# DPP E9 "The Virtual Pinball episode!!"

**Source:** Don's Pinball Podcast (regular feed)  
**Type:** podcast_episode  
**Published:** 2023-01-24  
**Duration:** 27m 38s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/donspinballpodcast/episodes/DPP-E9-The-Virtual-Pinball-episode-e1tu09k

---

## Analysis

Don delivers a comprehensive overview of the virtual pinball market, focusing on the spectrum from cheap toys (Arcade1Up, AtGames Legends) to commercial-grade machines. He details his personal experience with the Ultra VP from Rec Room World ($8,695), highlighting its features—industrial displays, 7.1 surround sound, physical solenoids, tactile feedback, and access to ~1,400 games via PinUp Popper software. He positions the Ultra VP as a legitimate alternative to owning multiple physical machines, bridging the gap between virtual and mechanical play.

### Key Claims

- [HIGH] Ultra VP machine costs $8,695 and includes dual commercial displays, 8 solenoids, 7.1 surround sound, physical plunger with accelerometer, tilt bob, and LED flashers — _Don provides detailed feature breakdown and pricing from Rec Room World website_
- [HIGH] PinUp Popper software running on Ultra VP provides access to approximately 1,400 games including classic Williams/Bally titles and digital-only creations — _Don states 'Currently, there's about 1,400 and so games available' and details browsing interface_
- [HIGH] Ultra VP price ($8,695) sits between Stern Pro and Premium pricing, with Premium having recently increased by ~$1,000 — _Don explicitly compares: 'This price rivals, it comes right between the price of what a Stern Pro and a Stern Premium would cost you now'_
- [HIGH] Stern intentionally withholds recent game code (post-2016-2017) from virtual platforms due to active production of physical machines — _Don explains: 'Stern likes to hold onto the code for games they still have actively in production'_
- [HIGH] Extreme Pinball (Australia-based competitor) offers premium version at $7,882 USD, but shipping from Australia costs ~$1,400 air freight to US — _Don provides pricing research and shipping estimate based on comparable Fathoms shipment costs_
- [HIGH] Ultra VP has proven reliable over ~1 year of ownership with only minor vinyl graphic peeling at corners (resolved with spray adhesive) — _Don reports: 'Issues that I've had with my Ultra VP, they've been exceedingly minor. Some of the vinyl graphics did peel up a bit'_
- [HIGH] Roland Buck (Rec Room World owner) attended Texas Pinball Festival with five Ultra VP machines on display — _Don states personal meeting: 'I did meet Roland Buck in person at Texas Pinball Festival last year he had about five ultra VP machines there'_
- [HIGH] Virtual pinball space includes features unavailable on physical machines: multiple game versions with video backglass modes, 3D glasses option, MAME arcade emulation integration, jukebox function — _Don catalogs software features added in recent update including 3D mode, MAME category, jukebox with 'several hundred songs'_

### Notable Quotes

> "A virtual machine cannot compare to having an actual machine. I mean, the actual machine will always be better. Well, the actual machine that's in appropriate working order will always be better."
> — **Don**, ~7:00
> _Establishes Don's baseline position that physical pinball remains superior, contextualizing his enthusiasm for Ultra VP as exceptional within virtual space_

> "What it allows you to do is it allows you to play quite an extensive library of games, an extensive library of games that require no maintenance."
> — **Don**, ~22:30
> _Articulates core value proposition of virtual machines: access without burden of upkeep, addressing practical concerns for collectors_

> "This machine is different. And if your experience with virtual pinball was at a Sam's Club or one of these other kind of homebrew models running a modified Raspberry Pi, I think you should take another look at them."
> — **Don**, ~10:30
> _Directly challenges negative stereotypes about virtual pinball based on low-end consumer experiences, framing Ultra VP as category-defining_

> "So as you're playing and you hit the flippers, there are flipper motors that are going off inside the machine cabinet. So you get that tactile feedback."
> — **Don**, ~13:00
> _Highlights key differentiator: physical feedback mechanisms that approach real pinball haptic experience_

