Ghosts ‘N Goblins

[TPR]

1 hour ago, Tekman said:

Concluding it must be the end user’s hardware doesn’t hold water in my testing 

Maybe not your testing, but it most certainly does when Toby tested a cart to be working and then sends it to someone else and it doesn't work. That is what I was referring to. 

[Pixelboy]

Just to quickly chime in, the ADAM went through multiple board revisions during its short life cycle. Some of these boards may show unforseen problems with homebrew hardware. This is not the first time such issues have been reported in the ColecoVision homebrew community.

 

[Tekman]

2 minutes ago, TPR said:

Maybe not your testing, but it most certainly does when Toby tested a cart to be working and then sends it to someone else and it doesn't work. That is what I was referring to. 

That's the whole point we've been discussing all this time. It works on some and not others. Same with it working on your two vanilla ADAM console and not my four consoles. Toby testing on the same CV console that it has always worked on doesn't conclude the issue being discussed here.

[Tekman]

8 minutes ago, Pixelboy said:

Just to quickly chime in, the ADAM went through multiple board revisions during its short life cycle. Some of these boards may show unforseen problems with homebrew hardware. This is not the first time such issues have been reported in the ColecoVision homebrew community.

 

True, but I wonder why the dump always works on the ATARIMAX when the physical cart doesn't? What could the ATARIMAX be doing to make it work? Timing of some kind?

[TPR]

This reminds me of my days of doing PC Compatibility testing at Activision where no matter how many different configurations you tested on, there was just always going to be someone that had a machine it didn't work on.  And you had to decide if it was worth spending the money to have the developer create a patch to fix the issue if it was widespread enough, or if you just offered a refund if it was a small isolated incident.  

[timdu]

Just wanted to chime in and I joined the Collectorvision club for 2023. I am experiencing no issues at all playing G 'N G on my "daily driver" Colecovision console, the CV NUC+.

 

 

 

It has the Super Game Module built in. I really like this console and if you are not familiar with it, more information about the console is available at:

 

https://ataribits.weebly.com/cv-nuc.html

 

I purchased mine through Marlin at the Brewing Academy online store:

 

https://thebrewingacademy.com/collections/colecovision-coleco-adam-hardware-consoles/products/the-cv-nuc-a-colecovision-clone-that-fits-in-the-palm-of-your-hand

 

 

-Tim

 

[Crapahute]

This probably has nothing to do with it, but I've had similar problems in the past. I thought it was the cartridge that wasn't working. I tested it on two different consoles BUT with the same PSU. I discovered later it was the PSU that was causing the problem.

[NIAD]

On 1/14/2024 at 8:49 AM, TPR said:

Maybe not your testing, but it most certainly does when Toby tested a cart to be working and then sends it to someone else and it doesn't work. That is what I was referring to. 

With all do respect to the Homebrew programmers and publishers because everyone understands how much time, money and passion they invest into each and every release, but…

 

What is being overlooked is the simple fact that about 145 legacy games were made and they all play perfectly on ALL the ColecoVision PCB revisions and regions. The only two issues are the Coleco release of Victory (which was a corruption of the game code in production) and Sector Alpha (an error in the cartridge PCB design).

 

Also being overlooked are the hundreds of Homebrew releases, both commercially sold or custom made, using numerous Homebrew cartridge PCBs (32K, MegaCart, Activision PCB, SGC #1, SGC #2, etc) that work properly across all the numerous CV PCB revisions and regions with a couple exceptions. Suite Macabre and GnG will not work for some while others experience intermittent issues, some have to remove the SGM and for the majority they play perfectly. The other example is Opcode’s SGC PCB #1 used for Penguin Adventure and Gradius in 2015… Gradius played fine for me but PA would constantly reset and the issue was discovered to be caused by a grounding error and Opcode’s answer was a new SGC PCB to avert this issue.

 

So for some, the only remedy is to dump the game and play using the rom image on the AtariMax Ultimate SD Multi-Cart. GnG plays perfectly using this method, so what is the AtariMax doing to make GnG playable via rom image versus not with the actual cart… timing issue, clearing RAM, etc.?

 

The likelihood of the issue being diagnosed is not very good as far as past issues like this have played out and some suggesting the issue could be do to a system modification or malfunction doesn’t hold water considering the long time and very knowledge people who are experiencing issues playing GnG on strictly a ColecoVision system.

 

Easiest remedy is providing the rom image especially in the case of san-d-2000 as it cost him extra money to send the cart back as well as pay import fees and it cost Toby time and money to test a new cart and send it across the pond. Others have the ability to dump the game to a rom image and saved themselves both time and money as well as Toby.

