What do you guys use for a screensaver on your cabinets?

[reptileink]

So for those that use a PC to power your cab, I'm curious as to what you use for a screensaver?

I had the old "goldfish aquarium" one, but felt that wasn't really related to anything "arcade". I now just have the slideshow of screengrabs, but that is kind of boring. Anyone have or have created an animated arcade style screensaver, or are you not really concerned with one? I turn the cab on a lot for parties, but it doesn't always get played.

[thomas_surles]

I think most of us use the screen saver that comes with the frontend. (Maybe not most idk) I use maximus arcade and it will just load a random mame game and play the attract mode for a minute  (or whatever you set it to) then switch to another game. It's cool since IL the game is actually loaded so if you see something that catches your eye you can just pop in a credit and play.

[reptileink]

Is that a setting within Maximus? I am running Maximus as well, so I'd appreciate the help!

[thomas_surles]

Yeah it's in the preferences somewhere. Off the top of my head I believe it's near the end of the settings past the control setup I believe. It let's you set it up how you want.

Edit. Watch out for it triggering during a game though. When I first had it set up, I was playing a console game and left it on pause to eat dinner or something. When I came back it was gone and showing another game, because it physically exits and loads other games.

[reptileink]

Good to know, thanks!

[Titchgamer]

Yup ime the same but I use hyperspin.

[DudeRegular]

The Attractmode front end has a cool screensaver that uses the loaded gameplay vids. I have my frontend setup with different lists per genre. It plays vids from whatever list is currently selected.

[yotsuya]

Screensaver? Lol.

[reptileink]

Like I said, Yots, sometimes I just have the arcade on if we are having a cookout or party, but it doesn't get used the whole time it's on (well, pretty much...lol). So sometimes it does go into screensaver mode. I will usually just leave a game on the title screen that goes into autoplay, but just wondering what others do.

[ark_ader]

I turn the cabinet off.

[Laythe]

Mimic pulls up a nonexistent arcade game you can't actually play and pretends to attract mode for it.  They're actually just video files.  I had fun making them.

Leave it alone long enough, and the marquee flips over to something like:


Vampire Piggy Hunter (from Invader Zim) - main screen shows the Gameslave gameplay clipped carefully out of the episode, and then a high score table that's all GAZ except for one DIB with a pathetic score at the very, very bottom.  Then goes black.

Puzzle Block by LeMarchand Amusment Corporation - main screen video is the puzzlebox xscreensaver, with a cheesy midi remix of the hellraiser theme.  When solved, glitches out and goes black.

Pirate Baby's Cabana Battle Street Fight 2006 - made a marquee for it, main screen plays a random chapter of the video, then goes black.

Kings Of Power 4 Billion % - same thing.

Buckaroo Banzai - there's a BB arcade machine that Whorfin zaps on his way out of the asylum, but we never see the *game*.  So I replicated the marquee.  For the game screen, the leaked CGI done for the stillborn Ancient Secrets and New Mysteries looks cheezy enough to be an intro for a 1990s game.  Dubbed the Team Banzai march in, for the sound.

Crash & Burn - custom marquee, screen uses the wall-of-TVs video footage from Hackers from the early dev build of Wipeout XL.  There's not much of it in the movie, I had to get creative to splice together enough.

There's others, but you get the drift.  If you touch a controller or try to coin up it just instantly pops back to the frontend, because ha ha.

[yotsuya]

I figure the 3-4 hours the game is on isn't long enough to worry about burn in or need a screen saver. But my MAME cab runs Hyperspin, so it automatically scrolls through games after a bit.

[smass]

With Maximus I just use the screensaver thats built in.  You can point it to open only games from particular favorites lists if you like, so mine pulls only from my classics list.  If you allow Maximus to pull from the entire MAME list (and you don't have a no-nag Rom set) it can pull up a game that you haven't played before and get stuck on the "OK" screen.

[romshark]

Yeah, I don't have a screensaver either. My arcade pc is also configured to never go into standby or turn off the display.

If I need to, I can launch 3DArcade frontend. It's configured to randomly select a game after a minute or so of inactivity, then plays the ROM for a couple minutes. Not the most elegant solution, as some games may need certain input before running properly.

I also plan to put attract videos on the computer, launched from a shortcut. This would load a playlist in Media Player Classic, make it fullscreen, and randomize the list. This wouldn't load on it's own like a traditional screensaver though. I'd have to run the menu option.

