WTD: Beta testers for Stern Orbitor 1 Updated Rom
seymour-shabow
how to use pinmame debug - at any rate, one of the reason I didn't like
Orbitor 1 as much as I could is that you can't turn off the minimum game
time...... so, did some hacking around and hacked the romset to simply
ignore game times. It should still count the longest ball etc. but no
more ball 3 (or 5) of you sucking wind, and hearing "SHOOT PINBALL
AGAIN....."
Suck wind.....
SHOOT PINBALL AGAIN
until your 90, 120, 150, or 180 seconds are up.
Tested the hack in pinmame, next step is to test it in a machine. I
don't have any chips to burn right now but you can bet I'm ordering them
ASAP.....
So, Orbitor one owners who want to try out my rom hack LMK and I will
send you a copy. You can set the dips for minimum game time to whatever
you like - the hack ignores them. (Well, not TECHNICALLY, but it
ignores the value it puts in the ram!)
For those who want to know what's involved with this, Orbitor one stores
player data in one of the 5101 chips, when you start a game it sets all
player's scores to zero, and puts the minimum gametime value at the end
of each player's data area..... 5a is 90 seconds. The game counts down
from here, and after every ball, puts the data back, subtracting out
your cumulative time for that ball. Once it reaches zero it probably
sets a flag somewhere or just compares after a last ball drain to see
the game time..... I don't really care about that. I hacked the rom so
that the initial value is always zero.
It makes the game more fun to me instead of if you're just having a
house ball type of game, you don't have to keep shooting the damn ball
up to end the game. Also makes it more fair for tournaments........
Shoot me an email if you are interested in testing this out for me.
Provided as is of course and I don't think that my software will cause
fuses to blow etc, I'm perfectly willing to do it in my own machine as
soon as I get some blank 2716's......
-scott CARGPB#29
seymour-shabow
Oh, and if you have 2716's on your board there's only 2 to modify, u1
and u5. If you have 2732's you have to change both.
-scott CARGPB#29
Funky Pinaholic
Hey Scott, I'd be interested in one that allows for 0,30,60,90
seconds.. Could you whip up one that does that?
I think it would also be better for the game to show the amount of
'free time' remaining rather than counting up the amount of seconds on
each ball. Or... Showing the total time played rather than time per
ball. It's not necessarily that any default seconds for total time is
an awful idea, but moreso that the game gives no hint to the player
(that quickly drains a bunch of balls) why they are being told to
shoot the ball again. AFAIK the amount of time played in one ball has
nothing to do with any game scoring... but I'll admit I'm a new O1
owner so I'm not 100% sure. :)
seymour-shabow
The high time per ball is what you're aiming for (pays out a special if
you do it)
Unfortunately by the nature of the hack it doesn't allow for the
changing of the times although delving deeper into it might reveal
that...... it really is a HACK what I ended up doing, but it worked.
-scott CARGPB#29
Funky Pinaholic
>
> - Show quoted text -
Aha! Well you (or rather I) learn something new every day. :)
How long must you keep a ball live to get a bonus? Is that selectable?
seymour-shabow
>> The high time per ball is what you're aiming for (pays out a special if
>> you do it)
>>
>> Unfortunately by the nature of the hack it doesn't allow for the
>> changing of the times although delving deeper into it might reveal
>> that...... it really is a HACK what I ended up doing, but it worked.
>>
>> -scott CARGPB#29- Hide quoted text -
>>
>> - Show quoted text -
>
> Aha! Well you (or rather I) learn something new every day. :)
>
> How long must you keep a ball live to get a bonus? Is that selectable?
You have to beat the previous high ball time to get the special - it's
not really like a score threshold.
Some more trivia - hit a switch and you get 13 seconds of time added (if
you hit no other) - but if you're holding the flippers up, you only get
5 seconds. Since you can't really trap the ball anyway on the real
machine, a moot point.
-scott CARGPB#29
seymour-shabow
OK, burned the mod to a couple chips and installed in my O1 - works
like a champ. No more endless 3rd balls! 3 and done, like it should
have been in the first place.
I've managed to get 112 seconds on a ball and a hair over a million
thus far - hard game. I never realized the bonus multiplier went up
to 15x like some other sterns...... fun!
Anyone else wants to try it out LMK and I'll send you the zip of the
roms.
Makes the game a lot better IMO.
-scott CARGPB#29