Edited January 15 by NIAD

[omf]

do we know what type of PCB this game runs from? from peering into the cartridge edge connector label facing up you can make out the words cv halfmega, i cant say i have ever seen or heard of a half mega cart.  perhaps it uses a modified mega cartridge PCB that is somewhat problematic?  maybe if the ROM from it was transplanted over to a standard megacart it would function (especially the version that does not use the gal chip.)   in my opinion although probably fine adds an extra area to cause breakage with a programming hiccup, also gal chips seem to be fairly expensive also

Edited January 15 by omf

[omf]

2 hours ago, Crapahute said:

This probably has nothing to do with it, but I've had similar problems in the past. I thought it was the cartridge that wasn't working. I tested it on two different consoles BUT with the same PSU. I discovered later it was the PSU that was causing the problem.

this maybe a possibility for some, i wouldn't have though it would be a problem for everyone else though especially if every other game they own works.

 

is there an issue with the shielding ground pin like there was for the risky rick game where it was pulled high and used for manual a bankswitch to get to the demo version as a kind of modded console punishment if you didn't have the shielding screwed in.  i wouldn't have thought so though as i grounded that pin after that issue was discovered and i still get the issue of a green screen

[+5-11under]

29 minutes ago, omf said:

do we know what type of PCB this game runs from? from peering into the cartridge edge connector label facing up you can make out the words cv halfmega, i cant say i have ever seen or heard of a half mega cart.  perhaps it uses a modified mega cartridge PCB that is somewhat problematic?  maybe if the ROM from it was transplanted over to a standard megacart it would function (especially the version that does not use the gal chip.)   in my opinion although probably fine adds an extra area to cause breakage with a programming hiccup, also gal chips seem to be fairly expensive also

It's my board inside. The latest versions have been in use since at least 2020. These use logic chips such as latch and inverters and diode AND gates to handle the bank switching and enable logic. Sometime before that, a GAL chip and AND chip did were used for the same functions. All SMT, except the GAL chip. A long time ago before that, all chips were through-hole.

 

I haven't been able to narrow down this problem yet. There's a game dependency, and there might be a game size dependency. It's also "on the edge", where it works on some ColecoVisions and not others, with potentially different results with other consoles or other configurations. I thought I had it solved through a timing change, but that didn't seem to fix all issues. I need to revisit that, and at the same time look at voltage effects. The board also uses some diode logic. It "should" work fine because only one stage of diodes in a row is ever used, but who knows? I'm hoping to be able to spend some time this weekend to see if I can properly replicate the issue, and then also see if I can properly fix the issue - I do have a few scrap boards that exhibit this problem on my ColecoVision (anything I sent out worked well on my ColecoVision).

 

[+5-11under]

2 hours ago, NIAD said:

With all do respect to the Homebrew programmers and publishers because everyone understands how much time, money and passion they invest into each and every release, but…

 

What is being overlooked is the simple fact that about 145 legacy games were made and they all play perfectly on ALL the ColecoVision PCB revisions and regions. The only two issues are the Coleco release of Victory (which was a corruption of the game code in production) and Sector Alpha (an error in the cartridge PCB design).

 

Also being overlooked are the hundreds of Homebrew releases, both commercially sold or custom made, using numerous Homebrew cartridge PCBs (32K, MegaCart, Activision PCB, SGC #1, SGC #2, etc) that work properly across all the numerous CV PCB revisions and regions with a couple exceptions. Suite Macabre and GnG will not work for some while others experience intermittent issues, some have to remove the SGM and for the majority they play perfectly. The other example is Opcode’s SGC PCB #1 used for Penguin Adventure and Gradius in 2015… Gradius played fine for me but PA would constantly reset and the issue was discovered to be caused by a grounding error and Opcode’s answer was a new SGC PCB to avert this issue.

Sorry, I'm not sure exactly what the point is (maybe I'm misunderstanding the "with all do respect" followed by the "but" conjunction). I'm reading the legacy games were about 98.6% working, and with modern releases we're getting potentially less success, but with added complexities such as old VRAM, old power supplies, dirty power switches, SGM, games > 32KB, games with EEPROM, Phoenix, F18A, DIY consoles, and more.

[NIAD]

14 minutes ago, 5-11under said:

Sorry, I'm not sure exactly what the point is (maybe I'm misunderstanding the "with all do respect" followed by the "but" conjunction). I'm reading the legacy games were about 98.6% working, and with modern releases we're getting potentially less success, but with added complexities such as old VRAM, old power supplies, dirty power switches, SGM, games > 32KB, games with EEPROM, Phoenix, F18A, DIY consoles, and more.

