PinHacks - All Forums

Stern SAM JTAG?

Mon, 20 May 2013 18:13:25 +0000

Anyone connect successfully to the JTAG port on the STERN SAM CPU?

Would like to directly access the Flash Ram on the board and hoping this would be a route to that end.

NEW RULE: No executable tools to modify ROM files

Tue, 19 Mar 2013 02:41:47 +0000

At the request of rights holders, I have removed threads that contain executables that modify ROM files. I will look into the legality of this request, but please don't upload anymore such files unless you see this notice removed and the old threads reinstated. I apologize for the inconvenience, and thank you for understanding.

Why, why, whyyy? On this forum...

Mon, 18 Mar 2013 03:42:26 +0000

...There's not even a single mention to the Powerful, Free, well Documented, Open Source WPC Pinball developing platform?
FreeWPC, guys! It's been there for many years, waiting to be exploited to its full potential!
Modifying rules of the original games directly in the original ROM's assembly code would be a very difficult task, why not compiling our own ROM, programming in C, using FreeWPC?
I'd say that using it is also Hacking a Pinball machine so it would perfectly fit for this forum.
Has someone tried the TZ ROM with the whole new ruleset on his real machine? I did, and it's playable, but it has bugs and needs lots of work and improvements, and there's been some development for other games as well, like Corvette... And recently Demolition Man:

Which even has some 'new' Video Mode:

Worth mentioning that at least on my TZ, it did not fry any coils or flashers.
So... maybe the amazingly skilled programmers in this forum, like mrglee, Tilt, RalphButler could join forces and help Brian (FreeWPC's author) to improve the system?

FreeWPC: http://code.google.com/p/freewpc/

Quickquestion slugfest rom bug in pinmame debug

Wed, 13 Feb 2013 16:15:21 +0000

Hello
I'm trying to work on the slugfest rom with pinmame debug
but the rom freeze after your hear the bong after the first screen in testing.
Does anyone as the same trouble with the slugfest rom and pinmame debug?

RS - Randomize City Starts

Tue, 20 Nov 2012 02:40:23 +0000

Forgive me if this has been mentioned before. I searched and didn't see anything. A major complaint with RS is the linearity. You always start with the same 2 cities, either NY or Miami. How difficult would it be to hack the ROM to randomize the city starts?

Thanks,
Chris

Cactus Canyon - Prototype Saloon Doors

Sat, 10 Nov 2012 19:32:47 +0000

Not sure if this is possible but thought I'd throw it out there. I have a early development Cactus Canyon whitewood which has a prototype saloon door mechanism (in front of Bart) that was subsequently removed. The mech has two switches which work in test (one of which remains in the production game) as well as a solenoid which also works in test (it is hooked up as the "unused knocker"). Is it possible to add rudimentary support for the mech to the ROM? Even if it was as simple as pulsing the coil when the switches (either one) are hit, opening the doors, and then turning it off when the saloon trough switch is hit (i.e. when a successfully shot is made through the doors into the saloon trough. I'd even be willing to pay someone to make this happen.

2012-10-24 17.35.17.jpg (Size: 94.94 KB / Downloads: 84)

Gottlieb Sys80B sounds

Fri, 26 Oct 2012 22:36:38 +0000

Hi all,

First time i'm posting something here.
I hope i've posted this in the right section as it's kind of hardware related too.
If not, feel free to move this thread, mods!

I've been figuring out how the Gottlieb System 80B sound board operates.
If i understand correctly, you've got 5 "inputs" and a reset pin.
By combining the sound inputs and connecting them to the ground, they play the correct sound. For example: input 1 + input 2 = sound 1 + sound 2 = sound 3.

Now i've noticed that in PinMAME, the music keeps playing while i trigger sound effects, but if i trigger music while playing music, it stops the music that's already playing, and plays the correct music instead.

I was wondering how this actually works on the real hardware.
How does the soundboard "know" it's music and it should keep playing while music is played?

Anyone have any experience with this?

It's for a little project i'm doing here.

Thanks in advance!

Regards,

Steve

STNG (or WPC) HSTD to "printer"

Sun, 21 Oct 2012 06:07:47 +0000

I've embarked on a project on my blog to create a modernized WPC serial port board for use in WPC DCS era games.

The end goal of my project is to dump High Scores to date (HSTD) to the serial port where another "computer" will read the serial stream and generate a local webpage that can be read via the local internet at my house.

