High Score Save Kits: Go or No-Go

[ChanceKJ]

We run a 60in1 in a MsPac, dedicated on single game mode on location and it. makes. BANK.

Always remember: WE are the 1% when it comes to the particulars of authenticity in this world.

 

[Outland81]

I have some thoughts on this, since the library arcade is coming up again soon.

Two things come to mind right away. One is the kit for Space Invaders/Deluxe. It's wonderful and I love it. Eight different games, plenty of menu options, etc.
But unfortunately, there's no way to prevent the public from entering the operator menu, changing all the settings and leaving the menu on the screen for me to deal with when I happen to come in and check on it a few hours later.

Long story short: it's great for home use, but not so good for the library arcade. With that in mind, I'll be returning that game to stock before the arcade opens.

The other thing is the HSS multipac kit on my Ms. Pac. Love it! And the operator menu is "secret" so that the public can't easily get in and mess around.
But you know what? My memories of the golden age do not include the speed-up option for any Pac games. I do remember seeing speed-up in the wild, but not nearly as often as the original.
So in an effort to show / educate people what it was like for most people back then to play Pac & Ms. Pac, my preference is to disable the speed-up options. Harumph!!
(This'll also keep people from hogging the game so much, b/c they won't be able to extend their time by zipping around the maze & thinking they're really great at Ms. Pac. )

The Braze kits are awesome. Multipede kit on my Millipede, Asteroids Deluxe multigame w/Asteroids & Lunar Lander.

There's a multigame kit for Gyruss. It's usually never available. I just checked the HSS website and I see it IS available.
Hmm, the settings menu can be disabled. Nice to have three game choices available in that cabinet. I love me some Time Pilot and Pooyan.

If the public can't get in and mess with the settings...
If the kit offers good choices...
If it's easy / nondestructive to install...

EDIT: The HSS multipac games are obviously more authentic than the Pac games in the 60-in-1 kit. For example, the sounds on the 60-in-1 Ms. Pac are just wrong. Others have noted the problems or flaws with the 60-in-1. In this case, I'd rather have fewer authentic choices than a lot of inauthentic ones. I like the HSS menu, too, which is just a simple list vs. a garish, ugly bunch of game screens. If you're presenting a retrocade to the public for a short time, I think it makes sense to keep the games as authentic as possible (balancing that with convenience and choice).

 

[Gremlin75]

In my experience, the HSS kits do affect gameplay in subtle (or significant) ways - the HSS kit for Mr. Do I installed created a huge delay and altered the sound when the ball is regenerated for the player. For that reason, I decided not to install the kit on my Mr. Do.

I have Braze multi-game HSS kits in several cabinets, because I want to have the additional games in my very limited arcade space, and the alterations to the way the games play is either too subtle for me to notice, or I'm not passionate enough about the "fidelity" of them to care (such as the color inaccuracy in Frogger in the Scramble multi-game HSS kit). For each game with a kit, I retained the original components to be able to return the cabinet to the "standard" state.

IMO, whatever maximizes your enjoyment of the games is what matters - BITD, operators implemented plenty of hacks to games to adjust to market conditions (such as the speed-up hacks in Pac-Man), so even a game "in the wild" could be altered from the factory state when on location. From a preservation perspective, I am strongly opposed to changes that are not (easily) reversible to the PCBs, although I almost always swap out old incandescent marquee lighting for modern solutions.

As far as high scores go - if you are just concerned with what your/your guests' PRs are, then HSS are a lot more convenient than post-it notes or whiteboards. If you're a serious gamer who is looking to set a world record or submission to TG, then a HSS (or anything else that modifies the game from the original factory code) is unacceptable. We don't need MORE Billy Mitchell nonsense in the community.

Gremlin75

 

[gamefixer]

We run a 60in1 in a MsPac, dedicated on single game mode on location and it. makes. BANK.

Always remember: WE are the 1% when it comes to the particulars of authenticity in this world.

the namco games have lag on the 60. Picked up from an older version of MAME I think.

But I get where your coming from. I use JROK's and ArcadeSD's in some games that have pissy boards (I'm looking at you Qix!)

 

[philmurr]

In response to the OPs question about whether or not they will be playing original code if a high score save kit is fitted then (as someone who's written a few high score save/freeplay mods) it all depends...(the below is valid for kits running on original hardware and not for FPGA boards)

For most games offering just high score save, you can keep the actual gameplay code itself exactly the same as the original, so you will be playing original code without any changes. This may or may not happen in practice depending on if any fancy changes have been made to the game.

All HSS kits will have modified code to recall the saved high scores on power-up and in some cases go to a menu so bootup code will be different (but may not affect gameplay code). They will also have modified code to save the high score to NVRAM but this is usually outside of gameplay code.

If a HSS kit has, for example attract mode freeplay added, then the attract mode code will be different (but may not affect gameplay code)

For multigames that have the option to return to a menu mid-game by pressing a combination of buttons then the gameplay code will have been changed and is not original. There are often other changes made to make all games fit in the game EPROM.

I've written custom code for some public venues so for example there are venue-specific titles in attract mode, or access to menus is disabled, but that sort of customisation is not available on the commercially available Braze/highscoresaves kits.

Of course none of this matters to TG or others who insist on 100% original code, whether or not the actual gameplay code has been changed.