The NEW Build Your Own Arcade Controls
Main => Software Forum => Topic started by: isucamper on May 06, 2009, 08:46:46 pm
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So I've slowly come to the realization that I'm never going to get a 25" Ampliphone vector monitor to use in a Zektor Vector cabinet... and even if I did, it seems like the ZVG graphics driver is about to be discontinued. Accepting this, I decided to go ahead and see how good I could get these games looking on my Wells Gardner D9800 raster monitor.
I first tried the much talked about AAE emulator which is gaining a lot of popularity for its use of hardware acceleration in emulating vector graphics. Unfortunately, since upgrading my OS to 64-bit xp, I can't seem to get the program to run.
Instead, I started fiddling with some vector games in MAME. I was suprised at how good I got them to look.
Here's some before and after pictures of vector games running in MAME at 800x600 on my WG D9800. The before pictures (the dim ones) are with the default MAME settings. The after pictures (the not dim ones) are with these options:
-contrast 2 -gamma 2 -beam 2
There were no other differences in how these pictures were taken (lighting, angle, ect.).
tempest
(http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f298/isucamper/temp1.jpg)
(http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f298/isucamper/temp2.jpg)
starwars
(http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f298/isucamper/sw1a.jpg)
(http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f298/isucamper/sw1b.jpg)
(http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f298/isucamper/sw2a.jpg)
(http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f298/isucamper/sw2b.jpg)
(http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f298/isucamper/sw3a.jpg)
(http://i49.photobucket.com/albums/f298/isucamper/sw3b.jpg)
Pretty dramatic difference. Not quite as good as AAE (there's a tiny bit of aliasing that doesn't exist in AAE) but way, way better than I thought MAME was capable of. I wonder why the default settings are set to look so bad? All this time, I thought MAME did a pretty horrid job of emulating vectors, but it turns out it just needs some tweaking.
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Your "after" images are pretty much how my vector games have always looked on the CRT computer monitor in my main cab. They're not perfect, but totally playable. Your "before" images are perhaps the worst I have ever seen. You can barely see your own ship in Star Wars.
Glad you found good settings. I wonder if your original display is the norm for arcade monitors?
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Your "before" images are perhaps the worst I have ever seen. You can barely see your own ship in Star Wars.
Glad you found good settings. I wonder if your original display is the norm for arcade monitors?
The picture is dim to begin with using the default settings. Add tinted glass into the mix and yeah, you can barely see anything.
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Your "before" images are perhaps the worst I have ever seen.
It looks even worse if you run at 640x480. Recent versions of Mame look terrible at 640x480 on my standard res. monitor (even after tweaking settings). I use an older version for vector games for this reason, there are a few more options to play with.
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The newer versions looking worse makes sense as well... I'm running .84 and .99 on the machine I was referring to. Didn't know the vectors were messed up in later versions.
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I use an older version for vector games for this reason, there are a few more options to play with.
Really? Can you tell me which version you are using? If there's a big difference I'd like to give it a spin.
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I recently ran across a post in this forum about Asteroids and other vectors not playing well. There was a comment about making them look better by adding a vector.ini for all vector games.
The vector.ini had the following lines
brightness 1.0
contrast 2.0
gamma 3.0
I went in to a couple of games and made this change and saw a dramatic difference in what showed on the screen. Is beam the same as brightness?
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I recently ran across a post in this forum about Asteroids and other vectors not playing well. There was a comment about making them look better by adding a vector.ini for all vector games.
The vector.ini had the following lines
brightness 1.0
contrast 2.0
gamma 3.0
I went in to a couple of games and made this change and saw a dramatic difference in what showed on the screen. Is beam the same as brightness?
no, beam is a totally different setting. it changes the width of the vectors. this is the option that I saw the most improvement from. I went to 2.0, which might be to big for some people, but 1.5 was a big improvment as well.
On a side note, I played Zektor for the first time in my life last night. It seemed to me that my ship would spin much faster in one direction than the other. At first, I thought my spinner was acting up, but all other games seemed fine. Is Zektor supposed to do that?
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isucamper,
thanks for posting this. I've always thought about tweaking it but it was never a high priority. but seeing recent AAE videos from emumovies and your screenshots motivated me to mess w/ them.
I wish mame would get the nice glowing effects like AAE someday.
