OK, now that the archives are up and running properly, there are a few voting issues to clear up. Once again, for those of you who didn't follow the threads over the last few months, or are new here, the archives contain games no longer supported by MAME--you can upload scores to them (they are marked with an *) and there will continue to be rankings on these games, but you will not be awarded leaderboard points for them.

First off, I know there is a small minority of players that don't like the archives idea, but please respect the other players, and don't petitoin for their removal on this thread.

Vote #1: Should we move the following games to the archives? These are all HOLD-THE-UP-ARROW type games that were originally designed to be played with a trackball, and currently there exist 10+ ties for first on most of them: Meadows Lanes, Robot Bowl, Tri-Sports Bowling, Capcom Bowling, Shuuz, etc. The only bowling/horseshoes games not included would be League Bowling, as it was designed for a gamepad and nobody has a perfect score, and American Horseshoes, which is broken. Moving these games to the archives would eliminate virtually all of the 'easy firsts' left at MARP, but would cost some players over a thousand points, myself included.

Vote #2: Should the 'too easy' games, as listed in the Banned Games page (under RULES) be moved to the archives?

Vote #3: I'm going to try and set a precedent here, and ask the MARP community what they think settings should be for Shootout and all clones, so that we can establish a TG setting where leeching the rollercoaster is not possible--that is, you could still hit it, but either deliberately killing youself on stage 2 would not be infinitely possible, or the settings would have to be hard enough that you couldn't consisitently hit the rollercoaster. Please, I need people to play this game and recommend settings to this thread. After this has been done, we can submit a consensus to Walter Day or Mark Longridge or whomever.

Vote #4: Should Turbo be taken off the banned list? Collision detection is still sketchy, but collisions do happen, and I'm not sure if the trick to avoid being hit remains.

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Thank-you for your time in considering the above. I look forward to your answers.

-- Q.T.Quazar (qan@home.com), May 26, 2000

Answers

1) Aye - throw them out. Well... archive them :)

2) If possible, Aye.

3) Because I have no idea what that game is about - I will abstain.

4) Aye - We've had that discussion :)

GB9

-- Gameboy9 (goldengameboy@yahoo.com), May 26, 2000.

Firstly, I still don't think that not awarding points for those games just because they are no longer in MAME just stinks. Previous MAME versions are supported - but games in eariler MAME versions aren't? Doesn't make sense. To have a higher score than BBH in (SFZ) is one achievement, but I now have nothing to show for it. Just stinks.

Right, now that I got that off my chest, on to the votes...

#1) Um, well, if it makes it too easy, then it is just that, easy. To be honest, I can't be bothered playing games that are too easy for the sake of leaderboard points.

#2) Read above.

#3) Can't comment, don't know the game.

#4) Again, don't know the game.

-- Barry Rodewald (bsr@hn.pl.net), May 26, 2000.

You're not quite on track, Barry. SFZero isn't gone because of a previous version/previous game rule. We never resolved that issue (some games, like vers of King of Boxers are thus still in limbo). SFZero is gone because it wasn't an arcade game, it was console, and that was why Nicola removed it.

Hope that clears things up. Q.T.Quazar

-- Q.T.Quazar (qan@home.com), May 26, 2000.

I know perfectly well why SFZ is no longer in MAME, but I'm just protesting not getting any points for it at MARP, with an older version of MAME which had that driver enabled.

-- Barry Rodewald (bsr@hn.pl.net), May 27, 2000.

1) These games should go.

2) These games should be in the archives as well.

3) and 4) don't know these games, so no comment.

Bye, Arjen...

-- Arjen Gnodde (arjen@ukonline.co.uk), May 27, 2000.

1. Archive

2. Archive

3. Give me some time to get the ROMs working right, and I'll try to help

4. I can't get Turbo to work that well on my computer, so I say we ban it in some way

Sincerely,

J.D. Lowe

-- J.D. Lowe (jedidrunkenllama@hotmail.com), May 27, 2000.

1) Archive.

2) Archive.

3) Haven`t played it, but will have a look. But for current voting purposes....abstain.

4) as above.

And that concludes the voting from the Irish Jury........

