NE146 Posted January 7, 2004 Share Posted January 7, 2004 In a pinch, just send us the mame you're using. .dos mame 56 .inp's can be really finnicky. But as long as it's the exact same mame version, you should be fine. Otherwise, it's a crapshoot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hepcat Posted January 7, 2004 Author Share Posted January 7, 2004 Jason: Very cool - you and I sound like we are at about the same level of play on the regular version (although you might be a little better than me; I think my high is about 220K) It is hard to get all four when the energizer lasts 1 sec, just on those boards I usually don't bother to try for all four Anyway, it would problably be cool to have a .inp file anyway; It would be cool to see if our techniques are similar In my MAME cab, I use DOS MAME .56 - will that be a problem for the .INP file? OK, I just checked, and the mspacman rom hasn't changed since mame37. So I guess it will be OK as long as I can get dos mame to work. Big if, given my limited computer skills. But I look forward to seeing you play, Bob. I'll record my games too for the next week or so and see if I can get a really good one going! --Jason Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hepcat Posted January 7, 2004 Author Share Posted January 7, 2004 .inp's can be really finnicky. But as long as it's the exact same mame version, you should be fine. Otherwise, it's a crapshoot. Yeah, I've had very little success with the ones I've downloaded. --Jason Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
goatdan Posted January 9, 2004 Share Posted January 9, 2004 They ARE different games though. Try playing sped-up MsPac and see how much you can score. If you can score 200k you're good. But the REAL challenge is scoring 300k. You get to the point of course when the ghosts don't turn blue, and you have random fruits (unlike Pacman where you always get the 5000pt key). So with no consistent 5000 bonus, and no points on ghosts, scoring that extra 100k is actually a lot more difficult than you imagine... it becomes a trial of endurance. Try it out! Of course in the unsped up version of MsPac, I'd consider 150k to be a good score for me And of course in Pacman, you can score whatever you want with patterns... if you decide to use them. I've actually been thinking about this quite a bit, and perhaps some of you can help me answer some questions... What *are* all of the differences between Ms. Pac-Man slow and fast? I'm researching the differences now (this discussion got me started on an interesting idea ) and I'm trying to figure out if there are many (any?) differences other than the speed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted January 9, 2004 Share Posted January 9, 2004 Hey HepCat! Here is my .INP from tonight: 227K My new high score on standard speed! You will see quite a few screw ups as far as trying to get the monsters grouped together but all in all I'm happy with this one. My problem is once you get the board that's the equivalent of the ninth key in Pac-Man, I don't last too long. All monsters are faster than you without eating dots, so I have to figure out a better strategy than the one I currently use :-P Now, you will need DOS MAME .56 for this, not sure if the Windows version of .56 will work, but I do know that the newest version (.78) will not. Let me know if you need it, because it's 2.5Mb zipped, and I didn't want to waste the Al's bandwidth. mpm.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dr Galaga Posted January 9, 2004 Share Posted January 9, 2004 I usually see just (Ms.) Pac Man move faster - BUT here is what Mowerman says about it: Speed ups will make the speed of Pac-Man faster than the ghost or will make the speed of all on screen characters proportionately faster.. These 2 different categories reflect the method used to create the enhancment. Software (ROM) speedups make Pac-Man much faster than the ghost. Hardware ( board modifications, extra wires etc) make all on screen characters move equally fast. He has a really good site on the Pac Man series games at http://users.erols.com/mowerman/pacfile.htm - go about half way down and there is a description of the different speed-ups. