Request Dark mode: Make the ball's light reflection lighter

Dark mode is beautiful, but the dot of white light that reflects off the ball is too dark. The ball is hard to see in dark mode. Even if it means cheating the background light, that reflection should be made a bit lighter. Overall I love the new PS4 version!

I'd like them to change the lighting options to what they had in the ps4 demo. It was much better than what they have in the full release.

You could tweak the lighting to whatever setting you wanted, not just 3 presets.

frankiedf said:

I'd like them to change the lighting options to what they had in the ps4 demo. It was much better than what they have in the full release.

You could tweak the lighting to whatever setting you wanted, not just 3 presets.

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I disagree.

The lighting in the demo was poor. The darkest setting was not as impressive as it is in the released version , and the brightest setting was washed out in the demo.

I'm all for a few more settings, but the demo lighting was busted.

My problem with the lighting is that on some tables it doesn't look like its coming from bulbs, it just seems to be bits of the playfield glowing from nowhere. No Good Gofers for example looks really bloomy and I have seen YouTube videos of that table and it looked nothing like that. Star Trek on the other hand seems to have a more realistic effect.

Its a nice improvement over the PS3 version though, but none of the tables I have seen so far look remotely photo realistic yet. Just looking at Star Trek, most of the clear perspex doesn't look like perspex, none of the plastic parts look remotely plastic. I'm hoping the PS4 still has enough GPU power left for some shaders to make those things look true to life. Even the back glass doesn't look quite right.

sarcomyces said:

Dark mode is beautiful, but the dot of white light that reflects off the ball is too dark. The ball is hard to see in dark mode. Even if it means cheating the background light, that reflection should be made a bit lighter. Overall I love the new PS4 version!

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In my opinion the dark setting looks correct for playing pinball in a dark room. The ball shouldn't be artificially lit. Making the reflections lighter on the ball would ruin the effect for me.

I just stumbled on the Dark Mode option in the settings.... and it's AMAZING!
This is really how most of us remember playing the games at the arcades, I almost forgot how important the table lighting is to a Pinball game's presentation.

Thanks FarSight! *thumbs up*

I think Dark mode is best lighting setting. Especially when actually playing in a dark room! Now let's get the Addams Family Kickstarter going for 2014!

brakel said:

In my opinion the dark setting looks correct for playing pinball in a dark room. The ball shouldn't be artificially lit. Making the reflections lighter on the ball would ruin the effect for me.

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Look at Attack from Mars on dark mode (noticed it on that table especially) The lighting on the table is incredible, except the ball is way too hard to see! On any table, there's always a white shine on the ball that comes from an outside source (an overhead light). On dark mode this seems to be way too muted, so the ball blends in w/ the dark table. I'm kinda surprised I'm the only one that sees this so far! It shouldn't be hard to see the ball, even in dark mode.

Could it be that you have different TV's and different tv screens and different TV screen settings that make you experience these things differently?

sarcomyces said:

I'm kinda surprised I'm the only one that sees this so far! It shouldn't be hard to see the ball, even in dark mode.

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I agree the highlights should be a bit brighter; it looks like the whole surface just gets darkened down, whereas what actually should happen is that the reflecting highlights should stay nearly the same brightness level.

This is pretty obvious if you Google image search for "pinball photography," for instance. Examples:





(Those are some of the first that come up; amusingly enough, the site at the URL in them appears to be defunct. ; )

Ball in PS4 Genie Dark lighting for comparison:



I posted this on the TPA FB page, asking if it's something they could possibly tweak.

sarcomyces said:

Look at Attack from Mars on dark mode (noticed it on that table especially) The lighting on the table is incredible, except the ball is way too hard to see! On any table, there's always a white shine on the ball that comes from an outside source (an overhead light). On dark mode this seems to be way too muted, so the ball blends in w/ the dark table. I'm kinda surprised I'm the only one that sees this so far! It shouldn't be hard to see the ball, even in dark mode.

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You don't have overhead lights in a dark arcade and that's what the dark mode is replicating. The only lights lighting a traditional dark arcade are the other machines and the glow of the red exit lights. I will see if I can upload my Chicago Pinball Expo videos and we can compare. There are tables that I think are more playable in neutral and there could be differences in TV brightness. I also watch in a light controlled room. If you're watching in a bright or sunlit room it can make seeing dark areas on your TV more difficult.

Today FarSight replied to my FB post (see above), saying "We'll look into improvements for the ball."

smbhax said:

Today FarSight replied to my FB post (see above), saying "We'll look into improvements for the ball."

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Tweaking the ball to be a bit more visible when in the dark, middle section of some of the tables would be a fantastic improvement. It's really my only gripe with the game so far.

if anything when the ball goes into those dark patches it should show light reflection more as the ball is higher than the dark surface and reflecting the light from the light sources, but if TPAs lights just shine up instead of out you'll lose the line of sight from the light and you'll get what you have no light reflection on the ball. Its incorrect.

smbhax said:

Today FarSight replied to my FB post (see above), saying "We'll look into improvements for the ball."

Click to expand...

With the PS4, they should have enough power to add more realistic lighting, including reflections, etc. The textures on most of the tables could use an upgrade too. Even the cabinet textures look fairly poor to me. Another weakness is the plungers on most tables are jerky and don't seem realistic. Very hard to line up skill shots, with the limited views of the tables too.

I think giving the players options is the way to approach this. If a player wants a dark table with a bright ball that should be the player's choice and you should be able to turn that option on if you would like to. Everyone's television sets are set differently in terms of brightness and contrast (in addition to screen response times and things like that), so it will look different for everyone. I love playing with the setting on dark on PS4. But I also wouldn't mind being able to see the ball better if I was completely focused on getting a good score. In fact I think that would be the best way to play. Dark settings with a brighter ball that is easy to track with my eye. I sometimes change the ball color on iPad to yellow or green so that it shows up better because I lose track of the dim silver ball on the busy tables' artwork. Ball reflection and color would also be a great option to have available on PS4 (and the Steam version as things get updated to match PS4).
Of course the best option is to play real pinball, but in that case you aren't dealing with screen response times and framerates! So, the visibility of the ball isn't an issue there. We need options available in order to overcome the limitations of simulation.