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I wish mame would get the nice glowing effects like AAE someday
I really wish it wasn't impossible to obtain a real life vector monitor without desecrating a nice Tempest or Star Wars cab. When you think about it, MAME's whole purpose, the archiving of all these old games as their original cabinets fade into history, does not apply whatsoever to vector games. Sure, MAME will emulate their source code, but the subtle aspects of how these games actually look is not captured by MAME at all. We are going to lose these games forever the day the last real vector monitor kicks the bucket.
It's really understated just how important an emulator like AAE is. To have someone going into the guts of their video card and comparing their emulated result side by side with the real thing is a big deal. And it's important to do it now while we can still make that direct comparison. In another 30 years, programmers might have to guess what the original vector games looked like.
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isucamper,
I hear ya. I wonder though to what extent how something looks falls into the mame project's mission statement. I mean technically they're preserving the "inner workings" of the vector games just as much as their raster counterparts.... When CRTs all but disappear, would we debate how the group is ignoring the look and feel of CRTs?
"MAME is strictly a non-profit project. Its main purpose is to be a reference to the inner workings of the emulated arcade machines. This is done both for educational purposes and for preservation purposes, in order to prevent many historical games from disappearing forever once the hardware they run on stops working. Of course, in order to preserve the games and demonstrate that the emulated behavior matches the original, you must also be able to actually play the games. This is considered a nice side effect, and is not MAME's primary focus."
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Are vector monitors impossible to produce? I wonder if there would be a market for such a thing to be produced new?
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When CRTs all but disappear, would we debate how the group is ignoring the look and feel of CRTs?
<sigh> Probably. And that time is closer to being upon us than I want to believe. I've got half a mind to start stock piling CRTs.
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When CRTs all but disappear, would we debate how the group is ignoring the look and feel of CRTs?
<sigh> Probably. And that time is closer to being upon us than I want to believe. I've got half a mind to start stock piling CRTs.
Oh man, don't say that... I'm already worried about how I'd replace my Wells Gardner D9400 when it eventually dies. I really don't want to put in a TV but would do it before I put in an LCD. (not trying to start another lcd vs crt flame thread)
Well I guess as long as the newer arcade games like variation x of Golden Tee still use CRTs we're ok for at least another few years.
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So isu you're using mame before the video re-write, right? (heheh.) My experience is that in various versions, some things say like gamma make little or no difference, while some others depending on the version will screw up the overall contrast. Version-wise, this is how I have things set:
Mame .104 : full screen brightness - 1.50
Mame after re-write, in this case .131 : only the contrast correction is adjusted, to 1.35 .
Advancemame: believe it or not, I let it decide, and it automatically sets it at 33khz. While it isn't as defined as at a higher resolution (and may perhaps be similar to a beam width of about 1.5 or so), the phosphor glow is better because of the lower scan rate. Then, I set the vector luminosity to 3.0 . Very nice. This is on a 27" arcade multisync. I'd take pictures, but you might as well try it out yourselves.
[later] I went back and played again with mame .131 . Brightness just makes the display area all white, and full screen brightness makes the whole screen white, both at fairly low values, and neither really adding anything before making it hazy. Gamma does have some effect, where before the re-write it didn't. Contrast correction however has a much more dramatic effect, in which case any affect gamma had becomes negligible. Also, contrast correction beyond 1.35 there's little if any increase in 'effect'. (Full screen gamma and contrast do the same as gamma and contrast correction, but perhaps wouldn't in the case of a raster graphic game.)
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+1 for this looking wonderful! I'm using a 27" Betson multi-sync monitor at 800x600 resolution & running MAME .115 (optimized for my CPU & w/ hi-score & no nag compile).
Thanks!!!
-Jason
The vector.ini had the following lines
brightness 1.0
contrast 2.0
gamma 3.0
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Thanks. Because of info found in this thread I am excited about playing the vector games on my cab! (Star Trek was always a favorite!) :cheers:
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I think your best bet is finding an old NEC or Mitsubishi presentation monitor that will let your run high res. Then run aae on that.
Our only hope for new vectors is if someday Atari decides to do a Star Wars reissue or something along those lines. But even that is going to be hard considering how scarce tubes are in general now.
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Our only hope for new vectors is if someday Atari decides to do a Star Wars reissue or something along those lines. But even that is going to be hard considering how scarce tubes are in general now.
