Q*bert also got added to the mix

[Flack]

When I got my Q*Bert it had been a long time since I played the game, and I (incorrectly) remembered getting points for leading Coily over the edge. I was spending all my time on the earlier levels making sure I used every single "rescue disc" and leading Coily off the pyramid every time. Then at some point that got boring and I noticed you get a bonus for every disc you don't use. So in reality I was going out of my way and taking up a bunch of time to avoid getting bonus points.

The story of my life.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

(This thread provides delightful discussion about a future possible arcade-style game on the PC. It fills me with joy! Boy, when this text game gets finished, am I gonna have some reckoning to do.)

Anyway, I long suspected that the ballast in my Q*bert was bad, and eating lights. I grabbed a known good starter, and the light from my Arkanoid and plugged them in.

It killed the light that was previously in Arkanoid in like four seconds. Yay for knowledge, boo for destroying a lamp.

(And my backup light flickers. Christ!)

So, off to Lowe's tomorrow - gotta snag two 18" fluorescent lights and a new backup. Luckily, I grabbed a ballast with a black light three years ago. Q*bert has a spare AC plug (I looooooooooooooove that they used to do that back in the day!) so this week my mission will be to take the old ballast out and put the modern-day one in. I'm stoked: I get that set, and my only issues with my Q*bert will be the water damage from the cab (can't really fix that) and the fact that it has the worst side-art of all-time. And that I may try to replace.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

jrok, the guy who made the awesome non-emulated, cramming-like-8-games-on-a-PCB board for Williams games, is making one for Mylstar games. This would include Q*bert.

http://www.jrok.com/xfer/msf/

Here is what he has to say about it:

Developing the sound support for the MSF board, which will be emulated in an Atmel AVR part, most probably. The original soundboard is basically just a 6502 hooked up to an 8-bit DAC for making audio effects... oh with a Votrax speech IC for extra annoyance !

And here is a photo:



I live in constant fear of my Q*bert board dying, so this is awesome. I think the photo shows him hooking this up to a JAMMA connection, which will be useful to a lot of people.

I paid like $170 for my Q*bert board and there just aren't many out there. If it plays the same, I'd probably feel more sane going this route.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

The dude running Phoenix Arcade (the web company) made the Q*bert "swear" marquee. If I were any kind of webmaster, I would have the information as to whether or not they were reproductions, or of his own design. I am fairly sure they are reproductions of an alternate marquee.

I always kind of wanted one, but they were listed as "out of stock" on his website.

I happened to be visiting Google Groups because the changelog for Inform 7 wasn't released two days early and MAN wuz I PISSED. I saw on rgvac that the guy did have some available, still. So I bought one.

Here's how my Q*bert looks now:

[Flack]

That, is awesome.

[bruce]

Wouldn't it be great to take Q*Bert, and hack the sound system, so that instead of cursing in his funny punctuationy way, he just screamed "Motherfucking ASSHOLE!" really loud when he died?

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

That would be good. It would save ME having to say it each time.

[AArdvark]

And have it doppler away when he falls off the back of the pyramid, Like Kevin Kline in 'A Fish Called Wanda'.




THE
REASONABLY OBSCURE
AARDVARK

[Flack]

In MAME, Q*Bert's "voice" is a series of WAV files. Replacing those with your own voice would (I think) be trivial.

[Ice Cream Jonsey]

I was trying to find out when I bought Q*bert side art. It had been a long time. Maybe May of 2010.

Anyway, stuck at home, I managed to get it installed onto my Q*bert. One project down. It may take me over a year to get to them, but I get to them.