RARusk
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Posts posted by RARusk
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The DreamCast still has one advantage over the other consoles - built-in VGA.
Once you hook up the DreamCast to a VGA monitor, using either a pre-made or self-made (it ain't that hard to build) VGA box, you won't want to put it on a regular set again. Think "Soul Calibur" looks awesome in S-Video? It looks truly spectacular in 640x480 VGA. To this day I refuse to play my DreamCast on anything other than my monitors.
If you want VGA (or something that passes for it) from the other consoles you have to use trickery, hacking, and/or converter boxes to acquire it. With the DreamCast all you had to do was tap into it. Simple.
Not every game supported VGA. But most of the few that didn't weren't worth getting anyway.
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You're not the only Gojira fan around here Godzilla. I have Super Godzilla (Super Nintendo), Godzilla: Generations (Dreamcast - Import. And yes, I do want Godzilla: Generations: Maximum Impact (Dreamcast - Import)), and The Movie Monster Game (C64).
I also assume that you may have checked out Toho's web site concerning the upcoming Godzilla: Final Wars movie. Seeing Godzilla standing in the middle of a giant crater in the middle of downtown Tokyo certainly has my interest piqued.
But of course, this topic is about the Alien movies so....
I have the following games:
Alien - (C64)
Aliens - (C64 - Activision)
Aliens - (C64 - Electric Dreams)
Alien 3 - (Commodore Amiga)
Alien 3 - (Sega Genesis)
Alien 3 - (Super Nintendo)
Alien vs. Predator - (Atari Jaguar)
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IIRC, you need to walk though the nest and take out the queen...then follow the map to the dropship.BTW today marks the 25th anniversary of the release of Alien to the theatres
OK.
Next question. Is there any way to get English instructions for Electric Dreams version of "Aliens"? I bought my copy when I was living in West Germany in the late '80s and the instructions were in German and French. I did a partial translation from the German side but got nowhere. Has somebody managed to post the English instructions of this game somewhere?
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You want frustrating? Try playing "Stuntman". That is probably the single most frustrating game (as a whole as opposed to a couple of levels within) that I have ever played. And I have been playing games for nearly 30 years. Don't get me wrong. "Stuntman" is a very cool concept and a cool game but it has so many design flaws I could write a book (a thick one) full of bug reports. For every one thing that makes "Stuntman" cool it does at least two things that are not cool. Since this game was done by the same people behind the "Driver" series, I have very strong reservations about "Driv3r".
As for frustrating levels I think that levels 9 and 10 in "Cannon Fodder" (Commodore Amiga) are the ones that stick out the most for me.
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I have the C64 Electric Dreams version of "Aliens". Has anyone here beaten it and if so, how?
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Broke more necks again tonight in the Riddick demo. Nothing more satisfying than creeping around in the darkness and taking out guards with my bare hands......
"Come out, come out wherever you are you motherf-*CRACK!*" *THUD*
Can't wait for June 1. I'll have some fun with this while waiting for GTA: San Andreas to come out.
Can't believe I forgot AvP (Jaguar). One of the best games for that system.
I also have Aliens for my C64 but I also have the European version created by Electric Dreams that I purchased while living in Germany in the late '80s. Pretty nice but I can't figure out what to do or how to beat it. Even today there is virtually no information on this version of Aliens.
I also played Alien 3 on the Commodore Amiga. It is identical to the Genesis version. The Super Nintendo version of Alien 3 is quite different and has better graphics.
During my gametesting days at Broderbund Software I had the opportunity to test Licence To Kill on both the Atari ST and C64. It was a pretty decent action game. Can't say the same for the movie though.....
And during my all-too-short temp stint at LucasArts Games, I tested Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis- Action Game for the PC, Amiga, and C64. The PC and Amiga versions were decent but the C64 version was bad. I think they canned the C64 one and released the others. I really wanted to work on the Monkey Island games but they wouldn't keep me. Their loss.....
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Been playing around with the "The Chronicles of Riddick" demo and I managed, with the exclusion of the two guards on the catwalk and the four guards in the last big room, to sneak up and break the necks of all of the guards in the demo. Not an easy feat. Definitely getting this title.
List of licensed titles that I think were good.....
