Home Page Forums MAME MAME TMS-09xx/1xxx thread (was New Dumps)

Apologies - I haven't had time to read through all of this thread, but I may have some useful stuff. Haze pointed me in this direction via his blog. I have almost all of the round corner Tiger LCD games (over 100 unique games). I would be happy for you guys to try to preserve them in MESS. Is this possible?

TSP50c1x MB games test modes found so far (All games programmed by Michael Gray, I believe; I need to verify what games he programmed at some point, he has an account on BoardGameGeek):
The test modes are all accesed by holding down a key and pressing the 'on' button:

Electronic Talking Battleship(1989):
Key Test:
Hold the Player 1 A1 key (or Player 2 J10 key which maps to same matrix position), then press the green 'On' button to enter key test mode.
When in key test mode, you are expected to press player 1 keys A1, B2, C3, D4, E5, F6, G7, H8, I9, J10 in that order, the system will beep after each key is pressed. Then press Player 1 Fire, the system will say 'two'. Now press Player 2 A1, B2, C3, D4, E5, F6, G7, H8, I9, J10 in that order, the system will beep after each key is tested. Finally, press Player 2 Fire, the game will say 'Battleship' and play the explosion sound while flashing the ship explosion LED, then turn off.

Sound Test:
Hold the Player 1 B2 key (or Player 2 I9 key which maps to same matrix position), then press the green 'On' button to enter sound test mode.
The game will play the beep, all of the speech samples, the firing arc and music jingles in order, followed by the explosion sound and the flashing ship explosion LED, and then turn off.


Omega Virus(1992):
Key test:
Hold the '0' key, then press the 'On' button to enter key test mode.
The game will say 'zero', 'one', 'two' when pressing the 3 number keys, and will say <monotone>'we are running out of time' when pressing the 'Repeat' key, and then turn off.

Sound test:
Hold the '1' key, the press the 'On' button to enter sound test mode.
The game will play the explosion sound followed by all of the speech sounds and sound effects, followed by the glitch samples, and then turn off.


I am assuming the international (german, spanish, italian, french, etc) versions of these games have the same test modes. (I also assume the test modes are the same on the 1998 ?re-release? of electronic talking battleship. It is quite unclear what changed between the 1989 and 1998 releases, but they use different mask tsp50cxx chips, so there must be some changes. Would be worth checking if the C3 key plus 'On' activates some new test mode that didn't exist in the older MCU)


Given the way these test modes work, I suspect dream phone and other games of this era probably have a similar set of tests if you hold the '0' or '1' keys on the phone or other entry pads while turning on the game.


Also note Omega Virus has a hidden game mode: After you press 'On', and the game asks you to enter skill, press 'repeat' 3 times and the virus will laugh once then taunt the players. This enables an extra difficult mode where the virus will start to move between rooms once any player gathers all 3 of the items needed to kill it! This makes the endgame MUCH harder!


P.S. If anyone has one of the international versions of these games, please open them up and send a picture or text of what is written on the tsp50cxx 16-pin mcu! The CSMxxxxx number will be different from the english ones. I'm curious if there is a British/UK voice version of some of these games as well.

LN

I don't think it is likely that the ROMs can be dumped non-destructively, but I could be wrong. These games generally have the chip bonded directly to the PCB and then globbed with epoxy. I've only looked at some RZone games and a few Konami games, so I'm not sure what chip the Tiger games use. Could you list a few titles? I can do some research.

LN- OK, I'll bite- how did you figure out the test sequences? I'll try a few things on Dream Phone and see what happens, and I'll try your Battleship sequence on mine.

Sean: Random button mashing!
Actually I figured it out by accident, since I read that Michael Gray had a secret mode in omega virus (which I later read the exact sequence to activate elsewhere) I wondered if there was some sort of hidden secret game in battleship if you held down a pair of buttons; so I held down both a1 and b2 when powering on the game, and it activated the key test mode (which is very weird behavior compared to the way the game normally starts). Immediately I tried holding just b2, and got the sound test, then just a1 and got the key test again (so the game must read the keys starting from a1 toward j10 in sequence; this turns out to be true for omega virus as well).

Omega Virus arrived yesterday and I wondered if it had similar tests, and sure enough first try holding 0 down did the key test, and second try holding 1 down did the sound test.

LN

I think Dream Phone really likes me:

push On+1
"ring"
push 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 * 0 #
"You're right; I really like you."

On+2
<guy's voice>
Hello.
Hello.
Hello.
Hell-o.
I just told you.
One more time.
You again!
What... weren't you listening?
I know where he hangs out.
He likes most sports.
He'll eat almost anything.
He looks cool in whatever he wears.
I know who it is, but I'm not telling. HA HA
Sorry, wrong number. Dial again.
Nice try, but it's not me.
You're right; I really like you.
<girl's voice>
Hi! I just heard
it's not
George
Tyler
Gary
Steve
Tony
Bob
<back to guy's voice>
Hello.
He's not
I'm not
except
He's not wearing
the mall
the snack shop
the movies
the park
the beach
the gym
baseball
volleyball
basketball
tennis
surfing
skateboarding
pizza
ice cream
popcorn
hot dogs
candy
cookies
bluejeans
a jacket
glasses
a tie
a hat
anything yellow

I also verified that the DTMF is accurate- I held Dream Phone up to my landline and dialed the local time and temperature number, and it went through. The "Design Manual" has sample DTMF code.

And my Battleship seems to act the same as yours. Same results for On+A1, and On+B2 says:
Prepare for battle!
Select Game.
Select Skill.
Select Players.
1
2
3
4
task force
enter
patrol boat
destroyer
submarine
battleship
carrier
letter
number
direction
fire
armed
Man your battlestations!
hit
sunk
<anchors away>
<whoop>
<whistle>
<explosion/LED flash>
<taps>

I actually had 4 Tiger LCD games here that were part of a bulk buy: X-Men Project X, Space Jam, Sonic and Batman the Animated Series. They are all very similar inside. The globs have 50-60 traces coming from them, depending on the game. I'll try to de-glob one and see what it is. It's likely that different games have different chips.

Found another chip (or two) that I'm not sure has been mentioned.

These are in Kingsford's Match Me game
http://www.handheldmuseum.com/Misc/KingsfordMatchMe.htm

Sort of like Simon with twice the buttons.
It has a General Instruments chip, labeled 8018 (with a 123 above it). There's a Mini Match-Me, and it has a GI 8002 (also with the 123). I can get some pics up later, just curious if these chips were familiar or not...

Since those could be date codes, maybe they are PICs with ROM ID 123? Kevin has dumped 1650s and 1655s with IDs 036, 192 and 255. How many pins?