I have a TRON prototype

[steph]

Same picture here,
but with higher res and better view of the labels..

http://www.hobbyroms.com/tron.html

Thoughts ?

Cheers,
Steph

 

[Braido]

Thanks Steph, I was in a rush to get on the road for hockey and had a busy day at work. I couldn't get the picture of the board tonpost property. I'll email you when I get back and somehow we will get those EPROMs available for you.

Thanks,

Shayne...

 

[Mylstar]

perhaps the PRO stands for PROGRAM roms versus SOUND roms?

 

[Spyridon]

The only known production versions for Tron are Jun 15, Jun 17 and Jun 25,

I've got a tube of TRON ROMS that I picked up as part of a box of parts. Some are marked June 6 and others are June 17

 

[steph]

I've got a tube of TRON ROMS that I picked up as part of a box of parts. Some are marked June 6 and others are June 17

Wow.... very interesting...

Jun 6th, never seen that before....

I've also checked in MAME,
and they recently added an Aug 9 version
(... which only differs on eprom D2 from Jun 25th )

Seems like a whole crop of undiscovered versions... ;-)

--

It would be worth getting a dump of those Jun 6th eproms as well ...

If you wish do to so, but can't find anyone locally,
I'll gladly dump them and return them to you...

LMK,
Cheers,
Steph

 

[Spyridon]

It would be worth getting a dump of those Jun 6th eproms as well ...

If you wish do to so, but can't find anyone locally,
I'll gladly dump them and return them to you...

I can dump them and send you a copy. I think only two of the roms had the June 6th date.

 

[steph]

I can dump them and send you a copy. I think only two of the roms had the June 6th date.

That would be very cool.

I'll compare them to the other sets
and submit it to MAME.

You can mail the images to me at info AT hobbyroms DOT com

Many thanks,
Steph

 

[cdjump]

I'll give you guys my 2 cents, and thats exactly what its worth....

First of all, the 5-12 date seems odd, but going from memory (and that's all i have to go by) i think i've seen it before, that doesn't mean its not early. It could be a proto romset, but, i kinda doubt it. Pro just means program roms.
If you look at the other ones they'll be labeled BG for background, and vid for video. The sound roms i forget - but seeing hand labeled roms on mcr games is not uncommon.
Now, once upon a time i bought a tron pcbset off ebay. I believe it was a really early pcb. It had the wire interconnects just like kick had on it, as well as 2564 roms on the video pcb. It was a darker green than you normally see, and has a bally-wulff sticker on it. Maybe an import? I don't know, but the wire interconnects lead me to believe its a really early one. Without at least some of those traits it would be hard for me to believe it was anything too special.


Boot it up and let us know what the timer on the spiders is - that's the simplest way i know of to tell.

 

[SHaMROCK73]

So last year i purchased from HobbyRoms the Free Play eprom but when i went to put it in i got a scrambled screen. So i took it off put the orginal back in it's place and threw the Free Play eprom in the coin box thinking it was defective. So a couple of weeks ago i decided i would buy another one as the 1st didn't work. I get it and put it in same thing, crap on the screen. So i take a picture of my board set close up on the eproms so Steph can see the dates on them. I email him that picture as well as a picture of the screen crap and wait to hear from him.

This evening i get an email from him that basically tells me i might have a proto type board that predates the known ones out there. He also asks me to send him my eproms so he can load them up to MAME and in return will send me correct and working free play eproms.

Anyways i'll copy his email in here tomorrow and i'll also include the pictures etc.. that i sent him of my board showing the eproms, dates, etc...

My question is: What would you do? I trust the guy and think it would be cool to share this if in fact they are somewhat rare or a prototype???

Let me know your thoughts,

Braido...

(sorry for the wait on the pictures etc.. they are at my office and it's 1:00 am here as i write this)

This EXACT same thing happened with my Tapper trying to get a working FREEPLAY from Steph at Hobby Roms. I sent him my original ROM and he sent it, and the working FREEPLAY back no problem. Steph can totally be trusted.

 

[i86time]

Did anything ever come of this? I just got a set that had SCPU ROMs hand labeled 5/12. The background ROMs were hand labeled 5/10. The gameplay appears to be the same as the 6/15 ROMs but I haven't played with either extensively. I did notice two things. On the grid bug rack, after it is cleared, the cone warp takes longer. And after the last tank is destroyed, you can't move you're own tank. I can't currently run my 6/15 board to compare, but I'm guessing that might be the same.

