy addition to any collection of pup packs.  It's just going to take a little while to get it working properly in my cabinet.

[PIPAllah]

Peace,

 

Other things to consider when building a pup pack:

 

"Note: PuP-Packs should avoid using PuP displays 5-10 as they are designed for Popper FrontEnd. You should use pup 11-19 with custompos for additional pupdisplays." - Nailbuster.

 

I would also suggest using the standardized system for Pup Screens:

 

0=Topper

1=DMD

2=Backglass

3=Playfield

4=etc.

 

Even though you're using a large screen, it shouldn't matter because once the screens are assigned correctly, your custom numbers should work on my system also.  I will test that tomorrow once I wake up.

[kcirrick]

1920X1080

Appreciate that input.  I'm wondering if it might be a screen resolution issue.  My display is set at 3840 x 2160 and it works great.  I stuck Cliffy's pinupplayer.ini in and the table showed up fine, but the pup-pack screens were on the left side of the display and only about three and a half inches wide plus the ocean screen around the alpha was missing entirely.  I changed my display resolution to 1920 x 1080 and the entire pup-pack was positioned correctly except the ocean was still missing and I had to relocate that screen.  I've been able to load any pup-pack without rearranging screens so I just set mine up to work on my cabinet and figured it would load fine on other cabinets.  I'm not sure what the secret is or if I'm even on the right track, but it looks like a little more research is in order. 

 

[kcirrick]

10 minutes ago, PIPAllah said:

Peace,

 

Other things to consider when building a pup pack:

 

"Note: PuP-Packs should avoid using PuP displays 5-10 as they are designed for Popper FrontEnd. You should use pup 11-19 with custompos for additional pupdisplays." - Nailbuster.

 

I would also suggest using the standardized system for Pup Screens:

 

0=Topper

1=DMD

2=Backglass

3=Playfield

4=etc.

 

Even though you're using a large screen, it shouldn't matter because once the screens are assigned correctly, your custom numbers should work on my system also.  I will test that tomorrow once I wake up.

Yeah, when I started I had absolutely no idea what I was doing so the screens are kind of a mess and I never got around to cleaning that up.  I've got a bunch of cleanup I've got to do from when I was trying to replace the tables callouts anyway.  I gave up on that because there were too many issues and I found I can't dump the POTC ROM.  It's a good as time now to take care of it all.  Time for a backup so I can really mess things up.  One thing for sure is I'm learning a lot.  Once POTC is figured out I'm sure the next one will go smoother.

[kcirrick]

Well, that’s it for tonight. I cleaned up the screens.pup and reassigned the triggers to the new screens, started the game and Alpha and Ocean were missing. Then, without thinking what I was doing, I ran the Option 1 bat and too late realized I had just written over all my work. No worries. It’s about 30 minutes to redo it.

 

That AK is definitely not my primary. That’s a Colt AR with an ACOG. I’ve had that AK for four and a half years and it’s never failed me once. What changed was I had an optic mount mounted on the side and swapped that out for a Texas Weapon Systems dust cover with a picatinny rail. Took it to the range and got the stove pipes. Disassemble, inspect, clean, lube and will take it back to the range next week. If it happens again I’ll try firing without the dust cover on. If I can’t resolve it I’ll contact TWS and see if they have any advice.

 

When I redo those pup files tomorrow I’ll upload and post the new link.

[PIPAllah]

4 hours ago, kcirrick said:

Well, that’s it for tonight. I cleaned up the screens.pup and reassigned the triggers to the new screens, started the game and Alpha and Ocean were missing. Then, without thinking what I was doing, I ran the Option 1 bat and too late realized I had just written over all my work. No worries. It’s about 30 minutes to redo it.

 

That AK is definitely not my primary. That’s a Colt AR with an ACOG. I’ve had that AK for four and a half years and it’s never failed me once. What changed was I had an optic mount mounted on the side and swapped that out for a Texas Weapon Systems dust cover with a picatinny rail. Took it to the range and got the stove pipes. Disassemble, inspect, clean, lube and will take it back to the range next week. If it happens again I’ll try firing without the dust cover on. If I can’t resolve it I’ll contact TWS and see if they have any advice.

 

When I redo those pup files tomorrow I’ll upload and post the new link.

Peace,

 

I got you.  Everything appears to be working on my cabinet now.  You weren't using screens 16 and 19 so I moved stuff there.  I put the ocean on 16 and made a D0 trigger so that it loads with the pup pack.  I put the DMD on 19.  Both now have custom positions.  Screen 16 has 2,0,0,100,100 and screen 19 has 0,0,0,100,100.  The reason I've done it that way is because in Screen Configuration I have screen 0 set to DMD/Topper which is configured to the top half of my DMD.

