LN2 wrote:Ok, so perhaps in your case your OS settings don't affect the game...fine..doesn;t matter. What's that got to do with changing the sensitivity in the game in MAME
I didn't mean to suggest that it did. I was responding to assertions that the OS settings
did affect the MAME control, and was in the hope that some different settings
in my OS might solve the problem of the shooter's poor speed potential.
LN2 wrote:but something is wrong if adjusting the in-game sensitivity does nothing for you.
I'm sorry, I didn't intend to imply that it did not. I tried everything from 0 to 255 and while there was a difference, it did not solve the basic problem.
LN2 wrote:We explained that. It means your in-game sensitivity is TOO HIGH! Lower it...geesh.
Geesh yourself...it only goes down to zero.
LN2 wrote:First, moving an object in a game in MAME isn't related to how fast you can move your cursor at all. It's not a valid comparison.
Unfortunately, it isn't related to how fast you could move the shooter on the arcade
machine either. If you have access to a real Centipede machine, try it. Take the
trackball in your fingertips, and without losing your finger-contact with it, move it
back and forth as fast as you possibly can. You will see that the shooter onscreen
moves back and forth
just as fast. Now admittedly getting all the way across
the screen was different because it took two or three full spins of the trackball to
get from one side of the screen to the other, and while there was no limit to the
shooter's speed on the screen, there
was a physical limit to how fast the
trackball could be free-spun.
LN2 wrote:I hope you get it this time.
I don't think my ability to comprehend is a problem here.
LN2 wrote:Well, given you still haven't tuned it correctly yet how can you make any conclusion?
I've tried everything I can think of on several PC's and nothing has had any effect
on the basic problem. As I suggested, if someone can demonstrate that they
can
move the shooter back and forth as fast as in the arcade game, I will admit that
my assumption was incorrect and devote more time to trying to set mine to do the same.
Until then, I can't think of anything else to do, and still believe that it is a "MAME thing",
as you put it.
LN2 wrote:What exactly is the blob method?
(Deep breath..)
At higher levels of play, maybe 90% of an expert Centipede player's energy is
spent keeping the bottom of the field clear of mushrooms. This is in order to prevent
the centipede segments from reaching the bottom of the screen and triggering the
side-feed, which in its latter stages is impossible to survive. The field is cleared by
killing the falling fleas which leave a trail of mushrooms or, failing that, destroying the
mushrooms after the flea has left them. The fleas fall on any wave when the centipede
does not come out "whole" unless there is a minimum number of mushrooms
in the bottom portion of the screen. Once the fleas have corrupted the players portion
of the screen badly enough, they stop falling. Some creative players (Eric Ginner may
have been the first) came up with the idea of
deliberately keeping a formation
(blob) of mushrooms in the bottom portion of the screen to prevent the fleas from
ever falling. This allowed them to clear the
upper portion of the screen
of mushrooms, thus making it take much longer for the centipede to go back and
forth across the screen on its way down. The players would kill the centipede
in this fashion, kill any spiders which might threaten to "eat" too many
of the mushrooms, and keep the pace of the game much slower. At one time this was
how the highest scores on the game were achieved. The centipede-trap method
was discovered later, and eventually some players may have gotten good enough
to play the game forever in the traditional fashion, I'm not sure. The highest I ever
witnessed was over 800k, I never broke 700k myself, except using the trap.
The "blob method" never particularly appealed to me.
I appreciate your time LN2. I know what I am talking about with respect to the
real Centipede machine, and so far, similar control response in MAME does not
appear possible. I hope someone can show that I am wrong, but I am not going to
hold my breath.
John