Star Wars - (Arcade)
Discs of Tron - (Arcade)
Krull - (Arcade)
Star Trek: Strategic Operations Simulator - (Arcade)
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom - (Arcade) (also one of my all time favorite games)
Road Runner - (Arcade) (another of my all time favorites)
Firefox - (Arcade) (last of the great laserdisc games)
Red Storm Rising - (Commodore 64) (finished eighth in the Red Storm Rising Ultimate Challenge contest back in 1989)
Spy vs. Spy series - (Commodore 64)
The Three Stooges - (Commodore Amiga)
Goldeneye - (Nintendo 64) (the reason I have a N64)
Star Wars: Rogue Squardon - (Nintendo 64)
Turok 2: Seeds of Evil - (Nintendo 64)
Super Godzilla - (Super Nintendo) (so I'm a big Godzilla fan.....)
Hopefullly I can add "The Chronicles of Riddick" to this list.
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You're probably going to have to find the pinouts for the Toshiba TIMM and create a 9-pin to 15-pin adapter for it. Shouldn't be too hard.
As for myself, I use my Jag with both my NEC Multisync 3D (15Khz and 31Khz) and Commodore 1084 monitors.
However, when I first got my Jag from a friend of mine at work, I had to open it up and hack it before I could even use it. It seems that while he had it in storage something slammed into the back of the unit and broke off the last four contacts of the AV port. I then removed the RF modulator unit and put in a 15-pin plug for a customized AV box I had constructed. Later, I decided to remove the 15-pin plug and replaced it with a PlayStation AV plug hacked from a PS Multi AV out box that Sony put out. This would make it easier to use off the shelf cables including an S-Video Monster Cable that I normally use in conjunction with my Mac.
For RGB use, I made my own box that contains a EL1883 sync separator chip (to get sync channels for RGB from Composite Video) and a Sony CXA1145 RGB chip (taken from a Sega Genesis) for amplification. I also made several custom cables to use with the box so I can use all of my other consoles.
The first picture, RGBBox.jpg, is my RGB box. It used to be a NAKI VGA box for the Sega Dreamcast. It has a section of a Xbox S-Video box grafted in the back for the purpose of holding the Audio and Video plugs. The light colored cable on the left is my Xbox RGB cable.
The second picture, MultiOut.jpg, is the Sony AV box where I got my AV plug from.
The third picture, AVport.jpg, shows the AV plug in my Jaguar. You can also see where I covered up the damaged Jaguar AV port. The Jag's AV port is where I got all of my signals from and soldered my wires directly to the contacts.
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You're probably going to have to find the pinouts for the Toshiba TIMM and create a 9-pin to 15-pin adapter for it. Shouldn't be too hard.
As for myself, I use my Jag with both my NEC Multisync 3D (15Khz and 31Khz) and Commodore 1084 monitors.
However, when I first got my Jag from a friend of mine at work, I had to open it up and hack it before I could even use it. It seems that while he had it in storage something slammed into the back of the unit and broke off the last four contacts of the AV port. I then removed the RF modulator unit and put in a 15-pin plug for a customized AV box I had constructed. Later, I decided to remove the 15-pin plug and replaced it with a PlayStation AV plug hacked from a PS Multi AV out box that Sony put out. This would make it easier to use off the shelf cables including an S-Video Monster Cable that I normally use in conjunction with my Mac.
For RGB use, I made my own box that contains a EL1883 sync separator chip (to get sync channels for RGB from Composite Video) and a Sony CXA1145 RGB chip (taken from a Sega Genesis) for amplification. I also made several custom cables to use with the box so I can use all of my other consoles.
The first picture, RGBBox.jpg, is my RGB box. It used to be a NAKI VGA box for the Sega Dreamcast. It has a section of a Xbox S-Video box grafted in the back for the purpose of holding the Audio and Video plugs. The light colored cable on the left is my Xbox RGB cable.
The second picture, MultiOut.jpg, is the Sony AV box where I got my AV plug from.
The third picture, AVport.jpg, shows the AV plug in my Jaguar. You can also see where I covered up the damaged Jaguar AV port. The Jag's AV port is where I got all of my signals from and soldered my wires directly to the contacts.
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Did another double post. How is this happening?
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Interesting.....
I'll try to gently pry the board from the holder and take a closer look at the traces and see what is what. Then I'll open one of my extra Jag joypads and hook up some wires and see what happens.
I probably got a little too excited about finding the Tempest paddle clone. Up until now I thought that the only way you could obtain one is to get one from a dead Tempest unit. The only reason someone has started making them again is because of MAME and classic games collections. The universal optic board can be used for both MAME and the original arcade game (if you have one sitting in your garage). I may still try to get one of the optic boards and examine it. At the very least it will give me an excuse to go down the the arcade parts shop and see what other goodies they have (it has been awhile since I have been there). If I can get the Wingman to work with Tempest 2K then maybe later I will try to get my hands on the Vortex Spinner and make a REAL arcade controller.
