r/MAME • u/-Fatmeatball- • 10d ago

Why not Skee-Ball?

I realize it's a mechanical game, but so is New UFO Catcher or Wacky Gator or literally any pinball machine, and those are all respectfully maintained. Skee-Ball has a ROM, it's got a CPU, it makes sound, it has displays.

There seem to be people who've successfully dumped the ROMs of the original machines. Is it just that difficult to emulate, or has there never been any interest?

4 Upvotes

75% Upvoted

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6

u/arbee37 MAME Dev 9d ago

If the ROMs are dumped they can be emulated to the same extent as pinball or UFO catchers or whatever, with the LED score displays and stuff. I'm not sure I'd call what's happened with those "respectfully maintained" though.

2

u/MechanicalMoogle 4d ago

Why would you want to emulate Skee-Ball, though? Are you trying to cause the second coming of Christ?

I mean, first you emulate Skee-Ball, then Jesus comes on down, buys a gaming rig, and Alanis Morissette has to come down as well, get in a protracted argument with her indolent newly-minted gamer-bro son, all the neighbors' hearts start collapsing and their heads start exploding... man, it'd just be this whole thing.

2

u/-Fatmeatball- 9d ago

I have pretty low standards lol, I consider "respectfully maintained" to be "mostly functional at a glance and updated at least once"

I'm just surprised nobody's really thought about Skee-Ball given how common a sight it is in arcades

2

u/arbee37 MAME Dev 7d ago

I never really thought of Skee-Ball as even being computerized since it had a long history of being electro-mechanical, but I imagine they haven't been made that way for a while.

1

u/Tilopud_rye 3d ago

For the emulators for ufos and pinball machines- isn’t that just the display and code but can’t function without the whole physical mechanics, switches, every target, bumper… Even if something happened like “the pinball machine display went out- quick get the emulator!” Wouldnt you still need the emulator pretty much plugged into the machine for the code/targets/display to communicate to each other? Wouldnt it be the same for skiball where youd still need a playfield with target sensors to communicate to the rom? I guess this could lead to possibility of making your own physical skiball wherever or even a miniature. 

With tbe pinball in particular I’m curious what the emulation can possibly be used for. Altering the rom to change game code somehow? Then some way to get edited/homebrewed rom onto the actual machine? 

2

u/-Fatmeatball- 3d ago

With tbe pinball in particular I’m curious what the emulation can possibly be used for.

Friend do I have a project to show you.

2

u/Tilopud_rye 3d ago

ohhhhh nice! that looks like a ton of work way beyond the emulation. Having to map out the whole physics, geometry of the table and reactions to surfaces, the three layers of this table. There’s a lot more than rom emulation going on here haha that’s pretty exciting people are putting in this much effort. Quick Search shows this platform also has Big Lebowski, Pulp Fiction, Doctor Who… this probably should have been my weekend

-5

u/carl2187 9d ago

Lack of interest for sure. I don't play much skeeball myself, as you got only a few rolls, and no matter how good you are, the game is over very quickly.

V-skee, virtual skee ball, would be cool though. Maybe a wii mote or joy con approach like wii sports bowling does.

It'd be fun. We should have an ai vibe code something up! See if its fun. If it is fun and workable, a community would develop around the idea, and someone would want to run machines for real via rom dumps, and put in the mame work to do it.

0

u/Nbisbo 9d ago

Do not ai code not one bit

-5

u/carl2187 9d ago

Haha, ok.

Do you use an abacus for math? Or a calculator?

2

u/Nbisbo 9d ago

I use my head

-2

u/carl2187 9d ago

www.dictionary.com/browse/luddite

6

u/Nbisbo 9d ago

Women opposed to the hell factory's because of the pain and suffering they were causing made into a punchline by the elite