With Atari Games gone, Midway who owned what was left of them now gone, and the 2 main companies that produced the monitors long gone, I don't think this is ever going to happen.
There was a company that had some new chassis repro'd, but I think there was an issue with them and someone else trying to undercut them by having stuff made in China. It all went down on KLOV a couple years ago.
That was the last I heard of anyone trying to supply new vector parts. There is now a converter to use a VGA monitor with them.
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I didn't realize Midway was gone now too.
Interesting about that VGA adapter. I bet it doesn't look too bad.
Since the deflection and HV boards for these cabinets are still being replicated, couldn't someone just hand wind yokes for an existing chassis on boutique-like basis? I'm sure it'd end up being a few hundred dollars more expensive than a used color vector is now but you would ended up with an all new monitor and no burn-in from three different games, etc..
I guess the real future is better emulation. AAE looks pretty good really but I just wish it was practical to have the real thing.
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I would stay away from the vga hardware thing if you can... I can't image it doing a great job.
Super high resolution monitors with good 3d engine using something like AAE (where it can simulate the vector lines) is going to be the long term way to go...
but face it... vector games are gone for good. I don't think any really came out after 3d games came out. Too bad... When you don't spend 3/4 of your game development into 3d modeling and textures.... you spend it on game play.
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I would stay away from the vga hardware thing if you can... I can't image it doing a great job.
Super high resolution monitors with good 3d engine using something like AAE (where it can simulate the vector lines) is going to be the long term way to go...
but face it... vector games are gone for good. I don't think any really came out after 3d games came out. Too bad... When you don't spend 3/4 of your game development into 3d modeling and textures.... you spend it on game play.
Vectors went away a LONG...LONG...LONG time before 3d games hit the scene. The bottom line is they're not reliable (in the field). I think the last vector was from about 1986 or so? Does anyone know the last vector game?
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I think it's on Jed Margolin's site, and was '83.
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Nope... the last commercially released vector was Empire Strikes Back, 1985.
There were two additional prototypes in 1985 that never made it... Tom Cat from Atari and Vertigo from Exidy.
So it's been 24 years since the last vector game was produced.
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It might have been 24 years since the last game was released but all the Vector games were high quality and were staples at arcades for more than a decade after the last ones were released.
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It might have been 24 years since the last game was released but all the Vector games were high quality and were staples at arcades for more than a decade after the last ones were released.
That is a stretch...
MANY of the vector games were high quality and staples at arcades for more than a decade after the last ones were released. There were certainly some stinker vector games though that pulled very little dough and had very small runs.
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Felt like digging up an old vector emulation thread! Tim (AAE creator) evidently has no interest in AAE anymore for whatever reason. The emulator is spectacular at emulating the brightness of arcade vectors, especially if you have a nice, bright CRT. I actually just discovered "Topgunner", the Vertigo prototype game. Very, very cool game. The "last" vector game created in 1986. It's too bad Topgunner will NOT run in AAE or Macmame OS9, it runs in Macmame OSX but that's inferior at emulating vectors to the OS 9 version.
It's too bad that AAE can't be "tweaked" a bit. It needs the game list to be cleaned up and a few games added, like ESB, Topgunner and Cosmic Chasm. The only way for me to get ESB looking GOOD is in macmame OS9 and it looks pretty cool but not as bright as AAE.
And BTW I have a real WG6100 running basically side by side with the AAE rig and the vectors are very close in brightness, not exact but all considering, pretty awesome for stardard PC gear and no $$$$ vector monitor! Currnetly working on a dedicated Major Havoc/AAE rig. MH looks and plays very, very nice. Maybe Tim will read this and do something.... ;D Keep hope alive!
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I just wanted to say I really am sorry there has been no new AAE releases for way to long, and that I have NOT lost interest, actually I work on it a little bit every week, just not enough to get it to where I wanted to release it.
I WILL release SOMETHING in a month or two (a demo most likely), with SOURCE CODE so that someone can take the only good part of my emulator (the shader code) and port it to something else. Right now I have an older version of mame running with it hacked in place of the D3D code, and it looks really good.
So don't count me out yet, just real life seems to get in the way of everything. I will get something out to the people who want it before the first snow fall... :)
Thanks,
Tim
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Excellent news Tim!
Very community spirited of you, lots of great code has died in the past from projects not being open source then development stopping for one reason or another.
