It’s getting harder and harder for pinball machines to compete with the cutting-edge graphics on home gaming consoles, and even VR now. But by adding an interactive element allowing players to design their own tables, artists Jérémie Cortial and Roman Miletitch have found a way to make pinball relevant again.
With Flipppaper, the virtual pinball machine the pair engineered and built, you don’t need any technical know-how to bring a complex table design to life — just the ability to draw with a set of four coloured markers that define barriers, speed boosters, flippers, and other gameplay obstacles.
After you’ve laid down a blank piece of paper and sketched your table design, the machine automatically scans your doodles and turns them into a playable virtual pinball game. And if you find problems with your design while playing, like the ball getting stuck in a certain spot, you can grab a marker and make quick tweaks to your design until the game plays smoothly again.