> "I mean, it's all in there. I mean, there's tons of games... Cactus Canyons are in there. Two different versions. one of which has some updated code. And they play fantastically. They're one-to-one responsive. There's not flipper lag."
> — **Don**, ~28:00
> _Addresses critical technical concern (input lag) and game selection depth, emphasizing playability parity with originals_

> "For my pinball budget, I can really go to these new releases, and then I have the entire back library here."
> — **Don**, ~36:00
> _Frames virtual machines as enabling portfolio diversification: new premium games + complete legacy catalog without space/maintenance burden_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| Rec Room World | company | Virtual pinball machine importer/retailer; operates recroomworld.com and YouTube channel; owned by Roland Buck |
| Roland Buck | person | Owner of Rec Room World; imports and sells Ultra VP machines; attended Texas Pinball Festival with display units |
| Ultra VP | product | Full-scale commercial virtual pinball machine ($8,695) featuring dual industrial displays, physical solenoids, 7.1 surround, LED flashers, PinUp Popper software with ~1,400 games |
| PinUp Popper | product | Frontend/launcher software for virtual pinball; provides access to 1,400+ games; includes MAME arcade emulation, jukebox, 3D mode, multiple game versions with video backglass options |
| Arcade1Up | company | Consumer virtual pinball cabinet manufacturer; offers 3/4-scale machines ($749.99) with Star Wars and Attack from Mars titles; positioned as entry-level toy option |
| AtGames | company | Manufacturer of AtGames Legends Pinball arcade cabinet (~$689-$350 on clearance); features internet connectivity, subscription-based game access, online leaderboards |
| Extreme Pinball | company | Australia-based commercial virtual pinball manufacturer; premium model $7,882 USD with comparable features to Ultra VP; shipping to US ~$1,400 |
| SkillShot FX | product | Full-scale retro-styled virtual pinball machine; 96 games; requires Steam/WiFi connectivity; sold by Rec Room World |
| Pinball Arcade | product | Digital pinball platform on PlayStation (and other platforms); Don's early entry point to pinball; suffered licensing erosion (tables dropped from service) |
| Texas Pinball Festival | event | Annual pinball event where Roland Buck exhibits Ultra VP machines with gameplay demonstrations |
| District 82 | location | Venue in Green Bay where Don played SkillShot FX arcade machine |
| Don | person | Host of Don's Pinball Podcast; virtual pinball enthusiast with Ultra VP home machine; owns physical pinball collection (Rush, Godzilla, Guns N Roses) |
| Tim | person | Don's acquaintance from Eau Claire, Wisconsin; built and sold custom virtual pinball machines at arcade/dealer location |
| Pilot Air Terminal | company | Pinball machine shipping service; flat fee $450 for domestic point-to-point shipping |
| Stern Pinball | company | Major commercial pinball manufacturer; withholds recent game code (post-2016-2017) from virtual platforms; recent Premium model price increase ~$1,000 |

### Topics

- **Primary:** Virtual pinball market segmentation and product tiers, Ultra VP machine features and specifications, PinUp Popper software ecosystem and game library, Virtual vs. physical pinball comparison
- **Secondary:** Stern licensing strategy for game code, Commercial virtual pinball manufacturers and competitors, Tactile feedback and hardware innovation in virtual machines
- **Mentioned:** Don's personal collection management and acquisition strategy

### Sentiment

**Positive** (0.82) — Don is enthusiastically endorsing Ultra VP as a legitimate alternative to physical machines, while maintaining balanced perspective that physical machines remain superior. His tone is educational and persuasive, aimed at overcoming skepticism. Criticism is minimal and constructive (minor vinyl peeling, single session with inferior SkillShot FX). Excitement about features (3D mode, jukebox, game variety) comes through clearly.