I spent some time in PinMame tonight; and realized that the print score data doesn't seem to actually print out the HSTD. This means I'm proably going to have to code my own hack; rather than just periodically calling the print routine.

I think @mrglee's IJ disassembly will help; but I haven't honestly looked at the code in great detail.

My inital thoughs are to hack the hstd display routines to output to the serial port. Has anyone spent any time in these routines yet?

I'd welcome any assitance with the romhack project if there are any interested parties.

Censored MM Profanity ROM

Tue, 04 Sep 2012 00:20:34 +0000

What??! Yes, I wanted to censor the f-bomb in the MM profanity ROM because on that particular ROM turning family mode "off" not only enables the swear, but also bloody dragon decapitations on the DMD and the sexy damsel. Plus, the beep is just plain funnier.

So, I just banged on the ROM a bit and the solution is to load the profanity ROM (mm_1_09c.bin) up in your HEX editor and change offset DF10E from 044E to 044D. That will add the bleep back in. Victory!

EDIT: It just occurred to me that the resulting ROM is probably the exact same (functionally) as either of the other 1.09 versions. Oh well! Move along. Nothing to see here.

Bally free play (eight ball deluxe, eight ball champ)

Thu, 07 Jun 2012 15:44:19 +0000

Hello
Just wondering if anyone as ever done a freeplay rom for those bally machines.
This is my next project.
I check real quick, but I'm not even able to locate where the credits are stored!
Any help will be appreciated

regards

Match Award Percentage Secrets?

Mon, 28 May 2012 06:49:13 +0000

I came across the following article:

This person claims to know Larry De Mar in person.

http://cheaptalk.org/2009/11/17/the-econ...f-pinball/

Quote:The other tool is the match probability: you win a free game if the last two digits of your score match an apparently random draw. While adjustments to the high-score threshold is textbook price theory, the adjustments to the match probability is pure behavioral economics. Let’s clear this up right away. No, the match probability is not uniform and yes, it is strategically manipulated depending on who is playing and when. For example, if the machine has been idle for more than three minutes, the match probability is boosted upward. You will never match if you won a free game by high score. And it gets more complicated than that. Any time there are two or more players and they finish a game with no credits left, one player (but only one) is very likely to match. Empirically, the other players will more often than not put in another quarter to play again.

It claims that the match percentage in games is varable based on a set of rules. In many of the late-era games, the Match Percentage adjustment appears to be a fixed value.
I wonder if Mr. Glee or anyone else has come across the routines that determine the result of match awards, and if so... is there anything interesting in there that takes into account what the article above seems to claim, namely:

- game idle time
- number of credits remaining
- number of players + credits remaining
- if a replay has been awarded
- if current game is the result of a match award credit

Missing custom pricing options in WPC roms

Fri, 25 May 2012 14:26:30 +0000

Brought to my attention by a friend that the option for "custom pricing" is missing from some WPC romsets, mainly Indiana Jones which is the one he was looking at. (l7 is the version I looked at).

Is this dependent on a jumper on the mpu board? The manual indicates that custom should be a selection. I wonder if it was removed for some reason? L7 does have the custom coin door which you can set to sort of be the equivalent with slot multipliers, etc. but it would be nice to be able to have the custom coinage where it belongs.

I remember back in the day the minimum # of coins was 2 and there were all sorts of coin doubler hardware etc. being sold by Happ, etc. to get around it.

F-14 divide by 10 roms

Wed, 23 May 2012 00:33:13 +0000

org $ae00

;/10 scoring change $cca2 to jsr $ae00 [correct checksum]

tab ;a is holding score byte to add as well as possibly a modifier in the top nibble
andb #$f0
anda #$0f
deca ;make it one less (effectively /10)
aba
ldx $aa ;original replaced code, $aa is currently up player score location pointer
ldx 0,x
rts

Seems to work in pinmame and might handle people that turn F14 over as it can be rather easy.

Gorgar lane change hack

Tue, 08 May 2012 19:10:11 +0000

Hello everybody
two of my friend ask me to do a lane change hack for the gorgar rom.
I wonder if it not already existing.
if not.
Maybe I could use a little help to know what routine are executed when a switch is activated in gorgar.
In fact even if I have work on sys 11 rom, I have never been able to figure how a routine is executed when a switch is activated. ( where the routine start and how the routine is selected etc.)

