tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

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DEL
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by DEL »

Bishamon wrote:
I remember playing Truxton at a local arcade when it was new. I loved that game! A friend and I used to play it co-op, and we fed a LOT of quarters in to that machine. :)

I finally picked up the Genesis version a few weeks ago; I had always assumed I would be disappointed that it wasn't as good as the arcade, but it is quite excellent.
Console-wise, the PC Engine port is excellent. The soundtrack on it is better than the arcade original as well.
As for the phone port, I'll probably leave it to The Old Mills to knock around. Seems like he's doing damage :wink:
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by MintyTheCat »

Bishamon wrote:I remember playing Truxton at a local arcade when it was new. I loved that game! A friend and I used to play it co-op, and we fed a LOT of quarters in to that machine. :)

I finally picked up the Genesis version a few weeks ago; I had always assumed I would be disappointed that it wasn't as good as the arcade, but it is quite excellent.
For an early MD Shmup it's pretty nicely done. I quite like the graphics in places but it's also a bit bare in other places. It's one of those Shmups that feels kind of claustrophobic in places too I found it to be.

tatsujin still has one of the best bombs of all time - that Skull is amazing.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by EmperorIng »

I'll eventually loop the Genesis port of Truxton (or should I switch it for Tatsujin instead??). I have made it to stage 1-4 where the difficulty really becomes an obstacle towards progress.

Is there a reason to use the Blue weapon in the game, or is it almost always outclassed by Red and Green?
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by mycophobia »

mid-to-max level blue is basically OP for the second half of the game. first half is mostly red with a little bit of green.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by davidwhangchoi »

mycophobia wrote:mid-to-max level blue is basically OP for the second half of the game. first half is mostly red with a little bit of green.
red plus auto fire op

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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by davidwhangchoi »

Finally starting to get to the stage two boss consistently. i've been consistently getting the stage one 1up with green.

little by little getting there :D
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by Mills »

Getting very close to 1cc no miss, no bomb with Max firepower. Just need to get consistency on the two Blue mid-bosses towards the final checkpoint of Stage5. Everything else I can clear without bombs consistently inc a little skill trick on the stage with the satellites.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by davidwhangchoi »

^nice!

i spent an hour and finally past stage one with no bombs. i died and practiced alot the 3 mini bosses with the twin lasers.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by MJR »

Looks like I have to take my Tatsujin board for repairs :cry:

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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by 6t8k »

Mills wrote:Getting very close to 1cc no miss, no bomb with Max firepower [...]
That's sick man!

I'm not sure but at least I haven't seen a NMNB clear documented yet (I'd gladly stand corrected), I think this might be a first. Any chance you might record your run?


@MJR: I feel ya :(
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by Mills »

That's the plan of recording the entire run once I've mastered Stage5.

Wanna break my 21million record also but I'm trying to figure out how to maximize my score for each loop. At the mo I only get 1.5-1.6 million per loop.

Working on an idea of intentional suicide on specific checkpoints of each stage.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by davidwhangchoi »

Do you all max out the speed power ups. How much speed do you guys use?

i tried maxing out my speed but it's hard to control being too sensitive.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by Square_Air »

davidwhangchoi wrote:Do you all max out the speed power ups. How much speed do you guys use?

i tried maxing out my speed but it's hard to control being too sensitive.
You want to have max so you can get more points. Max also allows you to do some nice macro dodging. You could go a little below max if need be, but max isn't too bad to get used to.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by mycophobia »

the sooner you get used to max speed the better. max that shit out
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by 6t8k »

Yup, would also add that I find it much more fun to play that way, albeit that it'll be more difficult to control as long as you're not used to it yet.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by davidwhangchoi »

thanks everyone, i'll then try and get used to full speed and grab the points.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by MintyTheCat »

MJR wrote:Looks like I have to take my Tatsujin board for repairs :cry:

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I have a problem with my tatsujin ou PCB but unlike you I have only a white screen and no text.
Do you know anywhere that I could take/send it to be fixed? It is one of my favourite Shmups and I wish to keep the PCB running for as long as possible.