Showing my appreciation for everything you guys do and the BUT is a long and winding road to the finale that someone like san-d-2000 should be supplied with the rom image so that he can finally play the game. He has been involved in this community for a long time and went thru the expense of sending the GnG cart back as well as the expense of joining the club.

[san-d-2000]

A small update on my side i managed to get my cart dumped and the rom plays flawless on my Atarimax cartridge, so i can finally play the game i paid for.

 

Providing the rom image would indeed have saved everyone time and money, instead i got the feedback below:

 

Quote

No need to complain about not getting the rom file, beside, very few (if at all) will do this.

 

Quote

Toby did tested the cartridge (for about 2 hours) before sending it back to you
Something is telling me the problem is on your side, maybe you could check with another console/different power supply?

 

 

 

 

Edited January 16 by san-d-2000

[youki]

Could it be a problem like the PCB is consuming more power than other one?  And so old PSU could have difficulty to provide the needs?

 

My cartridge works well , but i tested it on a modern hardware.

[san-d-2000]

19 minutes ago, youki said:

Could it be a problem like the PCB is consuming more power than other one?  And so old PSU could have difficulty to provide the needs?

 

My cartridge works well , but i tested it on a modern hardware.

I tried 3 different PSU's all with the same result, i also brought my PSU to my friends house and the Game runs fine on his Colecovision using my PSU.

However the fact that people have to unplug the SGM indicates it might have to do with power consuming.

 

[omf]

29 minutes ago, youki said:

Could it be a problem like the PCB is consuming more power than other one?  And so old PSU could have difficulty to provide the needs?

 

My cartridge works well , but i tested it on a modern hardware.

i doubt this is the problem, it may not be the case here but i have seen in the past people ignore the full stop on the power supplies power output data on the power supply and say it outputs x amps when in fact it really outputs x milliamps.

of course if the power supply is bad it could be an issue

[omf]

tonight ill hook it up to a bench power supply and see how much power it pulls, my colecovision is using 5v ram and a f18a so is a 5v only machine, the bench power supply gives out upto 5 amp, if it takes that much i think there would be a short or something is very wrong.  the internal psu i have i believe is a 1 amp cheap crappy one i got on ebay, but appears to be fine.

[nick3092]

Flash carts in general tend to use a lot of power compared to a static cart. I would be surprised if GnG is using more power than an Atarimax flash cart. If anything, I would expect more power issues with the Atarimax. Worst case, they use about the same. Plus san-d-2000's test seems to have ruled out a power issue. 

[youki]

i think Atari Max somewhat cleans the memory before starting a game.  May be game expect a clean to have a clean memory before starting , and no code cleaning that memory being present in the game itself.  It would mean than as the memory could be in a random state when you start the machine it could cause problem.   But honestly i would be very surprised if there is no code in the game itself to clean thing at start. Mystery Man knows what he does.

[NIAD]

6 hours ago, san-d-2000 said:

A small update on my side i managed to get my cart dumped and the rom plays flawless on my Atarimax cartridge, so i can finally play the game i paid for.

 

Glad to hear.

 

However, I hope I don’t see a message from you stating that after playing GnG… it’s really not the type of game that you like so you are looking to sell or trade it!!!!! 🫣

[omf]

ok, so as promised i hooked up the colecovision to the bench power supply and verified it works by running the test game i had to hand (risky rick)

 

the game was swapped to ghosts n goblins and the green screen presented itself, the power supply was set to 5.1 volts, and the current draw by the entire system was 690 - 700 ma, well below my crappy power supply i have installed internally.  this value of power consumption was the same when running risky rick in a functioning state also.  as a comparison, with the atarimax ultimate sd plugged in, the current draw is 830~ ma

 

[+GoldLeader]

FWIW, I tried out my copy.  My original '82 ColecoVision is acting flaky again,  but I presume (if my Coleco were repaired) it would probably play fine.  I haven't hooked up my Adam in a very long time,  but last night I did.  It got hung up on the orange screen (Capcom logo which should be black I think)...

 

I'll try it on the Phoenix when I get time;  I have a feeling it will play just fine there.

[nick3092]

My cart was tested on an Adam (not mine, I don't own one) and it also exhibits the orange screen that I only get sometimes if the SGM is attached to my Coleco (recapped, power switch cleaned, TMSRGB, ColUSB PSU). 

[san-d-2000]

On 1/16/2024 at 1:29 AM, 5-11under said:

I'm hoping to be able to spend some time this weekend to see if I can properly replicate the issue, and then also see if I can properly fix the issue - I do have a few scrap boards that exhibit this problem on my ColecoVision (anything I sent out worked well on my ColecoVision).

 

Any updates on this, also would be nice to know if this board is being used for any of this year Club games before ordering