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Author Topic: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs  (Read 1697 times)

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Mr. Bubblehead

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Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« on: January 13, 2006, 02:12:18 pm »
Does anyone still use Vantage?  I'm working on a vertical front end (more like just a nice menu to start games), and I'm trying to determine which ROMs are non-working...I have the full set, but I'm not sure how to tell if a rom is not working or it is just the incorrect version.

Mr. Bubblehead

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Re: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« Reply #1 on: January 13, 2006, 02:27:38 pm »
Also I noticed that Vantage has default keys to support 3 'fire' buttons, but from the list of supported games I think that only 2 are used at the most?  Someone correct me if I am wrong about this.

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Re: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« Reply #2 on: January 18, 2006, 09:06:31 am »
So...nobody knows?  I'm bumping this thread again because it's off the first page and I really need to know this information...surely there is someone out there that still uses Vantage...

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Re: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« Reply #3 on: January 18, 2006, 09:46:08 am »
What version of Vantage are you using? AFAIK all the games in v1.11 work, but the newer 1.12 has some additional games that might have a couple of issues.
Here's the list of games:
http://mame.joymonkey.com/vantage.html
Games added after v1.11 are shown in bold.

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Re: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« Reply #4 on: January 18, 2006, 11:12:09 am »
I am using v1.12.  I noticed that the list of supported games on your site has more than the list on the ArcadeOS/Vantage site...which list is correct?  Also you have Bosconian listed as a WIP(?)...isn't that a horizontal game?

JoyMonkey

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Re: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« Reply #5 on: January 18, 2006, 11:30:08 am »
The games marked WIP (Work In Progress) on my list are games that were being worked on after 1.12 and wouldn't be on the ArcadeOS/Vantage site's list. Not sure why Bosconian was added, it probably uses identical drivers to a game already in Vantage so they decided 'what the hey!' and put it in.

Here's the archive of the Vantage project pages (now abandoned):
http://web.archive.org/web/20050212164444/http://vantage.jbeffects.com/

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Re: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« Reply #6 on: January 18, 2006, 11:54:42 am »
Thanks for all this info Joymonkey.  What confuses me is that you have listed the following roms as WIP, however the Vantage website includes them in the list of supported games:

Azurian Attack
Cosmo
Dingo
Future Spy
Jump Shot
Moon War
Rescue
Space Laser
Super Zaxxon

I am assuming that your list is probably not updated, is that the case?  I have several of the ROMs listed above, and Vantage runs most of them, although with the following bugs:

Azurian Attack - limited ship control
Cosmo - I don't have this ROM
Dingo - I don't have this ROM
Future Spy - blank screen (non-working rom I assume)
Jump Shot - seems to work fine
Moon War - no ship control (spinner game?)
Rescue - seems to run fine
Space Laser - runs, but with erratic behavior (game resets, weird sprites all over the screen, etc.)
Super Zaxxon - blank screen (again I think it is a non-working rom)

Has the Vantage project been abandoned?  There doesn't seem to be a whole lot of interest in it, as other emulators (specifically MAME) offer much better emulation as far as roms working, controls, sound, etc.

I really appreciate Vantage, mainly for its extremely archaic system requirements.  I don't want to spend a whole lot of time that I really don't have fine-tuning a frontend just for Vantage if no one uses it anymore, though.

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Re: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« Reply #7 on: January 18, 2006, 12:14:14 pm »
I think everybody sort-of lost interest in working on Vantage when they realized that it doesn't support saving high-scores and would have to be re-programmed from scratch to get support in there somehow. Not many people seem to use very old PC's for emu cabs anymore, so maybe that's another reason why it's not as popular as it used to be.

Did you see the bootable Vantage/GameLauncher floppy I did? It only works with GameLauncher set to debug mode (which is why you get the 'Press Any Key' messages), but it works pretty well. It uses Vantage 1.11, since some of the 1.12 games have issues, like you said above.

What kind of frontend are you working on?

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Re: Q for VANTAGE users about non-working ROMs
« Reply #8 on: January 18, 2006, 02:08:33 pm »
Well here's the full story on how I got started on my Vantage "frontend" project (I say "frontend", but it is really just a graphic vertical menu for launching games.  It does not interface with Vantage directly).

About a year ago when I really got interested in this hobby I stumbled across the ArcadeOS site.  I was already using MAME32 on an old Dell Optiplex network computer, but I was intrigued by Vantage's extremely low system requirements, so I pulled an old '486 out of storage (I have tons of these as I used to have a storage facility full of discarded computer equipment).  I was impressed that most of the games still required throttling for them to run.  I had not even built one cabinet yet, but I decided that this would be a great platform to use on my planned basement arcade.  I wrote a simple text-based menu so that my young children could easily use the system, without the hassle of working from a command prompt or "complicated" frontend.  Also the program had to be small and fast, to work with the older computer.  The only problem with the menu was it was horizontal, and the games were vertical (the setup was going into a cocktail cabinet, which I have since built).  I always thought that eventually I would create a better menu, vertically-oriented, and with some "pretty" graphics with screenshots (to help my 5-year old who can't read yet identify games) and also I wanted to incorporate some simple features such as a screensaver (the cabinet is on most of the time).

Lately due to an injury I have had time to work on the new and improved "frontend", which I have aptly titled "Advantage" (yes, very original, I know.  Sometimes my own creativity just blows my mind).  I'm not really an experienced programmer so I don't know how to make it do all kinds of neat stuff like filter and sort roms or interface with the Vantage config files, but it is a huge improvement on my text menu.  It runs vertical, it is very fast (loads almost instantly), runs on any computer with a VGA display, runs in DOS, very small (but not small enough to fit on a floppy).  In order to keep it fast it is sprite-based (much like the games themselves).  However this requires a proprietary binary file format for all the images and screenshots, so that the processor isn't tied up uncompressing graphics.  This makes it about 2mb in size.

Although Advantage is being created primarily for myself, I feel that others may like to use it.  I have already built in some features such as customizable screensavers, personalized graphics, and several different key control sets (full mappable keys was too much for me.  Like I said, I'm not a very experienced programmer).

After reading your insights today regarding Vantage, I think I will make Advantage for Vantage 1.11, to cover all the working roms.  Similar to Vantage itself, my frontend will have to be rewritten to incorporate more features and additional roms, perhaps if interest in the project picks up I will devote more time in improving it.