Incidentally, has anyone else had this 'white screen' when you power-on the PCB? It worked fine, then I moved house, got it out of its box and it no longer worked correctly.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by MJR »

MintyTheCat wrote:
MJR wrote:Looks like I have to take my Tatsujin board for repairs :cry:

I have a problem with my tatsujin ou PCB but unlike you I have only a white screen and no text.
Do you know anywhere that I could take/send it to be fixed? It is one of my favourite Shmups and I wish to keep the PCB running for as long as possible.

Incidentally, has anyone else had this 'white screen' when you power-on the PCB? It worked fine, then I moved house, got it out of its box and it no longer worked correctly.
I am using services of Reprocade because it is here in my hometown, so I don't have to add expensive shipping costs :-)
There is also Arcadiabay in germany, if that's closer to you. Sounds like your board is dead, you should send it for examination to either of these companies. Arcadiabay is more expensive, but they are very thorough and they will clean your board also on top of fixing. Reprocade has very reasonable prices, but sometimes you have to wait longer because they don't always have access to all spare parts immediately (I had to wait two years(!) to get my Exerion board fixed but they did good job).
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by MintyTheCat »

MJR wrote:
MintyTheCat wrote:
MJR wrote:Looks like I have to take my Tatsujin board for repairs :cry:

I have a problem with my tatsujin ou PCB but unlike you I have only a white screen and no text.
Do you know anywhere that I could take/send it to be fixed? It is one of my favourite Shmups and I wish to keep the PCB running for as long as possible.

Incidentally, has anyone else had this 'white screen' when you power-on the PCB? It worked fine, then I moved house, got it out of its box and it no longer worked correctly.
I am using services of Reprocade because it is here in my hometown, so I don't have to add expensive shipping costs :-)
There is also Arcadiabay in germany, if that's closer to you. Sounds like your board is dead, you should send it for examination to either of these companies. Arcadiabay is more expensive, but they are very thorough and they will clean your board also on top of fixing. Reprocade has very reasonable prices, but sometimes you have to wait longer because they don't always have access to all spare parts immediately (I had to wait two years(!) to get my Exerion board fixed but they did good job).
Thank you for your suggestions, MJR.

As I recall there is only one custom IC on that PCB so hopefully unless that's fried then it should be possible to fix.
I do own Logic-Analysers and such so I could have a look at and see what works and what should work but gives odd results.

That's very handy that they are in your town too :D

I'll contact a couple of them and get some quotes and ideas. Really, I'd want to know if it can be fixed and saved. In any case I'll never scrap it - for all we know someone may well put together a project to replace the custom ICs for Toaplan's hardware. If it is the custom IC - and that being the only component that would be hard to replace - then it should be possible to replace the damaged IC with a working 'version' of it. We've done similar things with older Processors using FPGA and CPLD.

I kind of feel that if you are an owner of these older PCBs that you are kind of looking at looking after them so I'll try my best to get it back up and running ;)
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by Mills »

6t8k wrote:
Mills wrote:Getting very close to 1cc no miss, no bomb with Max firepower [...]
That's sick man!

I'm not sure but at least I haven't seen a NMNB clear documented yet (I'd gladly stand corrected), I think this might be a first. Any chance you might record your run?


@MJR: I feel ya :(
Obviously that would be plan depending on time and convenience and whether or not how best to record the run either myself with finger on phone or just a screenshot of the entire run.

High score wise, managed to get 1.7million 1st loop clear with two intentional suicide at the beginning of stage1, and use only 2 bombs use on Stage5. Not interested in using max firepower option at the start of game or buy additional bombs with coins.