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I just wanted to say I really am sorry there has been no new AAE releases for way to long, and that I have NOT lost interest, actually I work on it a little bit every week, just not enough to get it to where I wanted to release it.
I WILL release SOMETHING in a month or two (a demo most likely), with SOURCE CODE so that someone can take the only good part of my emulator (the shader code) and port it to something else. Right now I have an older version of mame running with it hacked in place of the D3D code, and it looks really good.
So don't count me out yet, just real life seems to get in the way of everything. I will get something out to the people who want it before the first snow fall... :)
Thanks,
Tim
I imagine there is actually a fairly good chance of Aaron allowing your code to be integrated with MAME as an official codepath if you're interested / willing (and it can be done in a clean way, and the license you use is compatible, or you grant MAME a compatible license to use your code)
I'm sure people would appreciate that if it were to become the standard anyway.
If you explicitly don't want that to be the case, you can of course specify that, and use an incompatible license. MAME will only do things 'by the book'
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I love Haze's idea. AAE in MAME...brilliant! I'm still using MAME .127 and haven't found a reason to update, but that would certainly make me do it! :D
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I'll also chip in that if it does get integrated into MAME then other things like the Vectrex emulation in MESS will naturally inherit the code, which would be rather neat.
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Tim.....you really should consider this. :)
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I will be watching this thread intently. I would not have a problem building a second cab (look at that, I haven't even started my first) dedicated to Star Wars.
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I imagine there is actually a fairly good chance of Aaron allowing your code to be integrated with MAME as an official codepath if you're interested / willing (and it can be done in a clean way, and the license you use is compatible, or you grant MAME a compatible license to use your code)
Really? I have never understood why the so called D3D "clean-stretch" patch was never integrated with MAME (which would allow arcade monitor users to use D3D settings without stetching as opposed to ddraw). That seems much less "deviant" from the accuracy goals of MAME than the AAE modifications and it was rejected. Don't get me wrong though -- I would love to see this in MAME.
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thumbs up for a possible collaboration between MAME and AAE :cheers:
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I imagine there is actually a fairly good chance of Aaron allowing your code to be integrated with MAME as an official codepath if you're interested / willing (and it can be done in a clean way, and the license you use is compatible, or you grant MAME a compatible license to use your code)
Really? I have never understood why the so called D3D "clean-stretch" patch was never integrated with MAME (which would allow arcade monitor users to use D3D settings without stetching as opposed to ddraw). That seems much less "deviant" from the accuracy goals of MAME than the AAE modifications and it was rejected. Don't get me wrong though -- I would love to see this in MAME.
because you're just meant to use the prescale options?
the vector monitor stuff is a simulation, there is no real 'right' or 'wrong' about it, it will never be accurate on a raster monitor anyway so the way in which MAME presents the rasterized vector display is something of a non-issue as far as accuracy and project goals are concerned because all solutions are equal. That's why (as well as some general hints that such a thing would be accepted in MAME if it were done properly) I think Aaron is more likely to accept such a thing.
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Glad to see something happening here, anything is good!
There are the obvious things in AAE that need attention, Game list and Joystick support but there are other, less obvious things that would make AAE really awesome.
The rom list for The Askey Major Havoc level hack does not match the actual roms in the working game hack. So the "Return to Vax" MH hack will never load in AAE because AAE is looking for the wrong romset.
It would be great to be able to rotate games vertically so one could build a dedicated Tempest/Multigame or Quantum. Quantum is so rare that I'm certain someone would do a dedictaed Quantum emulation project if the game could be rotated.
I'm not certain how this could be worked on but VECTOR GLOW just eats up too much processing power for me to apply it at all without bigtime slowdowns. I use a marginal GFX card (Radeon 9550) but I wonder if GLOW makes even real fast GFX cards choke.
The only scarey thing about intergrating AAE into mame is that the newest versions of mame need lots of CPU power to run the same games that older versions of mame can run with much less cpu power.
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I don't think the effects would be mandatory if the engine was integrated into mame.
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because you're just meant to use the prescale options?
What prescale option would you recommend for a game like Ms Pacman for example? I've yet to see anything that doesn't artifact/stretch the image other than direct draw + no hardware stretch.
