OrbitBoyBob

Hi All!

Anyone ever find a (freeware) version of the Centipede arcade game?
I believe that was by Atari, but not completely sure....
(ok, go ahead and shoot me, it was awhile ago, before my hair changed
to this lovely ashen color.... at least I still have it!)

While I'm at it, I was also looking for Joust (but with the original graphics,
not the Atomic Battle Dragons style...) I once had it for the PC when I was
running Win3.1 - you had to hit the quarter button to fool it into thinking you
just dropped some change on the machine, it didn't know it had been ported...

Hoping to find it for MW2005...
Any one ever found them?

Thanks!

alantdc

When I had my X50v, Pocket Cult MAME (best arcade emulator IMHO) ran Centipede perfectly at full speed with sound! Nothing beats the original arcade version :). I didn't have Joust, but you could give it a try.

OrbitBoyBob

Thanks Alantdc, I checked out MAME and it is something I will definately include in my program list - as long as I can find some of the old games software. You're saying it should work with the original Centipede and Joust?
Any leads where to find them???

alantdc

Originally Posted by OrbitBoyBob

Thanks Alantdc, I checked out MAME and it is something I will definately include in my program list - as long as I can find some of the old games software. You're saying it should work with the original Centipede and Joust? Any leads where to find them???

Sorry, I can't link to any ROMs as it's against the rules of this forum. But as they say, you can find anything with Google...

OrbitBoyBob

Alantdc --

Ooooops!:o

Ok, say I find the original game on PC through Google, Install MAME (on PPC?)
Then what do I need to make them run - anything else?
BTW, how much memory did doing what you did with Centipede and MAME cost you?

alantdc

Originally Posted by OrbitBoyBob

Ok, say I find the original game on PC through Google, Install MAME (on PPC?) Then what do I need to make them run - anything else? BTW, how much memory did doing what you did with Centipede and MAME cost you?

All you need is PocketCultMAME and the Centipede ROM. That's it. PocketCultMAME is free. Arcade ROMs are in a murky legal area. Currently, the only truly legal way to use a copyrighted ROM is to own the actual arcade machine and then rip the ROM with an EEPROM reader. Good luck!

OrbitBoyBob

Thanks Alantdc,

A Googling I will go.....

Lots of cloned stuff out there but still haven't found the original(s) except for some on-line only stuff and one joust that is only like level 3 - not the entire game!!!

OrbitBoyBob

Hooooboy Spudster, more problemos....

Found MAME for both PC (what I believe is the PC version .0123s) and for PPC (what you have called pocketcultmame 0.4a). Downloads give a htm file as a read_me that links to a page with free roms. Now, you put these files in the MAME rom folder on the pc and they show up on the MAME intro screen as selectable. Problem is, they all give an error that needed files are missing??? Some of these files have *.bin extention, some have nonsense extentions (ie: .7b, .10a) but none have a rom or chd extention that MAME says it needs to run them....

What did I miss here:o ?

alantdc

Originally Posted by OrbitBoyBob

Hooooboy Spudster, more problemos.... Found MAME for both PC (what I believe is the PC version .0123s) and for PPC (what you have called pocketcultmame 0.4a). Downloads give a htm file as a read_me that links to a page with free roms. Now, you put these files in the MAME rom folder on the pc and they show up on the MAME intro screen as selectable. Problem is, they all give an error that needed files are missing??? Some of these files have *.bin extention, some have nonsense extentions (ie: .7b, .10a) but none have a rom or chd extention that MAME says it needs to run them.... What did I miss here:o ?

Read Menneisyys's Arcade Games Emulation Guide (one of the sticky posts in this forum). In it, he'll tell you how to fix the ROM's using ROMCenter. NOTE: at least for me, a lot of ROM's simply wouldn't run even after fixing. Centipede was one of the few that did work.

OrbitBoyBob

Weeeellllll, I spent the better part of 2 days tinkering with things....
There are a lot of broken links out there, RomCenter for one was giving
all sorts or errors and missing info warnings so I had to get a version that was a bit older.
Got PCMame (finally) but no instructions as far as I could see (what do you do? just drop it on the SD Card through ASync?)
Menneisyys suggests downloading the PC version of MAME to test out your ROMs - a great suggestion and invaluable info relating to using the zipped folder and NOT decompressing the ROM, BTW...
So I find Centiped and load it up on the MAME PC version, get it to the "coin" screen and so far, not one key gets it to start - go figure. So I install an old-old version of ROMCenter to fix the Centiped ROM, but it has not been going well or easy.....
....things are not quite the same as in the Menneisyys Guide.
....not that I don't like a challenge, it just seems a bit much having a RL non-programming job - ya know?
....then to hear that a lot of the ROMs Don't work even after the fix - well, it's quite frustrating and now the wife is telling me I have to help my 16 yr old with chemistry, like I wasted their weekend, hooboy....

Thanx, but Sure there's not a better way?

alantdc

Originally Posted by OrbitBoyBob

....then to hear that a lot of the ROMs Don't work even after the fix - well, it's quite frustrating and now the wife is telling me I have to help my 16 yr old with chemistry, like I wasted their weekend, hooboy.... Thanx, but Sure there's not a better way?

Welcome to the world of freeware. And yes, there is a better way. Order Atari: 80 classic games in one for your PC (not Axim). It's got the arcade Centipede and 79 other Atari hits to boot--pretty much guaranteed to work. Your 16 year old will be much happier as well :-).

p.s. I just saw this in my local Best Buy, so you might be able to find it locally. Looks like it's still in stock at Amazon. I would give up on trying to get this to work on your Axim. Besides, the mouse is a much better controller than the D-pad.

OrbitBoyBob

Geeez, come to think of it, Something like Joust (the original) would be problematic with the D-pad! Thanks A- you just saved me some aggravation...