### Signals

- **[sentiment_shift]** Don explicitly challenges negative stereotype of virtual pinball based on poor low-cost cabinet experiences (Arcade1Up, AtGames), positioning Ultra VP as category-defining alternative (confidence: high) — Don states: 'if your experience with virtual pinball was at a Sam's Club or one of these other kind of homebrew models running a modified Raspberry Pi, I think you should take another look at them'
- **[event_signal]** Roland Buck (Rec Room World) demonstrated five Ultra VP machines at Texas Pinball Festival, suggesting active market engagement and community building (confidence: high) — Don: 'I did meet Roland Buck in person at Texas Pinball Festival last year he had about five ultra VP machines there he had the hood lifted up'
- **[licensing_signal]** Stern Pinball actively withholds recent game code (post-2016-2017 releases) from virtual pinball platforms to protect active commercial production (confidence: high) — Don explains: 'Stern likes to hold onto the code for games they still have actively in production. So you won't find a production identical Iron Maiden yet'
- **[market_signal]** Competitive virtual pinball landscape includes Australian manufacturer Extreme Pinball offering premium model at $7,882 USD with comparable features but higher shipping costs (~$1,400) (confidence: high) — Don compares: 'Extreme Pinball... premium version... you'll get about $7,882 USD... shipping from Australia... would be around $1,400'
- **[market_signal]** Ultra VP pricing at $8,695 now positions between Stern Pro and Premium tiers; Premium pricing recently increased ~$1,000, changing competitive landscape (confidence: high) — Don notes: 'This price rivals, it comes right between the price of what a Stern Pro and a Stern Premium would cost you now. Now the premiums have just gone up in price about another $1,000 more'
- **[product_strategy]** Ultra VP recently received software update adding MAME arcade emulation category, 3D glasses mode with anaglyph rendering, and expandable storage via additional SSD (confidence: high) — Don details: 'In this new update, there was also a MAME category added' and describes 3D mode functionality and USB mounting capability
- **[product_concern]** Ultra VP vinyl graphics experienced minor peeling at corners during first year of ownership (minor issue, resolved with adhesive spray) (confidence: high) — Don reports: 'Some of the vinyl graphics did peel up a bit... a little squirt with the spray adhesive, and it hasn't acted up since then'
- **[technology_signal]** Commercial virtual pinball machines now incorporate industrial-grade dual displays, physical solenoid/motor feedback, accelerometer-based nudge, and 7.1 surround sound approaching parity with mechanical machines (confidence: high) — Don catalogs Ultra VP tech: '8 solenoids, 2 contactors, shaker motor, gear motor, accelerometer, digital plunger with tension sensing, physical tilt bob, knocker, 7.1 surround with 3D spatial audio'

