Marble Madness

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 11:27 am

With all the terrible luck I've had with arcade-related things lately, I don't want to jinx this, but I bought Marble Madness from a guy in South Carolina. It was picked up on Tuesday, and it's on its way. I have been told that I am going to get a call on Tuesday the 4th to talk about delivery.

It was $404 to ship it from South Carolina to Colorado. That seemed perfect. Any more and it would have been tough to pull the trigger.

The seller threw in a RoadBlasters control panel, pedal and board. (Marble Madness and RoadBlasters are of the same conversion class, Atari System 1.) RoadBlasters was always one of those games I liked just fine, but never pulled the trigger on. Now I'll have a board and panel... well, there's a good chance I'll be asking around Colorado to see if there are any empty System 1 cabs in the coming months.

It's time to admit I have a problem.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 1:04 pm

If only there was a POLL that you promised EARLIER to let us VOTE on which of your GAMES you need to KICK TO THE CURB.

Whichever one it is, make sure to remove the coin door or TDR will call 911.

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 1:45 pm

ICJ, I have a RoadBlasters cabinet that, until recently, worked 100%. Now, I think the board is fried.

When we do our game swap later this summer, maybe I will throw it in.

AArdvark · Post by **AArdvark** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 2:01 pm

Whichever one it is, make sure to remove the coin door or TDR will call 911.
_________________

See! SEEE! It's all about the content!

THE
TOTALLY GLEEFUL
AARDVARK

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 2:17 pm

Flack wrote:ICJ, I have a RoadBlasters cabinet that, until recently, worked 100%. Now, I think the board is fried.

When we do our game swap later this summer, maybe I will throw it in.

Christ that is generous! I would take you up on that.

Do you -- I have a question for you, but I don't want you to move to check on it. I don't want you to go outside and check.

So, I heard that System 1 games have two boards: one that they all share, and then a daughter board. I assume the daughterboard is the MM / RB / Indiana Jones / etc-specific stuff.

Do you have a memory of that being true? If you go out and open your RoadBlasters and check I will be disappoint.

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Fri Apr 01, 2011 4:11 pm

I will say that, yes, that's the way I understand it works. That being said, I've never personally swapped two System 1 boards so I don't know if it works as well as advertised. But yeah, that's what I've heard, too.

A couple of years ago, the power supply died on my RoadBlasters. I think it was the first power supply I ordered and replaced and it was super simple to do. Then one day I had a bunch of people over to play games, and RoadBlasters got left on overnight. That would be, what, like 12 hours? I mean, seriously, weren't these machines left on for days, weeks, and sometimes years at a time back in the day? Anyway I came out the nest day and the steering broke on the game. It played, but you couldn't steer. But, ho ho! Someone gave me a spare control panel years ago! I swapped it out and ... nothing. Still no steering. That tells me something probably burned up on the board. Then I tried the classic "wait a week and see if it magically heals itself" technique before troubleshooting it. I went back out a week later and now I just get garbage. So, there you go.

Susan is out of town for the weekend, but maybe later I'll sneak out there and see what the machine does when I turn it on.

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Sun Apr 10, 2011 8:38 am

So how's the Marble Madness?

Marble Madness is one of those games that absolutely sucks with a joystick. I remember the C64 version being pretty good and the Amiga version being essentially identical to the arcade version, but without a trackball neither one feels right.

Tdarcos · Post by **Tdarcos** » Sun Apr 10, 2011 5:06 pm

Aardvark wrote:
pinback wrote:Whichever one it is, make sure to remove the coin door or TDR will call 911.
See! SEEE! It's all about the content!

I loved Marble Madness. That was a great game, I never had the money to play it back when it was around. Aardvark, please try to post some video about it, or in the alternative film it so I can see it, and I promise I'll never call 911 regarding it no matter how you leave the coin door!

The way the acid pools that killed on contact became alive and followed after you was funny. Plus the point "everything you know is wrong" where now the acid pools are worth bonus points to roll over.

AArdvark · Post by **AArdvark** » Sun Apr 10, 2011 5:14 pm

Well, if I ever have a chance to get out to Colorado I will stop by RobB's place and shoot some video of his game. Just for you. Wont even film it in 3D, neither

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Sun Apr 10, 2011 10:42 pm

Flack wrote:I will say that, yes, that's the way I understand it works. That being said, I've never personally swapped two System 1 boards so I don't know if it works as well as advertised. But yeah, that's what I've heard, too.