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Perhaps installing the "shader code" into a full blown version of mame is the best idea. I say this after I have done extensive testing attempting to use spinner controls in AAE with various games without success. Mouse controls WILL WORK in AAE but they DO NOT WORK WELL. I was at the point where I was about to install a spinner in my AAE rig and decided to do some tests. Spinner sensitivity is just not there and there's an anemic control panel for mouse controls. I was planning on building a dedicated MH AAE rig and when I tested a real Tempest spinner on a trackball adaptor, it was terrible, just completely unacceptable for really playing the game, same goes for Tempest and Vector Breakout, just not acceptable for really playing these games. I really tried but it will not work and I do not want to play with Windows system settings to increase mouse senitivity since the mouse cursor was moving very fast on my desktop without any adjustments.
Just so peeps know, I can use this same spinner setup to control MH and Tempest on Macmame PERFECTLY and I mean PERFECT, so this issue has nothing to do with the spinner (mouse) control that I have chosen to use with AAE.
Right now for me, AAE is a pushbutton emulator only until mouse issues have been addresed.
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Something that I realized after my test is the fact that a real Tempest spinner has many more optical "teeth" than a standard trackball optical encoder disc. This means that the mouse senitivity needs to be bumped up to get a similar feeling with the spinner. So I know that whatever was being controlled in AAE was slower than if I tested with a stardard trackball optic wheel but still, it was unplayable in Tempest or Major Havoc and those two games probably look the best on AAE. Keep hope alive!
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-contrast 2 -gamma 2 -beam 2
I know this thread is pretty old, but I was wondering what version of MAME were you running at the time you took these pictures.
I'm curious if your settings are still the best for modern versions of MAME (I'm using GroovyMAME 0.142).
I don't have access to my arcade cab at the moment or I'd try them out.
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My ZVG card is supposed to arrive tommorow! This changes everything...MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
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I have the zvg working with the windows beta setup! Clunky for now but I can play many games just fine. The brightness of the zvg is adjustable, so I can actually make the games brighter than "normal", I can see a difference right through the original Atari tinted glass. I have lots of "flickering" in various places in various games but I'm looking at a WG6100 and not a VGA CRT here. Irony is that this is the same rig I ran AAE, all the stuff is still there. I probably posted the specs months ago for AAE.
Main thing with the Windows beta is that none of the Sega games,Tomcat and Topgunner will not show on the game list/play, the vector menu isn't there and I am a complete noob with command line mame setups, so I can't even figure out how to rotate the vertical games yet and not certain the support has been built in yet. That's all "SteveJ"'s hard work, he is the genius here, I'm just an enduser and hopeful beta tester. My camera is busted but I'll take a few camera phone pics later.
And for the "purist" out there, Gravitar is still not quite perfect, even displayed on the same WG6100 in the Gravitar cabinet I have put this project into and never will be in any form of emulation when compared to running the real board, it just ain't the same. Space Duel, however is perfect and I just discovered the dip setting for 1 player only. More to come...
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My regular camera is busted and I've been too cheap to replace it. I used a camera phone to take a few shots of the WG6100 displaying a few games output from the ZVG in Windows, yes...Windows not dos. The photos do not do it any justice at all. I have also included a few shots of my "real" Asteroids Deluxe. Note that the real AD has the aqua monitor gel and the photos of the WG6100 are taken through the original Atari tined glass in my Gravitar cabinet, so the vectors are BRIGHT, real BRIGHT. I do have issues with "flickering" and you will see in Major Havoc how this displays in a slow shutter speed pic. Anyways, I can relate to just looking at a few images, even if you don't have the desire, money or capacity to get a ZVG working
(http://i669.photobucket.com/albums/vv60/taylormadelv/IMAG0151.jpg[img]
[img]http://i669.photobucket.com/albums/vv60/taylormadelv/IMAG0163.jpg)
(http://i669.photobucket.com/albums/vv60/taylormadelv/IMAG0160.jpg)
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(http://i669.photobucket.com/albums/vv60/taylormadelv/IMAG0148.jpg)
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I can't tell it's a vector monitor. Eager to see shots from your camera, highest resolution possible, I hope.
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I know this post is pretty old but I Was wondering about the Turbo-Twist high low spinner. Is it difficult to install on a wood panel and are you able to use the push/pull feature as a button for firing? Really looking to add a spinner to my Xarcade Tank Stick and would love the ability to use it as fire button too. Eventually plan on making a new panel but looking to get by with this for now. Oh and your cabinet looks great.
Thanks