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412-in-1 Game Elf review

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Sarver Systems:
I purchased this as part of a kit from [vendor name/link removed] that included a joystick, 3 buttons, and a power supply.

[kit link removed]

I opted to not use the included buttons or joystick, but I did use the power supply.

This review will focus on the Game Elf itself.

The very first thing I'd like to point out is that this DOES NOT use a standard jamma harness pinout.
What's different you ask? Button F is normally where a ground would go. So if you use a standard jamma harness, you ground out button F, essentially turning it into an always-on button. This prevents you from navigating any menus, or starting any games.

Once I figured out what the deal was, a quick read through the manual does state that button F should not be wired to ground, but it is all the way at the end of the manual, and not very clear as to the actual purpose of the warning.

I rewired the harness, and booted back up.

I was able to navigate through the menus and start some games.

I would say that about 20% of the games are unplayable, unless you have a large control panel that can support the following all at once FOR EACH PLAYER: 2 joysticks, 6 buttons, a trackball, and a spinner.

Some games require 2 joysticks per player (assault for example), some games require a trackball (millipede for example), and some games require a spinner (arkanoid for example).

The other 80% of the games, from what I've played, all seem to be pretty decent. Most of them are obvious ports or bootlegs of the originals. For example, the dots on ms.pac and variants are exactly the same as the originals. No big deal, the game still plays exactly the same.

Galaga (my favorite game) seems to be identical to the original, as does Dig Dug and Frogger.

When mounting the device to your enclosure, you'll only be able to use 3 of the 4 screws because the flash drive cover obscures the mounting tab. 3 screws is plenty, but for someone with OCD like me, it'll drive you insane.

The volume control knob is a really nice addition, but I would like to see it mounted on the end of a small harness so it could be extended to the exterior of the cabinet if needed. An option would be to just turn it up all the way and add a volume pot to the speaker line.

I have this device plugged into a 20" Dell LCD. All of the games look great, and I am hard pressed to tell it isn't being displayed on an original 19" tube monitor. The graphics all look great.

The system boots up really fast, and I am happy with the speed at which games load.

One thing that has bothered me with this device since day 1 is why they don't use the test and service buttons to enter the admin menus, instead of requiring us to hunt in the dark for the hard to find S1 button that sits flush to the edge on the device. Enabling the use of the admin buttons just makes so much more sense to me.

The admin menu system is very intuitive, and easy to navigate.

All in all, I would say I got a good deal for this, even though I have to disable a decent portion of the games.

yotsuya:

--- Quote ---I would say that about 20% of the games are unplayable, unless you have a large control panel that can support the following all at once FOR EACH PLAYER: 2 joysticks, 6 buttons, a trackball, and a spinner.
--- End quote ---

Game on, brah!

wp34:

--- Quote from: Sarver Systems on August 14, 2014, 03:32:44 pm ---
The very first thing I'd like to point out is that this DOES NOT use a standard jamma harness pinout.
What's different you ask? Button F is normally where a ground would go. So if you use a standard jamma harness, you ground out button F, essentially turning it into an always-on button. This prevents you from navigating any menus, or starting any games.

Once I figured out what the deal was, a quick read through the manual does state that button F should not be wired to ground, but it is all the way at the end of the manual, and not very clear as to the actual purpose of the warning.


--- End quote ---

Thanks for the review and pointing out more clearly this wiring issue.  I've been considering getting one of these for my Q*Bert restore until JROK releases his Q*Bert multi.

redfireplace:
Thank you for the information. I have a few questions.

What resolution is the monitor you used? Did you turn it vertically since these are all vertical games? I want to make sure a 1280x1024 monitor turned sideways will produce a good picture with these games.

Will Centipede and Millipede work with a joystick or do you really need a trackball to play them?

How do you connect speakers to this thing? Does it have a mini plug that I can plug computer speakers into?

Sarver Systems:
What resolution is the monitor you used?
I ran it at whatever resolution the VGA connector wanted.

Did you turn it vertically since these are all vertical games?
Yes

I want to make sure a 1280x1024 monitor turned sideways will produce a good picture with these games.
I don't see any issues. All of the games I've played look identical to the originals on a regular tube-type display.


Will Centipede and Millipede work with a joystick or do you really need a trackball to play them?
They'll play, but they'll play badly. In fact, you'll want to disable them in the control panel. Disable all the trackball games, Assault (requires 2 joyticks per player), Q-Bert (requires the joytick to be mounted at a 45° angle), all of the spinner games, and a few other games that require a joystick-mounted fire button.

How do you connect speakers to this thing? Does it have a mini plug that I can plug computer speakers into?
The Jamma harness has a speaker-out on it, which is what I used.
The circuit board also has a headphone jack on it that you can plug PC speakers into.
It also has a volume control, but I'm not sure if it controls the headphone jack or not.
[/quote]

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