---

## Transcript

 Welcome to the ether. Welcome to the virtual reality user. You can no longer feel your fingertips. The computers have taken control. Welcome, user, to the Don's Pinball Podcast Virtual Pinball Episode! That's right here! We're finally doing it! We're doing the Virtual Pinball Episode of Don's Pinball Podcast, episode number nine. Welcome, pull up a chair, this will be a reference anthology series Well, at least the first of one I want this to exist as a reference to virtual pinball that I can refer people to Alright, I'm done with that, let's get started Someone drop my Ed Boon There it is, okay Sorry about putting you guys into the matrix there for a second But I've pulled you out, I've pulled you in And we are going to address just what the heck is virtual pinball and why should I care? All right, we're going to get to that. Let's start with some definitions. Now, when I'm talking about virtual pinball, I'm talking about basically a video game version of actual mechanical pinball. Now, in meat space where we all live with these bodies of ours, we've got flippers and solenoids and mechanics and ramps and balls and physics and inertia. And those are all things that we like. I mean, we get that tactile sensation from that. But it's not without its downsides. Number one, the expense. Number two, a machine is 350 pounds if you want to get it into your house or location. And these things break and they require maintenance. Now, in its simplest form, virtual pinball is a video game that you can play on your desktop computer through Steam in VR. You can play it on your Nintendo Switch, your Segas and your Dreamcasts or whatever you kids have nowadays, Xboxes and Playstations, right? And that's how I got involved in this early on. Before I was even really into physical pinball as a major hobby, I was playing the pinball arcade on PlayStation. It's available other places, too. And you would play a couple of games for free, the few tables they had. I know Tales of the Arabian Nights was one of them, and that came free with the download. And then you could purchase a table individually for, I don't know, $3 to $4, or spend $15 and get a series of six Ballywilliams tables or something. And that was fun until, you know, licensing reared its head and then machine tables started getting dropped from the service. So if you had bought that table and downloaded it, you were safe as long as you never had to update or upgrade your computer system or try to re-download it. Then they were gone. Ed Boon, Adam's family is missing. Everything else was disappearing except for a handful of, you know, some strange obscure titles. So I've moved on. Now, there are now mechanical tables, or at least mechanical in the sense that you can purchase this thing and have it in your home as a standalone device that play games virtually. So instead of having a play field with all of the mechanics and everything in there, there's basically a computer screen, a computer running software. A lot of times there's a back glass screen, and it virtually emulates the game of pinball. So what they've done is they've taken high-definition images, high-resolution images of the play field and using some 3D modeling for the moving parts and everything. They've brought that together. And so virtually on the screen, you're looking at the play field from the perspective of an adult player looking down onto it. And then the back glass monitor is displaying whatever graphics, you know, as simple as just the back glass of the actual machine. or they've integrated other graphics, movie clips from games where that's appropriate can play on the screen. So this space has really evolved and it's really come into its own where it's now rivaling the kind of fun that you get from a real machine. I know, sacrilecious to say that. But these machines have been existing. Now, there are varying qualities of these things. The virtual pinball machines exist on a spectrum that starts at toy and goes all the way up to a commercial machine that really rivals the gameplay of actual pinball. The problem, and the reason why I think some people have issues with the virtual pinball, is that they got a bad experience on one, or one that didn't quite live up to where the technology is now, and that's kind of clouded their thinking to say, you know what, virtual's not for me. I want the machine only. Now, I'm going to say this right off the bat. A virtual machine cannot compare to having an actual machine. I mean, the actual machine will always be better. Well, the actual machine that's in appropriate working order will always be better. Okay, a lame flipper is not that much fun to play, no matter how great otherwise the game looks and how great that title is. So I mentioned the toys. We can start with those. There's a few on the market commercially. Arcade 1-Up makes a virtual pinball game. They've got Star Wars and Attack from Mars. They may even have some other tables in there. These are, I think, three-quarter scale, similar to the stand-up arcade units they have, the Mortal Kombat, the Street Fighter 1, the Pac-Mans, and whatever. They're fairly easy to put together. They're available for the average consumer. Prices go for $749.99 on the website. Now you can find those cheaper on sale on clearance. And people have taken these, and they've been able to go in with some computer know-how and modify these and add extra tables to them. So there is some usability there on that end. But