ALEX

-- Alex Weir (alexweir@indigo.ie), May 27, 2000.

1) archive

2) archive (if they've been banned by democracy, the controversial too easy games should not be banned untill there is a consensus)

3) tg settings should be found, it is leeching to stay on the same level for the whole game getting nearly unlimited points.

4) i just played it and it seems collision detection is working reasonably. I don't think banning is necesary unless a recording manages to avoid a collison entirely (drives right over another car with out crashing.)

-- Chad (churritz@cts.com), May 27, 2000.

1) archive

2) archive

3) I will look for settings. if this doesn' t resolve the problem it could be a good solution simply to ban this technique or to allow it only in the first life I get on level 2 (if I hit the rollercoaster after dying this point will be subtracted from the final score.

4) I don' t know

Bye

-- A.D.SAKURAGI (adeidda@inwind.it), May 27, 2000.

About the first question : another game that have improper control advantage is Shuffleboard (shuffle) so please check it.

-- A.D.SAKURAGI (adeidda@inwind.it), May 27, 2000.

1) archive 2) archive 3) and 4) I don't know

As for Shuffleboard: it can't be done with keyboard, you have to use mouse or trackball. Which is actually quite hard; I've tried quite a few times and I haven't been able to break the high score. Even if you could "shoot perfectly" you still might not get the highest possible because the computer opponent is also shooting and messing up your previous shots.

-- Jason Dyer (jdyer@u.arizona.edu), May 28, 2000.

#1)agree to archive. #2)idem. #3)can't play this game so no opinion. #4)never play the arcade version but it seems playable enough.

-- Blost (blost@mail.com), May 28, 2000.

1) Archive 2) Archive 3) Ban Technique--As far as TG settings, if there are none to be found, then default settings should be used. If a lot of players start submitting scores and the game appears easy, we can raise the difficulty bar and notify Walter and Mark. 4) Remove from banned list. If the bug still exists, ban the technique.

-- Pat (laffaye@ibm.net), May 28, 2000.

3) I played all three romsets. about shootouj and shootoub I think that is sufficient to move difficulty to medium. In this case enemies begin to shoot at you very faster and it is very hard to leech. Difficulty hard and harder is too difficult. Shootout (like Q.T.QUAZAR said) restart from when you die so there is no possibility to leech.

-- A.D.SAKURAGI (adeidda@inwind.it), May 28, 2000.

1:Archive them all...

2:Easy games? never heard about them.. but if they are banned why not..i say Archive them..

3:ok.. I4m the main reson why this subject came up.. After QT4s and my fight on the jap and the korean bootlegs i found out this little leaching point with the rollercoaster..QT didn4t thought it possible o go on forever but i can tell you it is.. not sure how the settings would be for the game but, if it is possible to start the games with 3 men and no extras at all it would be fine for me..or setting the extra to every 200k maybe(idon4t know if this is possible) to forbid people to shoot the rollecoaster, or only once or in one men only will only be abused i think..

Just wanna point out that the us version (shootout) is ok and doesn4t loop as the other two does and should be left with default settings. But maybe the easiest way is to ban those clones and only allow the us verion... That is also fine for me!

4:I say let4s keep it banned until it works as it should.

And one more thing: There are still games that are Freebies out there and if the bowling games should go I think most of those games should go to.. just my opinion of course... Here are some of them

Off the wall (sente): takes about 2 min to get another 100 points...

Star cruiser: Just shoot your opponent 7 times and 100 pts is yours after 3 min off "hard work"..

Spiker: after 11 points and 5 min later another 100 pts is yours..

I really think that those games also should go...BUT i must point out that I have scores on the above games so I will also loose points but that4s fine with me..

I like to hear your opinions folks! keep them coming! Cheers

QRS

-- QRS (qrs@telia.com), May 28, 2000.

OK, the voting looks pretty uniform. The bowling games will now be archived, as will shuuz, and the 'too easy' games will join them.

Turbo is unbanned, and Star Cruiser will be added to the 'too easy' list. Tornado Baseball is now filed under '2 player' and considered banned.

Anything else, just keep posting or send me an e-mail.

-- Q.T.Quazar (qan@home.com), May 28, 2000.