PinCabViewWFS - All Wildfire Studios Pinball PC Games in your PinCab!

[Aubrel]

PinCabViewWFS 2.3 by Aubrel (for old Wildfire Studios pinball PC games)

 

This patch is free and should remain free.
Not for commercial uses!!

 

I'm happy to release this patch! It will transforme and improve Wildfire Studios pinball PC games and will make them alive again in your virtual pinball cabinet.
The main goal is to get a pincab view with exported DMD and backglass for Wildfire Studios pinball PC games.
A "PinCabKeys" option is available in PinCabViewWFS.ini to get full support with standard VPX keyboard keys (used by default)
DMD's position, size and some shader's options can be set in PinCabViewWFS.ini
This pack doesn't contain any file of these games and will not modify them at all.

 

The pack contains :
- PinCabViewWFS Launcher by Aubrel
- PinCabView 2.6b ReShade's shader by Aubrel and Ducon2016 (ArcCabView 2.6b with PINBALL options activated)
- ArcCabView Custom ReShade 4.9.1 dll by Ducon2016 and Aubrel (ReShadeMod32.dll)
- dgVoodoo2 2.78.2 dll (ddraw.dll)

 

Supported games :
- Austin Powers Pinball
- Balls of Steel
- Devil's Island Pinball
- Dirt Track Racing Pinball
- Kiss Pinball
- Ultimate Gold Pinball

 

Here how it looks :

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

How to use :
- Install your game and update it with the last official patches available here : https://www.mediafire.com/file/k7ivql1wxp3axua/WFS_Patchs.rar/file
- Extract PinCabViewWFS in your game directory
- If needed set PinCabViewWFS.ini "ArcCabView", "PinCabView" and "PinCabView_ADV" as you want.
- Run the PinCabViewWFS_Launcher.exe to launch your game
Optionnal : you can send the table name as command to launch it directly, the difficulty level can be sent too as a second parameter (0-3)
- That's all, it should work

 

Examples with Balls of Steel :
"C:\My Balls of Steel Folder\PinCabViewWFS_Launcher.exe"
Will launch "Ball of Steel"
"C:\My Balls of Steel Folder\PinCabViewWFS_Launcher.exe" duke
Will launch directly "Duke Nukem" table with your last difficulty set (the name given should match table's file name, most often ".ddp" file)
"C:\My Balls of Steel Folder\PinCabViewWFS_Launcher.exe" barbarin 1
Will launch directly "Barbarian" table in "Regular" mode

 

PinCabKeys :
- "1" (repeat quickly) => 1-4 (add players)
- "2" => Esc
- "5" => F11 (add players in most games)
- "Enter" => Plunger
- "Shift"s => Flippers
- "z", "Space", "/" => Nudges

 

******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
Side notes :
- To use different keys, disable "PinCabKeys" in PinCabViewWFS.ini and set them as you want in the game menu.
- The Windows DPI-Scale setting for high resolutions should be the same for all your screens.
- In most cases you won't be able to use Reshade's UI ("home" key ingame) because unfortunately the mouse is locked ingame...
- A desktop mode and a few shader's options are available and can be set directly in PinCabViewWFS.ini
- InGame Ratio is set and locked to 9:16 if you want to get the game displayed in full size on your screen, you can use Full_Stretch option in PinCabViewWFS.ini
- You can run the game with your screen set in Landscape or Portrait mode, the result should be the very same.
- Some launcher settings won't be applied if the game is run as administrator (or if your account is set as "super administrator" on W7).
In this case you will have to set yourself the game in "single screen" (scrolling off) and the DMD size ingame using F10 key. It will be saved for next time.
(difficulty level sent by command line won't work neither in this case...)

If you will always use the game with PinCabview launcher, try to launch it one time as admin (it will set the game at best directly)

 

******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
Changelog :

2.3
- ArcCabView sharder updated (2.6b) to fix a grill display problem in PinCabView
- dgVoodoo2 version included reversed to 2.78.2 (problems found with 2.79 versions)

 

2.2
- With DMD on the 3rd screen the game display will now cover your full 3rd screen even with custom DMD sizes/positions
- DMD background option added (used and displayed only with DMD on a 3rd screen with custom sizes)
"PinCabViewWFS\Textures\DefaultBGND.png" will be displayed full sized on your 3rd screen, you can update this image according to your preferences.
You can also add "GameNameBGND.png" or "TableNameBGND.png" files in "PinCabViewWFS\Textures\" folder to get a different DMD-Background for each game/table.