And it is! It is the way it works.

I opened up Marble Madness when it arrived on the 6th, and sure enough, there are two circuit boards there. I started to take out MM and put RoadBlasters in there, to make sure that the RB board worked, but I didn't want to totally get into it the second night.

Then I got kidnapped by my girlfriend and taken to Taos, New Mexico.

I'm back now, though. System 1 is a pretty solid design, so far. But then, I've yet to see an Atari cab that didn't have a nice design.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Sun Apr 10, 2011 10:55 pm

Flack wrote:So how's the Marble Madness?

Marble Madness is one of those games that absolutely sucks with a joystick. I remember the C64 version being pretty good and the Amiga version being essentially identical to the arcade version, but without a trackball neither one feels right.

I like it. I listened to Mark Cerny's post-mortem on the game, but I have poor comprehension skills, so I think there's only 5 boards to the thing. I have made it to the 4th board. I am guessing that the levels repeat, since Twin Galaxies says the high score is 189,000, and I am at 25K after the 4th board.

(Also... JESUS CHRIST, trying to see a fucking score at www.twingalaxies.com has become a fucking process and a half. You need to register and login to see a score, and it's NOT your forum logon. You need to make a specific login TO VIEW SCORES. What a stupid decision by idiots.)

Anyway.

Yeah, Marble Madness is just as fun in person as I remembered. I find myself using both trackballs when I play a game. I like that I am allowed to use both! Haven't played a two-player game yet, but I suspect that will change when Mel stops by next.

It wasn't saving high scores, but I ordered a new 2804 chip and popped that in, and it saved them OK. I'd better link to where I got the chip, seeing how nobody can keep a web page on the Internet for more than a few years, except for you and me.

This was the chip:

http://store.pacmandotcom.com/search.ph ... rch=Search

2804 EEPROM Memory
X2804AP-45 512 X 8 nMOS EEPROM Memory 28 Pin DIP Package Used on many atari games

Marble Madness also does something with the sound in attract mode that I like: it plays music every now and then. Zoo Keeper and Q*bert constantly playing music in attract mode means that Zoo Keeper and Q*bert don't have their sound enabled for attract mode.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Sun Apr 10, 2011 10:56 pm

Tdarcos wrote:I loved Marble Madness. That was a great game, I never had the money to play it back when it was around. Aardvark, please try to post some video about it, or in the alternative film it so I can see it, and I promise I'll never call 911 regarding it no matter how you leave the coin door!

I'll shoot some video of it when I get it downstairs. I live in a bi-level house, and it's right where the front door is at the moment. I have to get some air in the wheels of my dolly, and then we'll be good to go.

The way the acid pools that killed on contact became alive and followed after you was funny. Plus the point "everything you know is wrong" where now the acid pools are worth bonus points to roll over.

I didn't know it did that! This is a great sign that things will be mixed up and fun on later levels. I am pleased that you shared that story with us, Commander.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Sun Apr 10, 2011 11:00 pm

AArdvark wrote:Well, if I ever have a chance to get out to Colorado I will stop by RobB's place and shoot some video of his game. Just for you. Wont even film it in 3D, neither

Well, I've been out here 12 or 13 years, and the list of dial-up JCers that have seen my place include

- Betty Boop

... and I think that's it. Even when The REAL Man was in Colorado, he never made it to my place. Christ! I need to fake bowelcratic cancer just to get you lot out here.

Looking at the list of non-dial-up JCers who have been in this house, it seems we have pinback, bruce, Flack, Knuckles, gsdgsd, milker, savvyraven, Souffle of Pain and then I stopped reading the list.

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Mon Apr 11, 2011 11:50 am

Across the board, I think the Atari System 1 and System 2 games had great audio. Most of those games were in stereo, and ... maybe it was the cabinet or something, but they all have great bass and sound. Not only that, but they all had catchy tunes and there's something about the speech synthesis that I just really like.

Atari System 1 Games:

Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom
Marble Madness
Peter Pack-Rat
RoadBlasters
Road Runner

Atari System 2 Games:

720
Accelerator (unreleased prototype)
APB : All Points Bulletin
Championship Sprint
Paperboy
Super Sprint

Of all of those, the only one I don't have memories of playing back in the day is Peter Pack-Rat. In fact, the fame was recently featured on iCarly (You got kids? I got kids.) and I thought it was a made up game until just now.