this is not going to compare to a full-scale commercial machine. This is something that, you know, I'm kind of in the toy budget range still. At Games is another company. They make the At Legends pinball arcade. I've seen this at Sam's Club. I think it's been featured at Costco too. I've seen these on sale. They retail for about the same price at $689. I found just now non-discounted. I've seen them as cheap as $350 to $400 on clearance if you happen to catch it on a good day at the Sam's Club. And I believe this one has some internet connectivity, and you can go online and pay a subscription fee and have access to more games and online leaderboards and those sorts of things. So there is some functionality there. But you're still left with a scaled-down version of a pinball machine. So my first virtual pinball experience occurred in an arcade at a dealer my buddy Tim up in Eau Claire he had put together some virtual pinball machines and had them for sale for a pretty reasonably priced just a few thousand dollars And they had real buttons on them, a real plunger, and they were full scale. The issue I had, though, was with the software they were running at the time. I don't know if this is currently what he's offering, but it basically booted up to Windows and then you would go through and open the file, find the game you want to play, click and load it, just like it was a desktop PC. The only difference was you were controlling it. Your user interface was physical buttons on a pinball machine. So that was interesting. What it wasn't was as satisfying as what I was looking for. So I didn't go on one then. I did eventually come across in my search the Ultra VP from Rec Room World. They're online at recroomworld.com. He's got a YouTube channel. And this is a guy from the Columbus, Ohio area who imports and sells a commercial-grade machine. And I'm going to go through all the features of it because this is the first machine that I played that was a virtual pinball machine that has rivaled a physical game. I've had it for about a year now, and I'm ready to give my reviews because I think this machine is different. And if your experience with virtual pinball was at a Sam's Club or one of these other kind of homebrew models running a modified Raspberry Pi, I think you should take another look at them. And so that's what we're going to get into. Now, just before I forget, the Ultra VP machine that I have does have a Facebook group. It's under Ultra VP Virtual Pinball Fans. So you can check that out for more. There's also a YouTube channel. So Roland Buck, he's the guy that owns Rec Room World. he imports these machines, and that's who I got in contact and who I ordered it from. So let me just run down the features of this machine. So really what sets it apart, and this is what I tell people, is it has two high-definition displays, and these are commercial displays. They're not like LCD TVs or monitors. They're industrial-grade monitors. And the machine itself, it's full-scale, and it does have all of the solenoids and gear motors and knockers and shaker motors and 7.1 surround sound within the machine. So as you're playing and you hit the flippers, there are flipper motors that are going off inside the machine cabinet. So you get that tactile feedback. The resolution and the refresh rate of the software and the graphics card are such that there's really minimal delay. In total, there's eight solenoids within this machine, two contactors. There is the shaker motor. There's also a gear motor inside there. And this is just an electric motor that kind of whirs. And so where this comes into play is during gameplay, whenever there's a major mechanism that's moving, like in Batman Dark Knight by Stern, there's a crane that's activated when you hit the Scarecrow shot and moves across the play field. There's a cylinder that turns to expose the Joker figure. As that's happening, the gear motor will actually go off in there, and you can feel those vibrations as if there's something really moving. And it's game controlled. It's one-to-one with what's going on with the gameplay. There's also an accelerometer within the machine. So if you cradle up the ball or the ball does get stuck somewhere, just like a real one would, you can nudge the machine and it'll sense that and the ball will bounce around a little bit. This is similar to the nudge effect that was on games on the pinball arcade that I played on my PlayStation. You could hit a shoulder button and it would kind of nudge the table. This is a similar thing. So it's fun that you can have some physical tactile control with this virtual game. It also has a digital plunger. And so it's got a physical plunger on the outside, a shooter rod that you pull out and let go. But it's got an apparatus attached to it on the inside that's sensing how much tension you're putting on this device. And it's one-to-one matching on screen with the virtual plunger in the game that you're playing. So you can still do those fine-tuned skill shots. So that is fun. There's a physical tilt bob within the machine. There's a physical knocker, too. So when you get a high score, you get a free game, you get a free ball, whatever's coded into the game software, an actual knocker will go off, like a real physical one within the cabinet. It does have a 7.1 surround sound with speakers lining the inside of the cabinet along with a subwoofer. So what this does, and this is also what kind of sets it apart from an otherwise homebrew