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Heres a track and field with trackball
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Onyx_PghPA:
I have fond memories of Track & Field only because it was the game directly to the right of the Dragon's Lair in my local arcade circa 1984.

A friend of mine actually recorded some 'arcade ambiance' of the Dragon's Lair in action and you can hear Track & Field clearly in the background.

I would play that T&F machine frequently when the DL was in repair, which was often.  The high jump was my best event, but I have to admit, that machine was strictly button operated.  Until seeing this post I wasn't even aware there was a trackball version.  Very cool.


Onyx
Wade:

--- Quote from: Xiaou2 on October 11, 2007, 10:30:18 pm --- This could be an early limited prototype production of the game. 

--- End quote ---

Unlikely!  Again, with no Centuri logo on those panels, I really think this was an aftermarket add-on for operators to breath new life into T&F.  Kinda like MsPac Speedup chips.

Wade
Xiaou2:
From KLOV:

Conversion
Later versions of the game replaced the Run buttons with a trackball.


 Actually, its more unlikely that this was a non-Centuri add on.   Such
a kit would be very expensive (dual trackballs), and not easy to get
widespread word out to Ops.


 Ok, so Ive been to many sites now..  and each says basically the
same as KLOV.

 The Artwork is said to come from the Konami version of the game,
seen here in very good close up detail:

http://www.ggdb.com/GameByName.aspx?c=&s=&vid=3165

 and heres the Tball CP underside:

http://www.quarterarcade.com/Game.aspx/7809


 Edit:  Looking at the Ebay pics of the Side-Art,  One can clearly
see the Konami logo.   This may be why they chose not to
add any additional Logos to the other artwork.   As
back then, many times licensing shifted often.
 
Wade:
I don't know if we'll ever know the source of the trackball version for certain.

This much I know - info on KLOV is VERY OFTEN wrong (if necessary, I can dig up some examples), and lots of other sites copy info from KLOV.  So just because KLOV says it was a later version, means absolutely nothing.

To me, the fact that the Trackball artwork has no brand name or logo on it, and looks absolutely NOTHING like the original sideart, marquee art, or CP art, strongly suggests that it is an aftermarket add-on.  Also, upgrades and conversion kits were pretty common as a way to bring interest back to an old game (or cabinet), so something like a trackball add-on for a game where some people couldn't do well with buttons seems like a sellable item.  Obviously, I can't prove this is how it happened, but it just seems like the most likely scenario.

Wade
Kremmit:
Look at the pic of the underside of that CP at Quarterarcade.  See that PCB attached to the bottom of the trackball?  I'll bet that thing converts the TB data to button presses.  If somebody had one of those and could do some testing to figure out how many button presses it sends per quadrature tick, we'd have what we need to work on a driver hack for MAME.
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