Interesting rotary joypad there Tyrant. Does it use the Indy 500 controller or is it a optical device?
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Made a mistake.
Oscar Controls does have a listing of prices for their parts. I just didn't dig far enough.
The spinner costs $59.00 and the knob (which is sold seperately) costs $16.00. This way you can use any knob you want (from several presented including the original Tempest version). Not too bad price wise.
But they do also sell a universal optic board that may be useful. I will try to go down to the local arcade parts place (where I got my arcade parts for my homebrew arcade stick) to see if they have one. Sells for less than $10. I will see if it can be used in conjunction with the Wingman.
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How in the world did I manage to do a double post?.......
Anyway, I did a Google search for technical info on the Wingman but came up empty.
However, I did find one guy who managed to replace the analog stick with a arcade stick.....
But the biggest find was www.oscarcontrols.com. Here they make paddle controllers for MAME projects and recently released the Vortex Spinner which is a better version of the ORIGINAL Tempest paddle controller! Sadly, they did not list the price but hopefully it is not too expensive. They did also mention something about a interface board so this is one direction I am going to head in to try to make the Wingman into a Tempest controller.
By the way, is it possible to talk to the programmer of Tempest 2000 (Jeff Minter I believe)? He might be able to shed a little light here since he programmed the game.
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(Did away with the double post to save loading time)
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I tried hooking it up the way it was stated in the FAQ just to see what would happen but had little success. Didn't surprise me. I will probably do a Google search on the Wingman and see if I can track down some technical info on it. I doubt there is any on the web but you never know.....
I plan to graft the Genesis buttons onto the Wingman and use a 9-pin cable which will hook up to a Jaguar joypad that will have a 9-pin plug hacked into it. This joypad will serve as an interface to the Jaguar unit itself and also allow me to use the keypad, pause, and option buttons.
The joypad would look very similar to my PlayStation interface like it is shown in Interface1.jpg attached in this reply.
InterJoy1.jpg and InterJoy2.jpg shows my hacked up single button joystick and a homebrew two button arcade joystick, respectively, hooked up to the PlayStation interface. I use this to play around with my Namco Museum discs (I have all five), Midway Arcade Classics, and Activision Anthology. The arcade stick is wired just like the Sega Master System joypad and will work on the Atari 2600, Commodore 64, and Amiga.
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(Fixed the picture order reversal. Starting to get the hang of things here.....)
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I recently acquired a Logitech Wingman from a local thrift store and am trying to convert it for use as a Tempest2K paddle controller. The Wingman is a PC joystick with a paddle knob on the left side. My guess is that the paddle allowed you to whip around 180 degrees in a first-person multiplayer game.
The first picture attachment, Wingman1.jpg, shows the Wingman in a hacked-up state. The joystick has been removed but I was unable to disassemble the knob unit from the case.
The second picture attachment, Wingman2.jpg, is a close-up of the paddle knob along with how much I paid for it (about $10). The knob is a flywheel based paddle that allows for precise fingertip control. Very nice and damn near perfect for Tempest2K.
The third picture attachment, Wingman3.jpg, shows the optical sensor unit underneath the flywheel. The rough hole near the bottom was an attempt to get at the shaft for future application of WD-40. Unfortunately, the shaft is encased in plastic. For application of WD-40 I will have to stick the tube between the knob and the case and let the WD-40 seep into the shaft.
The fourth picture, GenButton.jpg, shows a Sega Genesis joypad. I plan to try to graft the button section into where the joystick was on the Wingman and use those as the fire buttons for Tempest2K.
This all leads to my big question: Is there any way to use the knob for Tempest2K using a Jaguar joypad as an interface? I figured where ground goes (on the sensor device by the flywheel) and maybe where +5VDC goes but I can't seem to figure out the rest. Is there any schematics for the Wingman? Is there anybody who has successfully converted a "wagon wheel" based device for use for Tempest2K?
Any help would be appreciated. It would make for one extremely cool controller hack project if I can solve this problem.
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Well, I'm now an XBox owner
in Modern Console Discussion
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I'm kind of surprised the no one has mentioned "The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape From Butcher Bay". One of the best surprises this year. A great way to show off your Xbox.
Just got "Midway Arcade Treasues 2" today (Xbox). Based on what I've played so far they did a reasonably good job on the games that interest me the most ("Arch Rivals", "Total Carnage", "Gauntlet II").