machine, is as the ball is rolling up and down the play field, the sound is 3D. So it'll kind of travel based on which speakers are being utilized. So you'll hear the ball kind of far away from you when it's up play field. And as it's rolling down, you'll hear the sound transfer. Or when you're in a metal wire form ramp, you'll hear that metal sound of that ball rolling towards you. When the ball drains, there's like a physical sound with that subwoofer of the ball hitting mechanical or metal parts. and I swear it feels like there's an actual ball that's draining right in front of you behind the coin door. This game also has an operating coin door as well. They are also, and this is another thing that sets it apart from other virtual machines, so if you can think of the industrial display as being the play field, and then there's glass on top of that, just like an actual game. The monitor is such that it's recessed deep in the cabinet, just like a real play field would be, and then up above that is the glass, just like a regular machine. At the back of the play field above the monitor, there's actual LED flashers, flashing lights, just like play field flashers that you would find on a real table. So what these do is these replicate those energy photons coming from flasher lights from a real table. As a flasher goes off on the display screen that you're playing with, it's only going to be as bright as that display screen can be, So it's not going to have the same physical intensity that a flashing light was. So what these guys have done is incorporated a row, an array of about seven or eight of these flashers in the background. So they're flashing directly at you. So you're getting that same light feedback that you would get synchronized with the flashers on the actual play field. So that's something that really sets this machine apart from what AtGames produces and what Arcade1Up produces and what a lot of other homebrew folks have made. there's LED flashers it also comes with under cabinet lights and there's artwork that included in the cost of the machine you can pick from any of their 400 different color patterns which are patterned after actual machines so if you want it to look like a machine that exists in the real world they can do that, they've also made collages which is what I have, I have a collage of classic Bally Williams characters so I got the King of Pain from Medieval Madness I got the aliens from Attack from Mars I got the Addams Family on there Elvira on there There's a handful of Star Wars characters. Indiana Hilton Jones is on the side of the upper back glass cabinet. The, what was that guy that was in Dogma that was also Batman? Anyway, he's on there for some reason. He doesn't even have a game. So it's goofy and, you know, I like it, so shut up. but you can choose from their available artwork or they have a graphic artist that will work with you to design and put in custom things so if you want to look like your sports team or your business or whatever it is they can do that to you and also bundled in the cost here also on my list is free shipping so that's fantastic let's get to the price okay so what's the price for the fantastic machine now the machine includes coin door everything that i mentioned so far it's got the playfield monitor, it has the back glass monitor, it has a LCD screen for a digital dot matrix display. And it can replicate a traditional dot matrix display or even like a full screen LED size like you're seeing on the newer Sterns. So it's got that and then the back glass screen. And then there's a topper monitor on top. So another LCD screen, smaller than what would come on a Stern, but that sits up there and that effectively acts as a topper. So if you're playing Whirlwind, that's where the fan is that's blowing in your face, it'd be up there. If you're playing Fishtails, that's where the big mouth Billy Bass would be sitting up there. If your game has a topper, the topper will be up there. Or if you're playing a movie-based game like Spider-Man or Avatar or Star Trek, Adam's Family, it'll play movie clips up there. Just for fun, there's two police beacon flashers on there as well. They kind of spin around. There's a blue one and a red one. So these are They're all game controlled. So as you're playing the game, hit a high score, whatever it is that would set the bells and whistles off, these things start going. It's fantastic. The cost for all this comes from the website, $8,695. So this is not a cheap toy option. This price rivals, it comes right between the price of what a Stern Pro and a Stern Premium would cost you now. Now the premiums have just gone up in price about another $1,000 more than this. But what this does, and I'll get to the software in a moment, but what this does is it allows you to play quite an extensive library of games, an extensive library of games that require no maintenance. Okay, so there's that too. My plan when I got this machine was that I would have a physical real machine, and then if I got this, then if I wanted to, say, play Whitewater, I could just go play Whitewater. I could go play Diner. I could go play Big Bang Bar if I wanted to. I can go play Junkyard. I mean, I can go through and play these classic old games without having to fill my downstairs with 10 games that require maintenance and are older games and require parts that may be kind of hard to source. And so that's what it's been able to do to me. Now, I haven't held true to that