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hepcat Posted January 9, 2004 Author Share Posted January 9, 2004 Great Bob, thanks! I do have Dos Mame 56. So I'm going to download this file and see if I can get it to play. I haven't had time to record a full game myself, it will probably have to wait until the weekend. --Jason Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hepcat Posted January 9, 2004 Author Share Posted January 9, 2004 Wow Bob, very impressive performance! I've only done better than that once in 22 years, at least in terms of score. I have a few other comments: Great job on level 14. I think you got every monster except one, and I spotted a couple of unbelievable escapes. You obviously understand the "tie goes to player" rule and utilize it very effectively. Most players don't even know about this. I group the monsters a little differently on levels 3-5. You'll see what I mean when I have a recording worthy of posting, which I did not succeed in creating last night. --Jason Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted January 9, 2004 Share Posted January 9, 2004 Jason: Thanks! That game actually is my high score now - it's good to have it saved With the 'tie' thing, I've just learned how to make the most of the energizer time. You must do that as well, no? I've learned most of the monster's AI (as I'm sure you have too) over the years and use it againt them That's why you'll see me sometimes go right up to Pinky and make him turn away. I'm very curious on how you group them together in the 3 to 5 levels... I look forward to seeing your .INP file I put that entry into MARP - 2nd place! I've also noticed that the 1st place holder for Pac-Man Plus has a score of 180,000 - I think I'll try for that next; my high is 160,000... Hey - Are you going to the Philly Classic this year? I was thinking of going - it would be cool to meet some of the people from here. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted January 9, 2004 Share Posted January 9, 2004 Man.. I gotta watch this .inp file! I need to setup a win98 box though.. so I'm doing that now as I type this Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted January 10, 2004 Share Posted January 10, 2004 man.. I must've been using mame32 too long as I'm out of it and can't get it going. I got DosMame56 (executable name DMAME.EXE). I put MPM.INP into the /inp directory, and the mspacrom in the roms directory (It plays fine by the way).. But, when I try to do -playback, I can't get anything going. I've tried: DMAME -PLAYBACK MPM.INP (this results in a message that says "fuzzy name" and tries to run another game which of course fails) DMAME MSPACMAN -PLAYBACK MPM.INP plays Mspacman, no input. DMAME -PLAYBACK MPM.INP MSPACMAN plays mspacman, no input. ..then I tried #1 again, but I renamed mpm.inp to "mspacman.inp" and did: DMAME -PLAYBACK MSPACMAN.INP Plays mspac fine.. but still no dice now I tried: DMAME MSPACMAN.INP -PLAYBACK Still the same. What am I doing wrong? Granted I spent only 5 minutes so far, but this should be easy! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted January 10, 2004 Share Posted January 10, 2004 Hi NE146... You are *soooooooo* close: mame mspacman -playback mpm (don't include the '.inp'; MAME adds it automatically) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hepcat Posted January 12, 2004 Author Share Posted January 12, 2004 I'm not having any luck with this. The most I got over the weekend was 150K. I've regressed because I know the "camera" is on me. In the meantime Bob, you could check out my 270,000 game on Pac-man Plus, posted here. http://www.atariage.com/forums/viewtopic.p...er=asc&start=25 --Jason Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted January 12, 2004 Share Posted January 12, 2004 Hey Jason: 270K?!?!?!? Wow - I have to watch this one tonight... I'll try it as well, hopefully I'll be able to come close... It's funny, once you get to the point where the monsters don't turn blue any more, I'm *sure* a pattern is possible... (the whole point of Pac Man Plus was to eliminate the use of patters...) I really haven't played Jr. Pac-Man too much, but now that I have a new take on playing it (I find if I treat it as two boards side by side instead of one large board, I play better) We *have* to get a one-on-one match going at some point... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hanglyman Posted January 15, 2004 Share Posted January 15, 2004 Hey Jason: 270K?!?!?!? Wow - I have to watch this one tonight... I'll try it as well, hopefully I'll be able to come close... It's funny, once you get to the point where the monsters don't turn blue any more, I'm *sure* a pattern is possible... (the whole point of Pac Man Plus was to eliminate the use of patters...) Pac Man Plus is completely patternable when they don't turn blue, and paternable on all other boards until you eat an energizer. The only random element is the energizer effect of sometimes one of the ghosts not turning blue or the maze going invisible. Ms Pac Man however is a different story, due to the fact the monsters don't always come out of the box the same, pure patterns are not possible even on the no blue boards, but there are grouping techniques that use partial patterns, they are pretty tough to master though. DAS Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xot Posted January 15, 2004 Share Posted January 15, 2004 Hey Jason: 270K?!?!?!? Wow - I have to watch this one tonight... I'll try it as well, hopefully I'll be able to come close... It's funny, once you get to the point where the monsters don't turn blue any more, I'm *sure* a pattern is possible... (the whole point of Pac Man Plus was to eliminate the use of patters...) I really haven't played Jr. Pac-Man too much, but now that I have a new take on playing it (I find if I treat it as two boards side by side instead of one large board, I play better) We *have* to get a one-on-one match going at some point... I'd be curious to hear who's really good at Junior. I've owned the arcade machine for a number of years and my best is only 87,000 or so. I've never cleared the seventh board. It's all about grouping the monsters and by the last board (whose maze is pure evil) I just can't make 'em behave. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NE146 Posted January 15, 2004 Share Posted January 15, 2004 Here is my .INP from tonight: 227K My new high score on standard speed! You will see quite a few screw ups as far as trying to get the monsters grouped together but all in all I'm happy with this one. Man that's an awesome watching that. It shows you really know your stuff! I dig all the quick turnarounds you do and your movements to "direct" the ghosts the way you want them. Also, it's really cool to see wait on eating power pellets for extended periods until you get them together for some chomping (which is totally not how I play, if they aint all together.. oh well ). I learned a lot from it! I love seeing how others play Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted January 15, 2004 Share Posted January 15, 2004 @NE146: Thanks! Although the 'waiting' to group them together makes for a long game I'm working on PacMan Plus right now to beat a certain high score @HanglyMan: Yes, I have found out that a pattern is possible until you eat a fruit. I actually use one now, and it even works until the second fruit is eaten (as long as the 'fruit' blue time is longer than the 1st apple energizer equivalent)! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess Ragan Posted January 16, 2004 Share Posted January 16, 2004 I happen to LIKE the speed chip. It's a pain to play Ms. Pac-Man when everything onscreen is moving at near-slug speeds. The game becomes a lot more fun when the speed is cranked up. JR Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted January 16, 2004 Share Posted January 16, 2004 @HepCat, NE146, Anyone else who's interested: Ok Here's my new high score in PacManPlus: 268,000! Things to look for: 1) On the 2nd level, I get sandwiched between two monsters and live through it! If you notice right after I get out of it, I stop, because I couldn't believe what just happened. 2) On the third board, I eat the fruit at the exact same time I run into a monster (didn't get any points for it - went right through him) ok - I'm resting for a while... pacplus.zip Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PacManPlus Posted January 21, 2004 Share Posted January 21, 2004 Hey Hepcat - What happened? I'm still curious to see your mspacman input file... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ulij20 Posted March 24, 2004 Share Posted March 24, 2004 Was there ever a speed up chip for Pac-Man? I don't know if the original ever had the speed up, but if you enter the code to play Pac-man on the 20th anniversary version, and Ms. Pac-man is fast, Pac-man will also be fast. Kind of defeats the purpose of hiding the original, don't you think? --Jason What is the code for Pac Man on the 20th Anniversary version? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KaineMaxwell Posted March 24, 2004 Share Posted March 24, 2004 I still play Ms. Pac-Man anytime I get the chance but never found one with the speed-up. Though when I play on MAME I play it with the speed-up. Speeds the game up and adds a bit to the difficulty. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nukey Shay Posted March 24, 2004 Share Posted March 24, 2004 Other than on the various consoles I don't think I've ever played Ms. Pac-Man without the speed up chip. It seems that every machine I've seen has one and now I'm used to it. Was there ever a speed up chip for Pac-Man? Tempest Virtually all games use frame counters to determine if sprites should be moving (this is true for home console games as well). The speed up conversion is nothing more than 1 byte in the program being ignored...so that the character moves on every frame. There are chips that exist that have the monsters' frame counters disabled as well. This "ignoring" can be done by burning an eprom with the memory location(s) zeroed...or by using a transister to skip over them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Saikyo Posted March 25, 2004 Share Posted March 25, 2004 can't you see? if the speed up chips get installed in EVERY ms.pacman arcade board then the original game will ONLY be able to played properly in emulation and what a big grey area THAT is! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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