"Insert Coin" question

[CGRemakes]

I was wondering if there was a program (or of one could be written) that would allow users to use a coin door for non MAME games.  For example, I own several computer games (written for computer, not-emulated) such as NBA Hangtime, Mortal Kombat, Atari Anniversary edition, etc. that only require the user to press start.  I was wondering if there would be a way to have a program that runs in memory that requires you to insert a coin before the start button becomes activated.  I wouldn't think it would be that hard, but I don't know that much about it.  Would this be something that would be usefull?

[eightbit]

It would depend on the game and it would be difficult. What would be the point?

[CGRemakes]

The point would be to be able to use a coin door for non emulated games.  It would be for effect more than anything.  Obviously it's functional without it, but it wouldn't be the same as dropping a coin in to play.

[eightbit]

You could map the coin button to the start button so you'd have to put a quarter in to press start. Changing the messages to say insert coin would not be possible.

I don't understand peoples fascination with this, its come up here several times before, why bother?

[CGRemakes]

That'd probably work.  I just figured with it being designed for a computer, you have to press start more times than for arcade games (menu options and things), so I didn't want to have to insert a coin each time I wanted to make a selection.  Like I said, I was just curious if something like this had been done or were possible.  Thanks for the input.

[TalkingOctopus]

yeah this has been discussed very recently:

http://www.arcadecontrols.org/yabbse/index.php?board=15;action=display;threadid=12349

I think that you are stuck with the start button but will probably survive  .

Honestly, most of my friends question my sanity when they have to put quarters in my free arcade.

[grafixmonkey]

I don't think you could ever get this working the way you want, without modifying the game software itself.  The closest you could possibly come is making a circuit that blocks pressing of the "start" key more times than the number of coins that have been inserted.  I don't know how that would behave with things like continues, pausing the game, accesing a menu, etc. etc.

It would go like this, shown in a table with coin-insert events, start-press events, and START indicating whether the game sees the start button or not.  Counter counts up when a coin goes in, counts down when start is pressed, and only allows a start press to pass if the counter is not zero.

counter        |    0    1    0    0    1     2    3    2    1    2    1    0    0    0
ins_coin        |          *               *     *    *               *
press_start    |              *    *                     *    *          *    *    *    *
START          |               *                           *    *          *    *  

Hope that comes out looking anything close to a table.  It probably won't.

By the way, the circuit to do this would be worthy of a final project in some electrical engineering classes.  So if when I say "7402" you automatically think "NOR gate" and know from memory which pin is VCC, you can probably build this.

[CGRemakes]

That's ok, it's not the end of the world if I don't have to insert a coin to play.    Sorry, I didn't know someone had beat me to the idea, I didn't recall ever seeing anyone else mentioning it.  Thanks again for the input!

[Ken Layton]

Use the coin switch on the coin door in place of the start switch.