because other games have gotten my eye, and I brought them down too. And my arcade's a little bursting at the moment. But I just wanted to review this machine and give my impressions of it because a lot of people have written off virtual pinball, and I want them to have a crack at this. Now, there's a few other games in this space, kind of in that price range, that I want you to be aware of. There is a product called the SkillShot FX. It's another full-scale size machine. It's retro-styled, though. It has this wood paneling on it. It has a single pedestal design, so it looks like something out of the early 70s. The problem with this thing is there's only 96 games involved in it. I think it requires Steam, Connection 2, and Wi-Fi in order to operate. Now, that's probably how they have to operate within a licensing, kind of legally black and white space to market this thing. Rec Room World sells this machine. The software is available elsewhere. It's sort of the kind of thing that you need to just play however you can get it. You know, look around, kid. But currently on my machine, it's running this pinup popper software. I did want to talk about that. Currently, there's about 1,400 and so games available. So, right? I mean, that's fairly mind-blowing. What's different with this machine, when you turn it on, it boots up within just a few minutes, and then it boots right into the front end of the Pinup Popper software. And so you can play this on your computer. You can download it and kind of go through the menus and see what it is. But basically, once you go into it, you can just pick all games, and then the game that is available is displayed on the screen, and you can just hit your flipper button and scroll through these, and they'll just move just like pages of a book. Here's 007, and then here's ACDC, and then the B games and the C games and the Deadpools and all that, and you can just sit there and flip through them. There's about 20 different menus, it seems like. You can break games down and sort them by letter. So you just go to that letter and then find the game. You can build a favorites menu. You can sort games by manufacturer. If you want to look at all the Bally Williams games, the Capcom games, Stern games that are on there, you can do that. In addition to the pinball games themselves, there's also digitally created virtual games, games that never existed in the real world. strangely licensed games other versions of standard games if you want to go play a Taylor Swift pinball machine there's one on there if you want to play Foo Fighters are on there there's about four different Iron Maiden tables all of different types none of which are the actual Stern table when you look at what games are available they're really kind of the most recent I think is right around 2016-2017 releases and that's because Stern likes to hold onto the code for games they still have actively in production. So you won't find a production identical Iron Maiden yet, but I would imagine that would come soon. There is a Deadpool on there. It's a kind of recreation tribute. It's pretty close, but you can tell it doesn't have the actual ROM. But as far as everything before that, Indiana Joneses, Bally Williams games, Whitewater. I mean, it's all in there. I mean, there's tons of games. Cactus Canyons are in there. Two different versions. one of which has some updated code. And they play fantastically. They're one-to-one responsive. There's not flipper lag, and I think that helps separate this machine. The skill shot effects, I played one. There was one at District 82 in Green Bay, and, yeah, I played with it for a little bit, and it was more like the virtual pinball toy, and mine is more of like an actual simulator of pinball. So before I bought this machine, I kind of went through the market, and I watched as many videos as I could find of different builds of machines And commercially available there was only one other one that I found that came close to emulating what the Ultra VP does And that is by a company called Extreme Pinball. They're in Australia. And they do have a fairly nice machine. Doesn't look like it has the flasher lights, but it has a lot of the topper motor. It looks like it has the upgraded equipment. It also has a stern shaker inside. It's 4.1 surround sound. 10 speakers. Has a gear motor. Has the solenoids. Um, it's price. If you get their premium version, which is what would equal equivalent to the ultra VP. Um, you get it with a topper monitor and the CPU upgrade, you'll get about $7,882 USD. So fairly close in price to the 8,695 from the rec room world ultra VP. Um, however, you have to factor in shipping. And if you're in the U S it's coming from Australia. Um, I did email out for quotes to see what the shipping price would actually be. but I know domestically if you were to use a company such as Pilot Air Terminal, which I've used to ship games before, they have a flat fee of $450, and if you drop the machine off at one of their distribution centers, of which they have one in just about every major city, and then do a point-to-point shipping to another one of their facilities to pick up directly, $450 is what that costs. So I would assume it would be more floating on a boat from Australia. from what I hear people that got their fathoms shipped air shipped to them in the US it was something like $1,400 or around that price so I mean it would more than make up the cost difference now I'm not sponsored by rec room world I'm