 

[Braido]

Did anything ever come of this? I just got a set that had SCPU ROMs hand labeled 5/12. The background ROMs were hand labeled 5/10. The gameplay appears to be the same as the 6/15 ROMs but I haven't played with either extensively. I did notice two things. On the grid bug rack, after it is cleared, the cone warp takes longer. And after the last tank is destroyed, you can't move you're own tank. I can't currently run my 6/15 board to compare, but I'm guessing that might be the same.

I am willing to send him my board or ROM's so he can copy them but i want to find a replacement working board 1st so i don't have any down time. To date i haven't found a replacement board so haven't sent in my ROM's.

My TRON is from the local arcade here in town where i grewup. I played this game a ton and was happy to purchase it. That being said i am not familiar with other TRON games out in the wild and can't comment on any different game play. I played TRON games other than the one i own bitd just not as much as i played the one i now own and so can't remember any differance in game play.

 

[i86time]

I'm sure the early ROMs (6/15) have different gameplay. There's the 1000 timer on the 1st grid bug rack and 2 cycles on the 2nd light cycle rack, both of which are on the 5/10 ROMs. Other than that, I don't know as after I verified the 6/15 boardset worked, I packed it up. I can't really test much between the boards now, not until I finish the resto on my other TRON.

 

[RobMcRaf]

This is why I love these forums. Got a Tron boardset and was trying to figure out why I had 1000 on the counter, and 2 cycles and 2 tanks on the second rack.

Thanks!

(and yes, I know this is a thread resurrection! Haven't done one in a couple months.)

 

[tron guy]

This is why I love these forums. Got a Tron boardset and was trying to figure out why I had 1000 on the counter, and 2 cycles and 2 tanks on the second rack.

Thanks!

(and yes, I know this is a thread resurrection! Haven't done one in a couple months.)

I haven't looked at mine lately, but is it possible the dip settings are just set to easier and that is why there are only 2 cycles and 2 tanks?

 

[RobMcRaf]

AFAIK, there are no dip switches for difficulty. (besides, they are set the same as the other boardsets) There is a setting in the service menu, but it is defaulted to 5 (just like the other boardsets). There are new stickers over the eprom windows. I'll bet that if I pulled them and read them out, they would be from an earlier version. But... got stuff to do.

 

[z0ner]

Thanks for necroing this - I never heard of such a thing.

BTW the MAME version of this is TRON (6/15) a.k.a. tron4.

The blocks being eliminated in the cone have a much higher distinctive tone as well.

 

[i86time]

I forgot I had posted about this.... After reading user astrp3's blog post (http://allincolorforaquarter.blogspot.com/2015/08/the-1982-tron-tournament-esports-first.html), the 5/12 ROMs might be the ROM set used for the first local competitions which began 5/24 (see the first and fifth images in the post) that were deemed too easy, thus the later June ROM sets with changes.

 

[seanengadet]

Ottawa, the capital of Canada with all the politicians in it!

Braido is in BC, Canadapost is not that bad for shipping.

Ottawa's a great place.

Steph's an upstanding fella who helped me out with Dragon's Lair ROMs once.

This thread is old as Jeebus. WHat was the outcome?

 

[RobMcRaf]

Thanks for necroing this - I never heard of such a thing.

BTW the MAME version of this is TRON (6/15) a.k.a. tron4.

The blocks being eliminated in the cone have a much higher distinctive tone as well.

Ah! I thought my ears were off or I was imagining it. They do seem to have a different tone.

 

[cdjump]

I've seen a very few of these 5-12 sets now, and i finally got one that was complete, minus the pg0, but, i had another dump from some time back with the the program roms good, but incomplete on the video and sound roms.
Here's what i can tell now - the 5-12 program roms are the earliest roms yet found, the video (fg) eproms are the same as all the other version of Tron, and are dated 5-10.
The ssio eproms are also dated 5-10 and are contained in the mame tron4 set.
Now that i have a good complete set that's verified booting, i'm happy to share them.
If anyone knows how to get them added to mame, feel free to. Send me a pm with your email and i'll send you the zip file with the complete set.

Edit - forgot to mention, the video pcb is the early model with several jumpers on the back from the factory.