Centipede

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I have a Centipede.

It worked.

I tried to take it downstairs.

It no longer works.

I'll post again when it works.

[pinback]

I feel like part of that story is missing.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

So is a chunk of my leg.

[pinback]

This sounds like me being dick, totally don't mean to be a dick, I know it's part of the hobby, I'm just trying to learn:

"Burn-in" is obviously something every arcade collector must deal with. Ol 'pede there appears to have just a bit of it.

As a collector, does that:

1. Piss you off and make you want to replace the screen.
2. "Add character" to the machine.
3. Piss you off but not enough to make you want a new screen.
4. Totally get you psyched.
5. OTHER??

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

This sounds like me being dick, totally don't mean to be a dick, I know it's part of the hobby, I'm just trying to learn:

I don't think you sound like a dick at all. Also, in other news, while trying to get the thing downstairs, I lost my penis.

"Burn-in" is obviously something every arcade collector must deal with. Ol 'pede there appears to have just a bit of it.

True! Although, a lot of times burn-in shows up worse on a flash photograph with the game off than it does when the game is on and you are playing it.

That's basically what happened here. I'd take a photograph of the game being played with the flash off so you could see that while playing it's not that bad except I'm a dickless freak and the game doesn't work.

As a collector, does that:

1. Piss you off and make you want to replace the screen.
2. "Add character" to the machine.
3. Piss you off but not enough to make you want a new screen.
4. Totally get you psyched.
5. OTHER??

Ha, you know what, the only burn-in that really bugs me is when it is burn-in for a different game. My Zoo Keeper was originally a Qix, and Qix has the word "Qix" up top. Fuck that pissed me off. (I put a new monitor in Zoo Keeper. Well, my friend did.)

That said, it was different when we used to be able to get new 19" CRTs for $145. When that happened, I occasionally bought a new monitor for a game like Ms. Pac-man that had a monitor from the 80s with Ms. Pac-man burn. Just because we could.

Now, though, to go through the trouble of finding a CRT is such a goddamn pain (and expensive!) that we make do.

I bought a new neckboard for the Centipede. I anticipate being able to start it and take a photograph that more closely resembles what it's like during gameplay in a couple weeks.

[pinback]

One more question, and then I'll hang up and listen. Love your guys's show by the way:

Are you any good at Centipede? Do you feel your experience with trackballs and trackball-related careers and games contributes to your Centipede skill?

To put it another way, is RYE gonna end up with high score the next time I visit or what?

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

One more question, and then I'll hang up and listen. Love your guys's show by the way:

Are you any good at Centipede? Do you feel your experience with trackballs and trackball-related careers and games contributes to your Centipede skill?

No, I can't get to the fourth board.

To put it another way, is RYE gonna end up with high score the next time I visit or what?

Course he will!

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

It never really struck me before you said it, though. I use a goddamn trackball, what, 16 hours a day? And I can't manipulate one well enough for the bug blaster to do the one thing the Bug Blaster Project was designed for (blast bugs).

God. What am I doing with my life?

[pinback]

It never really struck me before you said it, though. I use a goddamn trackball, what, 16 hours a day? And I can't manipulate one well enough for the bug blaster to do the one thing the Bug Blaster Project was designed for (blast bugs).

But you EXCEL at a different trackball game, The Castle of the Crystal Bear! How do you explain your terribleness at Centipede?

Long time first time.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

It never really struck me before you said it, though. I use a goddamn trackball, what, 16 hours a day? And I can't manipulate one well enough for the bug blaster to do the one thing the Bug Blaster Project was designed for (blast bugs).

But you EXCEL at a different trackball game, The Castle of the Crystal Bear! How do you explain your terribleness at Centipede?

Long time first time.

I have a theory on Centipede. I have posted it before, but I will post it again.

Did you know that the spider can't move backwards? I think lots of people know that.

The spider enters from side and then can't go back. So a good strategy is... let him pass you.

Get your points, let the spider pass and get more points.

But I can't do that, can I? I can't leave WELL ENOUGH ALONE. No, I have to keep picking at the spider. They said that Centipede's rich pastel colors is why it was the favorite game of female arcade players back in the day. I posit that the reason they liked it is because they understood the concept of something not bothering you, whereas male players can't.

I see that thing on the screen and it is disgusting. It deserves to die. If I told you that spiders were an alien race, would you be surprised? So even though there is a foolproof way to never get killed by one (it appears, then spin in the direction it came from) I can't do it. I can't.

I won't.

So it quickly becomes personal and I am engaged in a battle over ten lines of pixels that I could "opt out" of at any time. And because they are spiders, they win. They always win. I kill 100 of them a year and they keep coming back.

Man, I really wish that I 1) had an attached fun penis instead of this black and blistering hole caused by the ripped flesh of the cabinet falling on me and 2) could play that game right now.

[Flack]

I'm glad you survived the Centipede fall. Having 300 pounds of gaming madness on top of you is no joke. Just ask my ex-wife -- ZING.

I dropped a RoadBlasters cabinet on myself once. In retrospect, trying to put a game on a dolly on a slippery surface on a slope may have been asking for it. They're so big that they kind of fall slowly and at least when that RoadBlasters fell on me, I had this illusion that I could stop it. So it was less of an instant-flattening and more of a slow-crushing. It just so happened that my mom was there at the time and the visual of her tying to lift a then-horizontal RoadBlasters cabinet off me made me laugh a little while it was crushing my leg and pelvis.

By the way, if this was all an elaborate ruse to get out of helping me move games upstairs this Fall... well played, sir.