 

2.1a
- Backglass with frame display fixed when curvature is enabled
- Default Frame Reflection Intensity decreased
- Option DMD Color added in the shader and ini file

2.1
- Updated to work with official ArcCabView/PinCabView shader version 2.3
- Updated to work with last official dgVoodoo 2.78.2 ddraw dll
- DMD Filter option added in the shader to crop DMD colors below the filter value
- The launcher can now be killed safely to close the game
- Performance mode added and general performances should be improved too
- Option Rotated_180 On/Off added in ini file
- Some small changes, fixes and cleanups

 

2.0
- Updated to work with official ArcCabView/PinCabView shader version 1.0a

 

1.0
First Official Release

 

******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

PinCabView Info / Support :  https://vpuniverse.com/forums/topic/5494-pincabview-bigraceusa-fantasticjourney-timeshock-theweb-wormspinball-worldrallyfever-slamtilt-resurrection/
PinCabView2D Info / Support :  https://vpuniverse.com/forums/topic/5744-pincabview2d-most-old-dos-pinball-games-in-your-pincab/
PinCabViewWFS Info / Support :  https://vpuniverse.com/forums/topic/5903-pincabviewwfs-all-wildfire-studios-pinball-pc-games-in-your-pincab/
ArcCabView/PinCabView shader Info / Support :  http://www.emuline.org/topic/2598-arccabview-display-your-arcade-games-just-as-you-want/

Thanks to Ducon2016 and Houb for the amazing "CRTGeomMOD" shader (and thanks to cgwg for the original CRTGeom shader)
http://www.emuline.org/topic/1420-shader-crt-multifonction-kick-ass-looking-games

 

ReShade home : https://reshade.me
dgVoodoo2 home : http://dege.freeweb.hu/

 

******************************************************************************************************************************************************************************

 

Download PinCabViewWFS 2.3 :   https://www.mediafire.com/folder/5ttx0loy7lzfy/ArcCabView

 

Nota: Please respect my hard work, I spent more than a thousand hours working on the full PinCabView projects (Launchers, Memory patches, ReShade Shader, DosBox code patches...).

I know it's not perfect and yes it can be improved but please ask me before releasing any update/mod.

Also if you made improvements or any changes please leave the credits to all the people who contributed directly or indirectly to this project and share your code/changes

 

Enjoy !

[Aubrel]

Edit 2022-04-19 : Now updated to v.2.1!!

 

Everything runs and looks even better !  😍

[Aubrel]

PinCabViewWFS 2.2 Released

 

2.2
- With DMD on the 3rd screen the game display will now cover your full 3rd screen even with custom DMD sizes/positions
- DMD background option added (used and displayed only with DMD on a 3rd screen with custom sizes)
"PinCabViewWFS\Textures\DefaultBGND.png" will be displayed full sized on your 3rd screen, you can update this image according to your preferences.
You can also add "GameNameBGND.png" or "TableNameBGND.png" files in "PinCabViewWFS\Textures\" folder to get a different DMD-Background for each game/table.

2.1a
- Backglass with frame display fixed when curvature is enabled
- Default Frame Reflection Intensity decreased
- Option DMD Color added in the shader and ini file

 

The launcher's full sources are now included.

I hope to never see any commercial use...

 

Nota: Please respect my hard work, I spent more than a thousand hours working on the full PinCabView projects (Launchers, Memory patches, ReShade Shader, DosBox code patches...).

I know it's not perfect and yes it can be improved but please ask me before releasing any update/mod.

Also if you made improvements or any changes please leave the credits to all the people who contributed directly or indirectly to this project and share your code/changes

 

Enjoy!

 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Also, if someone wants to try I made a small tool to install and run all or only the games/tables you want with Pinball X :

 

PinCabView_Run 1.0 for PinballX frontend

 

Here a small tool to install and run your PinCabView/PinCabView2D/PinCabViewWFS tables in PinballX!

/!\ It supports only last PinCabView versions from : PinCabView 4.1a / PinCabView2D 3.1a / PinCabViewWFS 2.1a

Most medias (backglass and tables) are only here as simple jpg images
(I would be pleased to provide full video medias support but they are too much tables: it would take too much time and would be too big : sorry!
BTW you can do your own captures for the games you want...

Also some medias/wheels have been provided by some users and are already available in https://vpuniverse.com
(/!\ these medias where unfortunately not named as I did here and if you use them you will have to remane them)

How to use :
- At first, "PinCabView" packs should be installed and working for all your games
- Save your PinballX "Config\PinballX.ini" file from your PinballX directory.
- Extract this full archive where you want in your computer ("Desktop\PCV" folder for example)
- Run "PinCabView_Run.exe"
- Select your PinballX's folder and exe when asked
- Select the games/tables you want to show in PinballX and set the format you want for the backglass medias (with or without grill) when asked
- Select the Path and Launchers for the games you just added when asked
- That's all : you can now run PinballX and with luck the selected games/tables should be included and working!