I think a gorgar rom with lane change will be a great improvement
thanks

Line Counter .exe

Mon, 07 May 2012 17:32:00 +0000

Hello
here is a little tool that I devellopped to find the number of occurence of a line in a trace output.

For Example I have done a trace on a Gorgar rom to see what is the code that is executed for a particular switch. The Trace output is sometimes as long as 50 000 lines and most of those line are routine that are always executed. (Display score, music, etc.) So the trick is to find the line that are executed only once or twice.

So the program that I develloped take a .txt file like that:
*****
FA40: bne $FA3F
FA3F: dex
FA40: bne $FA3F
FA3F: dex
******

and transform it into an output file like that:
*******************
FA40: bne $FA3F **2**
FA3F: dex **2**
FA40: bne $FA3F **2**
FA3F: dex **2**

***************

the numbers between the ** ** is the number of times this line is on the file.

so to find a line that is there only once
you just have to do a find **1** in the output document

To use this program
you just have to drag a file into the Line_Counter.exe

the file will generate an output file with the same name + _Line_count_output.txt

Line_Counter.zip (Size: 9.64 KB / Downloads: 58)

NEW HACK: Data East STAR WARS pinball with added Timed Ball Save feature

Sat, 05 May 2012 19:20:52 +0000

One thing sorely missing from DE STAR WARS is a Ball Save feature.

Believe it or not, there is one actually programmed into the game... but... it is turned off when the ball hits ANY switch. Therefore, Ball Save is immediately turned off every time. There is even an animation shown of Han Solo frozen in carbonite and Darth Vader says "Freeze!" then the ball is auto-launched back into play. But again, no one ever sees this because it is immediately turned off when the ball is launched.

I have disassembled the code and reverse-engineered how it works. I could have easily made it so instead of one switch hit turning off Ball Save, it could be something like 10 switch hits... but that would be no fun and not practical. Instead, I have edited it so now there is a ten second timer during which Timed Ball Save is active.

You'll also see that the insert in the middle of the playfield were Luke and Vader's light sabers are crossed will flash while Timed Ball Save is active.

Now that I have finished this first challenge... I am looking for suggestions on some rule tweaks. As is often stated, the ramp shot is way overpowered. I am considering making it so the ramp shot will not ever randomly give Force Awards and maybe will not spot the letters in STAR WARS. I am wide open to any rule balancing and score tweaking ideas you might have. Please reply with any suggestions. Let's take this already fun pinball machine to the next level! Once I feel it is complete, I will share the ROM file for all to enjoy.

Here is a link to a video of Timed Ball Save being demonstrated:

http://www.dkpinball.com/DKWP/?page_id=230

Thanks,
Chad

6800 assembler code question for comparing large decimal numbers

Thu, 03 May 2012 19:23:25 +0000

Let's say I have two locations in memory that are holding the numbers 204,612 and 382,345 in memory represented in decimal.

So the memory locations look like this:

memory location 1: 00 20 46 12
memory location 2: 00 38 23 45

How could I compare those two numbers and determine if the second one is at least 8 greater than the first one? What would the code look like?

Thanks,
Chad

Data East Star Wars code questions

Sun, 29 Apr 2012 01:31:46 +0000

Does anyone have general knowledge about Data East Star Wars code?

I would love to hack this game to remove the random Force Awards from the ramp shot. Also, possibly remove the spotting of the STAR WARS letters from the ramp shot.

I think this would go a long way to balancing the game because, as it stands, the ramp shot is worth too much.

Can anyone assist with this?

System 11 hacking questions

Thu, 26 Apr 2012 23:47:32 +0000

I've read the System 11 doc by Francis and it is very helpful.

I have a couple specific questions.

1) Is there an easy why to check which Player (1 - 4) is currently active?

2) Where in System 11 games (specifically Pinbot) would be a good place to intercept the "beginning of Player's turn" section of the code?

3) Does anyone have a DASM of a System 11 game with comments and descriptions in it?

Thanks,
Chad

Bally Medusa - Would someone knows how to change one thing

Sun, 22 Apr 2012 21:36:37 +0000

Hi !

I would want to change a rule on the Bally's Medusa rom.

The zipper-flippers open after 10 seconds, when no target has been shot down.

I would like that they open after 5 seconds.

Does someone knows what to modify on the Bally's rom ?

Thanks for your answer.

Image4.jpg (Size: 12.74 KB / Downloads: 64)