Well played.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Well, that's the thing - with two people around, this never would have happened. My girlfriend could have stopped the thing from rolling halfway to the wall just by being there. If I had put a couch there, it would have stopped it. And so forth.

Are you moving games upstairs? Let's do it. Let's get that 720 in the movie room, yeah!!!! You have a sweet setup with the TV, chairs and deck, Flack. An arcade game up there would be pretty awesome.

[AArdvark]

The arachnophobia is keeping your Centipede points low. Face your fears and increase your scores.


Sorry about your leg though.


THE
EIGHT LEGGED
AARDVARK

[pinback]

He's saying it's the spider that gets him. There's no--- how can you die earlier than the fourth board otherwise.

I have to come over there once he fixed it to see how a guy who uses a trackball for 12 hours a day and whose best game is a trackball game can be so terrible at this.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I dropped a RoadBlasters cabinet on myself once. In retrospect, trying to put a game on a dolly on a slippery surface on a slope may have been asking for it. They're so big that they kind of fall slowly and at least when that RoadBlasters fell on me, I had this illusion that I could stop it. So it was less of an instant-flattening and more of a slow-crushing. It just so happened that my mom was there at the time and the visual of her tying to lift a then-horizontal RoadBlasters cabinet off me made me laugh a little while it was crushing my leg and pelvis.

Haha, well, get this shit. The Centipede was an early (er, IS an early) model, and it doesn't have the places in back where you can grip the cabinet, like most Atari cabs have.

It's so tall I couldn't tip it onto the dolly.

So I got in front of it, pushed it up and tried to cram some wood between the cab and the floor so I could go around back and tip it onto the dolly easier.

(This is while the thing is still in my garage.)

Well, because I can't do anything right, the wood was at an angle and it did start to tip. SLLLLOOOOWWWWLy. I came around and was able to stop it easily.

...

Christ, what the fuck am I doing with my life? I am wasting my goddamn life.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

Well, it works again.



Some quick impressions. I never really "got into" Centipede. However, I was always fascinated by it because my next-door neighbor growing up had one. (He had a Centipede in his garage and some other game that for the life of me I can't remember.)

In fact, there were probably two specific incidents that caused me to get these machines as an adult. The first was that a Centipede machine was in the house next door. Though our neighbor invited us over to play it any time we wanted, we were too shy to take him up on that.

The second incident was one summer when a BMX race was in our neighborhood for a week. Our house in Rochester was situated in a way that meant if we walked out back, we'd go through a quarter-mile of weeds, trees and brush and then emerge into property owned by other familes, who had houses that faced a street perpendicular to ours.

One year a rich guy created some BMX track for his son and held some kind of competition there. They had a tent and placed some video games in it, one of which was Mr. Do!. I didn't care about the BMX races, but I was fascinated by the fact that I could walk out my door, walk through the tall grass for a bit and be playing an arcade game.

Anyway, back to Centipede. I think I understand why it got so big back in the day. The colors are outstanding. There is nothing like it from the year it was released. I mean, Tempest looks like a goddamn nightmare come to life. But you're getting the same colors each time on each board. Centipede starts picking random combinations. (Someone correct me if I am wrong on that.) And these colors are wonderful pastels. More, Centipede doesn't do the thing where the first boards are too easy and a waste of time like Zoo Keeper. Maybe it's just because I can only get to 21,000 in it, but I have to pay attention the whole time.

My current strategy is to wipe out the mushrooms in the area I have access to, thus drawing the flea. I then pick off fleas (two shots to kill and he gets faster after the first one!) until the centipede itself gets closer to the bottom of the screen.

That's all I know. I know there is some sort of strategy to stop the spider from making his way across the field, but not the specifics.

[Tdarcos]

I started a reply then realized it was too long. The reply is posted on Caltrops here:

http://www.caltrops.com/pointy.php?acti ... pid=154700

You can reply here or there. Here's the first paragraph:

Ha, you know what, the only burn-in that really bugs me is when it is burn-in for a different game... was different when we used to be able to get new 19" CRTs for $145... Just because we could... Now, though, to go through the trouble of finding a CRT is such a goddamn pain (and expensive!) that we make do.

That brings up a related question, if they're even going to make commercial coin-op video games any more (you can ponder that point separately), what would they use for output? There are several choices:
-------------
Oh I missed the accidental pun; Centipede, "that bugs me". Maybe you had to be there.

If I told you that spiders were an alien race, would you be surprised?

Not for readers of Robert A. Heinlein's book Starship Troopers, not at all.

[Flack]

That brings up a related question, if they're even going to make commercial coin-op video games any more (you can ponder that point separately), what would they use for output?

Arcade games have been using LCD flat screen televisions/monitors for about a decade now, and many larger games have been using projection monitors for about 20 years.

[Tdarcos]

That brings up a related question, if they're even going to make commercial coin-op video games any more (you can ponder that point separately), what would they use for output?

Arcade games have been using LCD flat screen televisions/monitors for about a decade now, and many larger games have been using projection monitors for about 20 years.

What do they use for video output? NTSC Analog TV, ATSC Digital Television, PC-Type (VGA/DVI). S-Video, more than one of these or what, and how does the resolution compare to what a PC might generate? (I think a TV does 640x480 while I can run my monitor with no sweat at 1280x1024.)

Also, are video game machines perhaps selecting portrait instead of landscape when doing a long screen as opposed to a wide one?

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

That's a good question. I don't have LCDs in any of my games, but I may go that route for Warlords. (More on that later.)

Flack, are the LCDs set up to accept RGB, ground and horizontal / vertical sync just like the old standard resolution arcade monitors did?