Main challenge interest is no miss, no bomb clear but recent plays I keep messing up stage5
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by 6t8k »

^ Carpe diem! Maybe you can get ahold of a tripod? I think it'd definitely be worthwhile.
Mills wrote:buy additional bombs with coins
I'm... puzzled, how does that work? :o
MintyTheCat wrote:Do you know anywhere that I could take/send it to be fixed?
There's also wolfgangrobel.de (german text only), I also know there are some proficient PCB docs at forum.arcadeotaku.com, some of which post repair logs at jammarcade.net, I believe (there are three Tatsujin Oh entries currently :)).
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by MintyTheCat »

6t8k wrote:^ Carpe diem! Maybe you can get ahold of a tripod? I think it'd definitely be worthwhile.
Mills wrote:buy additional bombs with coins
I'm... puzzled, how does that work? :o
MintyTheCat wrote:Do you know anywhere that I could take/send it to be fixed?
There's also wolfgangrobel.de (german text only), I also know there are some proficient PCB docs at forum.arcadeotaku.com, some of which post repair logs at jammarcade.net, I believe (there are three Tatsujin Oh entries currently :)).
That's good: https://www.jammarcade.net/?s=truxton&searchsubmit=
I'll have a read. I haven't hooked up the PCB myself as yet and checked anything, but I kind of see the same issue: that white screen is what I get too.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by Mills »

Mills wrote:buy additional bombs with coins
I'm... puzzled, how does that work? :o

Every stage you clear, you get coins to buy power up or bombs.

If you can virtually use an infinite amount of bombs depending on coins stock.. ideal for lesser skilled gamers who just wanna get through the game.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by 6t8k »

Hah, only now I've realized you've actually been playing the phone version the whole time. :oops:
(somehow the impression snuck in that you just gave it a quick shot recently)

Would be a nice feat nonetheless.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by mikejmoffitt »

The white screen seems to be the powerup default for a lot of GP9001 based systems (like Truxton 2 / Tatsujin Oh). Check that the CPU is alive, and then that the 74LS138 address decoder is giving valid select signals for RAM and ROM (and GP9001!). Bad RAM should be reported on screen but if the CPU is taking a shit early on then it won't be able to tell you.

GP9001 chips do develop faults sometimes but usually it affects the DRAM addressing for the sprite framebuffers. Rarely do they just go belly-up, so I doubt that is the problem.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by MintyTheCat »

mikejmoffitt wrote:The white screen seems to be the powerup default for a lot of GP9001 based systems (like Truxton 2 / Tatsujin Oh). Check that the CPU is alive, and then that the 74LS138 address decoder is giving valid select signals for RAM and ROM (and GP9001!). Bad RAM should be reported on screen but if the CPU is taking a shit early on then it won't be able to tell you.

GP9001 chips do develop faults sometimes but usually it affects the DRAM addressing for the sprite framebuffers. Rarely do they just go belly-up, so I doubt that is the problem.
Good insights, Mike.

I can check the *AS and *DTACK, but nothing on the Address Bus would tell us more. First things first: does the 68K have a CLK then onto the next step. Just thought: what's handling the 68K's HALT and RST pins? I should check that it isn't messed up as that will upset the 68K in my experience. Handy if anyone has a Schematic of the PCB - anyone got one?

I can watch the 138 (3 to 8 Mux for the kids watching this at home) and see what gets selected and strobed. I'll check when the RAM and ROM ICs have their form of 'active' too. I'm goign to hope to God that if it is the RAM then it'll be easy to replace. I only see there being liek one custom IC that would be hard to replace. That ceramic shelled DIL 68K IC I dare say could be replaced so long as I know what it needs.

I'll have a proper look at the PCB when I get the chance - just in the process of moving/starting new job over here :)
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by Mills »

6t8k wrote:Hah, only now I've realized you've actually been playing the phone version the whole time. :oops:
(somehow the impression snuck in that you just gave it a quick shot recently)

Would be a nice feat nonetheless.
Just need to find out how I can record and post my run like this YouTube link.
https://youtu.be/g8vUpN12BEg

YouTuber used a Samsung phone to record and post this. I don't have any such features on my Moto4G phone to do this. Don't wanna record a run with my thumb over the phone screen, as that would look silly.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by 6t8k »

But you did try something like this?
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by Mills »

Didn't even know there was such an app with screen recording feature.

I'll give that a try.
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Re: tatsujin/truxton appreciation thread.

Post by Zombi 6 »

Good God.........i have had the pce version for around a year now,found the screen to "small" making the game rather hard. Just found out you can acces a menu and change the screen slim so its almost like an arcade version
Fucking bliss :D . I dont understand why this was not included as an already accessible feature I would never have gone back to the game as much not knowing this.
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