It's funny that I am so terrible at classic games like Asteroids and Q*Bert because I could kick all of your asses at 720, Paperboy and any of the Spring games. I was pretty good at RoadBlasters too, but that came from owning one. I thought I was good at Indiana Jones until I found out it was just an easy game to play.

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Mon Apr 11, 2011 12:01 pm

Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:I listened to Mark Cerny's post-mortem on the game, but I have poor comprehension skills, so I think there's only 5 boards to the thing. I have made it to the 4th board. I am guessing that the levels repeat, since Twin Galaxies says the high score is 189,000, and I am at 25K after the 4th board.

I believe the arcade version has 6 levels, and doesn't repeat.

Tdarcos · Post by **Tdarcos** » Mon Apr 11, 2011 12:08 pm

Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:
Tdarcos wrote:I loved Marble Madness. That was a great game, I never had the money to play it back when it was around. Aardvark, please try to post some video about it, or in the alternative film it so I can see it, and I promise I'll never call 911 regarding it no matter how you leave the coin door!
I'll shoot some video of it when I get it downstairs. I live in a bi-level house, and it's right where the front door is at the moment. I have to get some air in the wheels of my dolly, and then we'll be good to go.

There is an on-line playable version of the game that runs in a web browser available at http://nintendo8.com/game/605/marble_madness/

Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:
Tdarcos wrote:The way the acid pools that killed on contact became alive and followed after you was funny. Plus the point "everything you know is wrong" where now the acid pools are worth bonus points to roll over.
I didn't know it did that! This is a great sign that things will be mixed up and fun on later levels. I am pleased that you shared that story with us, Commander.

Uh, it's been like probably 20 years, i do remember the acid pools but in the small amount of time I've had to play the on-line version (I kept falling off, a lot, plus the coin-op son-of-a-bitch allows one play and once you run out of time it's GAME OVER), I didn't see them. So I remember the acid pools and chasing you doing that, but be prepared that I could be wrong, or it could be that they're in the coin-op version but not in the version I'm playing which is why I didn't see them.

I don't want you to be disappointed if I'm wrong in my memory, today was the first time I saw Marble Madness again in at least 23 years.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Mon Apr 11, 2011 2:51 pm

Flack wrote:
Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:I listened to Mark Cerny's post-mortem on the game, but I have poor comprehension skills, so I think there's only 5 boards to the thing. I have made it to the 4th board. I am guessing that the levels repeat, since Twin Galaxies says the high score is 189,000, and I am at 25K after the 4th board.
I believe the arcade version has 6 levels, and doesn't repeat.

You are correct! I did more reading last night, and I was wrong about everything I wrote. Very wrong. Let's all think less of me for that misstep. We're supposed to be up on our arcade games here.

Management appreciates you correcting the earlier mistake. (Pretend I logged in as "Management" to write this.)

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Mon Apr 11, 2011 6:19 pm

The only reason I knew is because I wrote a review of the game a few years back and I remember being surprised that the game just ends. In fact, I think you can play through the entire game, start to finish, in less than 10 minutes. That fact just astounded me. I remember thinking of arcade games as these unbeatable machines. No matter how many quarters I pumped in, I could never quite win. And then there's Marble Madness, a game you can beat in ten minutes.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Mon Apr 11, 2011 7:54 pm

JONSEY:

If someone had come on here and said "MM is a game with six unrepeating levels that you can beat in ten minutes, and that's all it is" would you still have bought it?

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Mon Apr 11, 2011 8:06 pm

Oh, yeah. I mean, I was under the impression that this shit repeated, but I can make it like 20 seconds into board #4 at this point. I've got a long way to go before there only being 6 levels affects me.

Plus, I am looking forward to two-player mode! I bet that's a lot of fun.

Plus, this System 1 cab open the door to the other System 1 games that Flack mentioned. And I guess the main thing is, Marble Madness enhances my collection of arcade games in a way that pleases me: controls that don't emulate for shit, and a conversion class (the aforementioned System 1) that I didn't have.

Plus, nobody is playing these games for 11 minutes, except you and Asteroids, and you skipped town.