 

Now, my next question is what kind of monster video card or processor are you using?  I have a 4070 Ti and Ryzen 5600x and after a little while my pup crashed.  Videos got real choppy before the crash.  Either I don't have enough computer to run your pup or there may be something going on with your videos.

[PIPAllah]

Peace,

 

It appears that on my cabinet your Topper Screen is off by 1 pixel on the left and top.  Easy fix.

[kcirrick]

On 2/17/2024 at 5:50 AM, PIPAllah said:

Peace,

 

I got you.  Everything appears to be working on my cabinet now.  You weren't using screens 16 and 19 so I moved stuff there.  I put the ocean on 16 and made a D0 trigger so that it loads with the pup pack.  I put the DMD on 19.  Both now have custom positions.  Screen 16 has 2,0,0,100,100 and screen 19 has 0,0,0,100,100.  The reason I've done it that way is because in Screen Configuration I have screen 0 set to DMD/Topper which is configured to the top half of my DMD.

 

Now, my next question is what kind of monster video card or processor are you using?  I have a 4070 Ti and Ryzen 5600x and after a little while my pup crashed.  Videos got real choppy before the crash.  Either I don't have enough computer to run your pup or there may be something going on with your videos.

 

 

When my son gave me this machine it didn’t work at all, had a very low end PC and low end graphics card. I rebuilt it from scratch, but always had issues with the hardware not being able to perform so I replaced it and currently have:

 

Dell Intel Core i3-10105 CPU @ 3.70GHz 16.0 GB RAM

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1660 SUPER

 

You clearly know what you’re doing, but have you checked to verify all your screens are running at 60Hz? I posted my visual pinball settings earlier, but here’s the pic of what I am currently using.

 

I’ve almost got my new more compatible screens.pup done for both cabinet and desktop modes. I’m making it a lot cleaner looking and am comparing to that POTC full dmd add on that’s available for download. Pretty much nothing in there except the pup files, but they hopefully are helpful. I’m hoping you and Cliffy would be willing to test it out when I upload it – without messing up all of your own work of course. Your input encouraged me to fix some sloppy work in the screens.pup. I was so far along I procrastinated doing it.

 

Edit:  Oh, and you're right about being off a pixel.  I fixed that on mine too.  It was bound to happen.  My own brain sometimes seems to be off a few pixels too.

 

Edited February 19 by kcirrick

[kcirrick]

Cliffy and PIPAllah

 

I’ve redone the screens.pup files in both the cabinet and desktop versions. The screens.pup is clean and properly done this time. Plus I did a little additional tweaking here and there too. I’m only using the Topper and the Backglass screens now. Everything else is above screen 10 so no more screens going to weird places with weird sizes.  If you all get a chance I’m hoping you are willing to give it a test. (After saving your own work and fixes.) I think this one’s a keeper.

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YEzvLXbbX5P_2exams-JPAtSOkbTdIV3/view?usp=sharing

[LTek]

10 hours ago, kcirrick said:

Cliffy and PIPAllah

 

I’ve redone the screens.pup files in both the cabinet and desktop versions. The screens.pup is clean and properly done this time. Plus I did a little additional tweaking here and there too. I’m only using the Topper and the Backglass screens now. Everything else is above screen 10 so no more screens going to weird places with weird sizes.  If you all get a chance I’m hoping you are willing to give it a test. (After saving your own work and fixes.) I think this one’s a keeper.

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YEzvLXbbX5P_2exams-JPAtSOkbTdIV3/view?usp=sharing

 

I just tested this and overall really like it!  I'm not sure if I found a bug but here's what happened...

 

I heard "Catch the Wind" then ball stopped/hung (marked screenshot where the ball was) then disappeared, all videos went blank... a second later the ball is back in at the plunger and screens gone. Callouts still occurred and I played to 77M so (4x longer than prior to them going away).

 

 

[PIPAllah]

18 hours ago, kcirrick said:

Cliffy and PIPAllah

 

I’ve redone the screens.pup files in both the cabinet and desktop versions. The screens.pup is clean and properly done this time. Plus I did a little additional tweaking here and there too. I’m only using the Topper and the Backglass screens now. Everything else is above screen 10 so no more screens going to weird places with weird sizes.  If you all get a chance I’m hoping you are willing to give it a test. (After saving your own work and fixes.) I think this one’s a keeper.

 

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YEzvLXbbX5P_2exams-JPAtSOkbTdIV3/view?usp=sharing

Peace,

 

I had to switch your backglass from "show" to "forceback."  Then I could see the backglass.  When I sent a ball up the tortuga ramp, the pup crashed.  I'll play a few more games and report back.