Side note: if I ever get around to making a PC board for my Ninja Turtles cabinet, that system will also include some episodes of the original TMNT cartoon, as well as the first two movies (the 90's movies).

[yotsuya]

This is *NOT* directed at the OP, but more of an observation...

I dunno.... we got some dudes who are anal retentive about hiding every second of startup so you can't see the front end because it will "break the illusion"... I hope they aren't the same ones who want to run a screen saver when the machine idle. Talk about breaking the illusion...

[keilmillerjr]

This is *NOT* directed at the OP, but more of an observation...

I dunno.... we got some dudes who are anal retentive about hiding every second of startup so you can't see the front end because it will "break the illusion"... I hope they aren't the same ones who want to run a screen saver when the machine idle. Talk about breaking the illusion...

I assume those people are directly launching a single rom with mame, probably running a raspberry pi. Neat fact, mame can launch with up to 6 neo geo roms filled in slots just like the original hardware. And these people are probably running a Rom with a good attract mode (not Pac man).

I got bored and completely remade my attractmode layout the other night. After a period of inactivity, it will select random games. Potential burn in with the menu interface, but home games are not run 24/7. Will probably just set shutdown after an hour or whatever. Should be good enough I'd assume.

[paigeoliver]

You aren't going to burn in a thing on your Mame cabinet. The amount of time the image needs to be displayed is orders of magnitude longer than you think it would be (thanks to all the scare stories on local news stations back in the 80s warning parents how that Atari was going to break their TV set). An hour, 2 hours, 10 hours, 100 hours. Realistically judging from all the arcade games and monitors I have owned it takes years. I have a Turbo mini that was routed for 18 years and has no screen burn. Replaced the monitor recently in an Out Run that was operated for 16 years and it also had zero burn (although to be fair I have seen Out Runs with terrible burn). Pacs and Qberts seemed to be able to lay down a noticeable burn after a couple years of service. My Pong (Pro Tennis), has some light burn, and it appears to have been operated from 73-79 (black and whites burn easier though).

This is *NOT* directed at the OP, but more of an observation...

I dunno.... we got some dudes who are anal retentive about hiding every second of startup so you can't see the front end because it will "break the illusion"... I hope they aren't the same ones who want to run a screen saver when the machine idle. Talk about breaking the illusion...

I assume those people are directly launching a single rom with mame, probably running a raspberry pi. Neat fact, mame can launch with up to 6 neo geo roms filled in slots just like the original hardware. And these people are probably running a Rom with a good attract mode (not Pac man).

I got bored and completely remade my attractmode layout the other night. After a period of inactivity, it will select random games. Potential burn in with the menu interface, but home games are not run 24/7. Will probably just set shutdown after an hour or whatever. Should be good enough I'd assume.

[DudeRegular]

I am not worried about burn in. The way attract mode cycles through gameplay videos is pretty cool. Its much preferred to having the same short gameplay preview video repeat over and over if the cab is idle.

[big10p]

I sometimes have my cabs on all day. I use MaLa and have a video of the Tron light cycle scene as a screensaver.

[Schwing]

Plus the fact that if you touch anything during a video, it directly selects the game. Only thing, it only shows videos from the current wheel, I'd prefer for it to show gameplay videos from all wheels (mix daphne with arcade and snes for instance).

I am not worried about burn in. The way attract mode cycles through gameplay videos is pretty cool. Its much preferred to having the same short gameplay preview video repeat over and over if the cab is idle.

[reptileink]

I'm not really concerned with burn in. It was just a random question about what others might have.

I am also not concerned with having to "double-click" my Maximus icon on a desktop screen when turning on the cabinet. I just make sure I do it all before the guests come over so it's ready to roll. I had an arcade party a few months ago, and actually burned a CD with "arcade ambiance" track to make you feel like you were in an arcade...lol

[Titchgamer]

Why not just set maximus to load on start up?

[reptileink]

You know, I set it to run on startup, yet it doesn't. I don't know enough about this computer (the previous owner had a dual boot that I haven't removed yet). Wondering if I need to remove that first as it goes to a dual boot screen each time I turn it on.

[megamoze]

I disabled my screensaver completely.  I typically load a game and run that game for a day or two then switch it out for something new.  The games themselves typically cycle enough that I don't worry about burn in.