(Then you can remove these files from your desktop folder)

Good to know :
This will install "PinCabView\PinCabView_Run.exe", PinCabView's databases and medias in your PinballX folder and PinballX should be set directly.
To update your config after the first run just run again PinCabView_Run.exe from this location (this time don't delete anything!!)
The media's names you will have to put are the "description" of the games/tables as given in PinballX's Databases\PinCabView\PinCabView.xml

Known limitation : Custom PinCabView2D games are not supported
If you added support for other games you will have to add them yourself.

Enjoy

 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Download folder :   https://www.mediafire.com/folder/5ttx0loy7lzfy/ArcCabView

 

[Aubrel]

Updated to 2.3 !

 

Enjoy! 😃

[CarnyPriest]

I dusted off Kiss Pinball and Austin Powers Pinball from my old collection and installed to the cab using an old external BD drive. They both worked with the launcher out of the box, positioning DMD and backglass on the correct screens. I have a Pinball 2000 style cabinet which requires flipping the DMD so that it may reflect off of the playfield glass. I updated pincabview_fx shader to version 2.6d and added DMD_YFLIP=1 to Presets/PinCabView.ini. All is good.

 

 

[CarnyPriest]

I'm having an issue with direct table launching with Austin Powers Pinball. I get a warning message "Please run the game from the menu." Weird thing is that direct launching works when I am in my standard display configuration. It's landscape mode except that I have my backglass display as primary. Easier for me to work with files when I am at my cab. Direct launching then works and displays the playfield on my backglass display and no backglass or DMD (or they might be somewhere just not visible). I've tried overwriting the launcher files a few times and uninstalling and reinstalling the game. Don't know if any relevant information about the display order is stored in the registry. I'm not finding anything. 

 

The game does work properly with the launcher if I don't use any parameters. Then, I can select the game and mode through the in-game menu. It's not very useful for launching through a front-end though. I'm not sure where to go from here.

[CarnyPriest]

Related to the previous post, I don't have any issues with Kiss Pinball. I have a way to use joyrider3774's PinballX_Launcher_App to allow selection of novice, regular, arcade, and tournament modes from within PinballY. This is a method to apply on top of database files and media from PinCabView_Run from the post above May 12, 2022.

 

Read this link from joyrider's repo for more info.

 

https://github.com/joyrider3774/PinballX_Launcher_app

 

I found that I need a custom script for PinballY to re-establish focus from the PinCabViewWFS launcher. Otherwise, PinballY does not regain focus.

 

The script is AutoHotkey and would require compiling to LaunchKissPinball.exe, but I imagine that this could be coded as a bat file:

 

#NoEnv  
#SingleInstance force
#WinActivateForce
SetTitleMatchMode, 3
DetectHiddenWindows, On

; User inputs
WaitForMenu = 15000

Run, %A_ScriptDir%\PinballX.Launcher.App\KissPinballLauncher.exe %1%,, Hide

Sleep, WaitForMenu

Process, WaitClose, PinCabViewWFS_Launcher.exe
Sleep, 500

ExitApp

 

The script passes the table name to the mode selector app. The app is simply a copy of the joyrider app that I names KissPinballLauncher.exe. I've attached the program ini that I use.

 

The PinballY settings:

 

KissPinballLauncher.ini

[Aubrel]

Here a small demo of ArcCabView/PinCabView with the new "Balls of Steel" released by Atari this year (january 30 2024)

Thanks to @BurtMacklin for the information and support about this new release.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2050260/Balls_of_Steel/

And It can work perfectly !!

 

 

 

😎

 

Edit : the shader itself is working, not the launcher

(You can't use the actual launcher with this new game release)

 

Edited February 9 by Aubrel

[digitalarts]

Hi Aubrel

so nice to see you're still here and active 👍😊

[digitalarts]

@CarnyPriest did you ever fixed the behavior of the two Austin Tables ?

and of course many thanks for your ahk scripts - works very good in my PinballY cab 

[CarnyPriest]

8 hours ago, digitalarts said:

@CarnyPriest did you ever fixed the behavior of the two Austin Tables ?

and of course many thanks for your ahk scripts - works very good in my PinballY cab 

No. If I were to try another way, I might use an ahk script to spoof the mouse clicks or keys to launch through the in-game menu rather than through command line switches.