happy with my purchase and I just want to spread the word I did meet Roland Buck in person at Texas Pinball Festival last year he had about five ultra VP machines there he had the hood lifted up so you can come and take a look at him as far as Issues that I've had with my Ultra VP, they've been exceedingly minor. Some of the vinyl graphics did peel up a bit, so I went and I talked to him at Texas Pinball Festival. He said, just get yourself a spray bottle of adhesive. Just spray it down, hold it up there, and that's what I did. I haven't had a problem with it since. These are pretty durable vinyl graphics. So there was just a little lifting at the corners for a few of the panels, a little squirt with the spray adhesive, and it hasn't acted up since then. And when I first got the machine, the mounting hardware on the inside of the front right leg had kind of fallen away. So I just reached in there, put it back into place, and tightened the screws, and it's been no problem since then. So this thing, fortunately, knock on wood, has been working flawlessly for me, even through a software update where I obtained another solid-state drive and was able to plug it in there. So in addition to the 1,400 games, the digital games that don't exist in reality that are on there as well, there is a jukebox function. So it plays – there's several hundred songs on there, and the graphics look like you're going through an old jukebox. So it comes up with the title of the artist, the title of the song, the year it came out. And then it also plays the video associated with that music on the back glass. And so sometimes when I'm down in the basement and I'm working on my other games, I'll go ahead and just put the jukebox on and let it go and just listen to music. In this new update, there was also a MAME category added. So it does arcade emulation for vertically oriented arcade games. So Pac-Man, Donkey Kong, Gunsmoke, about every arcade shooter, Raiden, a lot of Neo Geo games. They're in there too. and there's a USB mount right underneath the cabinet and you can plug in just a game controller and play it and I was able to play that flawlessly. There's also a new 3D function. So you can bring out your wireless keyboard, click a key, switch the display over to 3D mode and then just use those red blue 3D glasses available on Amazon fairly cheap and you can play the pinball games in 3D. It's cool. It's cool. It's not the like high definition 3D you would see if you went to the movie theater. There is still a little bit of ghosting. Everybody's going to have their own. Some are really going to like it. Some are really going to hate it. I'm okay with it. The 3D effect does work, and maybe it'll tighten up as time goes on. But, I mean, it's a free added benefit, and I thought that was fairly amazing. So one other thing I want to mention is with the titles that are on there, let's say 1,400 games. Now, a lot of them are duplicated, and the reason for that is because some of the games will also have a mode where they'll play videos on the back glass as you're playing. So Star Trek The Next Generation, you can play the OG version where it has just the back glass display. It looks like you're playing the actual machine. Or you can play the version that's playing clips from the episodes on there, which I think is fun. So that's something that's not available with a physical pinball machine. There's other versions where they've taken some 3D modeling and put some extra characters or extra effects on the screen. There's a Star Wars rebel attack or something that has flying lightsabers and lasers and space vehicles zooming around. It's got a Darth Vader animated figure that's up at the top of the play field taunting you as you're playing. And then between games, once it hits a game over, some disco arrangement of the Star Wars musical come on, and he just starts dancing, busting a move. So it's hilarious. you know so there's a lot of options available on this machine that aren't available on a physical machine the classic games play just flawlessly on this and like i said you know if i just want to go play williams diner um i can you know i don't have to go track down this machine get into my basement get it working again get it shopped and then just have a game where the code you know is shallow compared to what we have contemporarily right so what it's allowed me to do and this is what I got for my $8,000 is I can have a machine that's endlessly entertaining. I keep going to it, you know, every few weeks I'll go through and just start playing virtual games again for a bit. And it keeps me from having a whole workshop full of games in various stages of repair. It lets me focus on the new machines, the new machines with those nice deep codes that are still evolving. You know, my Rush, my Godzilla, my Guns and Roses, you know. So for my pinball budget, I can really go to these new releases, and then I have the entire back library here. So I hope that helped everybody. Just wanted to give my thoughts on what's available virtually there in the virtual space. So check it out, RecRoomWorld.com. Roland Buck is the guy. Check out the Facebook group. The Ultra VP Facebook fans. And also check him out on YouTube at RecRoomWorld. He's got videos of gameplay and everything. So check it out. Holler at me. Let me know what's up.

_(Acquisition: groq_whisper, Enrichment: v3)_

---

*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: e0ad8a84-c24d-4fba-8d65-db14403845ab*