K’NEX Full-Sized Pinball Machine! (with automatic scoring)

Thanks for watching! Be sure to like and subscribe, as I post a new video every 10 years. Let me know if you ever make a K’NEX pinball machine yourself! Here’s some extra info if you feel like learning more:

Motors.

The machine uses 3 motors. A corded power drill powers all 10 chain lifts. A second motor powers the moving ramp, the multiball door, the mini door on mini pinball, and the spinner. A third motor motor opens and closes the blue mini pinball trapdoor when activated.

Scoring System.

A Makey Makey (5:42) is a circuit board that plugs directly into a laptop and is used as the input for the program that displays the score. The Makey Makey only requires two pieces of conductive material to complete a circuit which indicates to the laptop that a specific key is being pressed. A Scratch code is used to interpret the keystroke inputs from the Makey Makey to perform such actions as play sounds and change the score on the laptop display.

12 “sensors” throughout the machine (5:30) allow these connections to happen on command. The 8 main targets lead to a sensor on their corresponding chain lifts to trigger the score. Another sensor signals when the ball goes into the top slot in mini pinball. There’s also a sensor that detects when a ball is lost, which triggers a “ball lost” sound for the player and tells the program that the player is one ball closer to “game over”. The final two sensors detect when the player pulls the red knob to launch a ball, which plays a sound effect, or the grey knob, which resets the game.

Gameplay.

To start/reset the game, the player first pulls the grey knob. This action moves a lever which pushes all 3 starting balls from the upper holding area into the lower holding area, ready to be launched. The player then pulls back and releases the red knob, which launches the first ball.

7 elements are immediately accessible from the play field: the orange tunnel to the pinwheel, the spinner hole to the rotating arm, the multiball door which gives an additional ball, the high jump to the face, the low jump to the long track, under the ramp which temporarily opens the blue trapdoor, and the left slot to the pin drop.

The 2 other elements are trickier to get to. When the ball goes under the ramp, the blue trapdoor is temporarily opened. The trapdoor leads to mini pinball, and the top hole in mini pinball leads to the 3 swinging arms and a large point bonus.

The first three balls the player loses on the main play field fall back down into the upper holding area, and are used in the next game. When the player loses more than three balls (by previously achieving multiball), the additional balls are rejected from the upper holding area and instead fall onto a track that leads them to the back of the machine (5:46). They are then picked up by the chain lift and placed back into the multiball storage area.

The game continues until the player runs out of balls. When the computer detects that the player is out of balls, it ends the game and displays the players stats, which are the number of times the player hit each of the 9 targets, hit the bonus target, and collected a star, as well as the total number of targets hit.

Strategy.

The player should use four main strategies to achieve the highest score possible:

Most importantly, the player should hit all 9 targets to collect all the star bonuses. Every time a new element is hit, the player gains a star. The stars give bonuses of 0, 0, 100, 250, 500, 750, 1000, 1250, and 1500 points respectively, a total of 5350 extra points.

Another strategy is to continually hit under the ramp (+100 points), which opens the trapdoor (+300), which leads to mini pinball and access to the mini pinball hole (+600). This loop, when fully completed, gives the player a total of 1000 points.

A third strategy is to hit the multiball as much as possible, as this makes scoring more rapid and prolongs the game. Although multiball is only worth 100 points, recieving another ball on the field is much more valuable.

Finally, the player should aim for the current bonus target. Every 40 seconds, the screen displays a new bonus target, which cycles randomly between the 7 targets that are immediately accessible from the main playing field (2:55). When hit, 400 bonus points are added on top of the points that are normally awarded for that target (1:21).

Credits.

The entire project was designed by myself, with the exception of a few elements.

Credit to Thibault Art (   / thibaultisthebest  ) for his tutorials and allowing me to create the “Mouse Head” element.

Also credit to Shadownman39 (   / 39shadowman  ) for his design of the rotating/curving arm and the flinging pins on the pin drop.

Music: Stop (Instrumental) - Approaching Nirvana. (   / approachingnirvana  )

Scratch code: https://scratch.mit.edu/projects/3962...