New top story on Hacker News: Ask HN: Why is there no modern successor to the 3D Pinball games of yesteryear?

Ask HN: Why is there no modern successor to the 3D Pinball games of yesteryear?
11 by eigenvalue | 9 comments on Hacker News.
I recall games like Full Tilt! Pinball and the 3D pinball game included in Windows were pretty popular and good showcases for the speed and quality of computer graphics back in the 90s. Then it occured to me that modern GPUs like the nVidia 4090 would be incredible for simulating a pinball machine with insane fidelity using RTX ray tracing and the optimized physics simulator (PhysX) they have. You could probably end up with something that truly looks and feels like the real thing. I'm certainly no expert on the subject, but after doing a quick search on Steam, I don't see anything like that on the market. Why do you think that is? Would it really be so hard to do? Wouldn't that be popular? I know I'd love to see it just because it would be such a great showcase for the power of modern machines, especially the integration of super realistic physics. Imagine bumping the machine hard to cheat? Or being able to smash the glass with a hammer and then put objects in the case and see what happens to them while you play? Could also be an amazing physics education thing if you could see real-time free-body diagrams overlaid on the ball that you could freeze in time and study showing all the forces acting on it. You could turn a dial and see what it would be like to play pinball on the moon! I hope someone sees this and makes it!

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