The color DMD animations look great on this game!

Color dmd is needed on every single game its available for end of disussion.

You got it! Finally learned my lesson and started pulling them back out if I ever sell a game (except on Tron). Much easier to sell without trying to recoup that cost, and you know you’re going to want to put it in the next game that will take it anyway!

Also when it comes to must-have mods, I know it’s expensive, but the temple upgrades that back alley creations made look fantastic in Ripleys.

I just swapped my super-bands to silicone bands and it is somewhat better from airborne point of view. The two criminals to the darn airballs are as said, the two posts guarding the scoop. They are 3/8"'s according to the manual but will still want to deflect the ball through the glass and to outer space if hit spot on... Never going back to super-bands again btw. Much better controll and feeling with silicone bands.

//Matt

Has anyone lit up the green plastic where the idol is to the right ? Being dark it looks out of place to the rest of the G.I which is evenly spread.

// Matt

Lit. mine with green lights to make it look like a jungle .

DSCF0339 (resized).JPG

I personally agree. I like silicone too. I get the Titan flipper rubber. I have trouble getting the super-bands on sometimes too. Too tight.

Every game I get recieves a full set of Titans. Ripleys was the first machine I ever put them on, and I was hooked.

Very nice.. I checked for space and there isn't hardly any under there as the ball kicks around under that plastic. What did you use, lightstrip or lampsocket to a post or something ?

Thanks
Matt

Between the two plastics I used a mini -Wedge base w/rear mounting bracket ( Pinball life 077-5026-01 ) . With a green flexible 90 wedge tied into the GI . If I had it to do again I would go with a light strip .

Does anyone have a long term hack for the shooter lane switch in this game. Every few months I end up having to spend a ridiculous amount of time to tweak the shooter lane switch to fix the "hyperactive switch" issue and all the problems that go along with that.

I love this game to death, but this issue just makes me want to throw this game out the window (after bringing over a few friends to get it out of the basement first)....

I've had Ripley's for seven years and have never experienced a shooter lane "hyperactive switch" issue

Maybe I'm not understanding the exact issue, but generally if a switch repeatedly acts flaky, I just replace it.

I’ve had that error before. I adjusted the shooter lane switch and all was fine. I did get a new switch to have on hand, but never had the error again after the switch adjustment.

I've also had my Ripleys for about 3 years and I'm unfamiliar with the issue. Do tell, what's the problem/symptoms?

This has been a constant on off issue since I had the game. I originally replaced the switch when I first had the issue and that had no effect, so it is a newish switch. The biggest rage inducing problem I have with this is there is nothing objectively wrong with the game; in the switch test the shooter lane switch is working perfectly as well as the trough optos. The only time this has an effect is during multi ball when a new ball is added to the shooter lane and the game just sits there for 6-8 seconds before it decides to launch the ball; during the ball saver if another ball is drained during that time a second ball will be put into the shooter lane. Also if at any time a ball falls back into the shooter lane it will never be kicked back out.

I have adjusted the switch to both maximize and minimize the possible contact time with the switch as well as in-between, but I have never found anything to work long term. It just decides to to start working sometimes and I have not found any pattern to what works or not. I am surprised that a few of you have never had this problem because I figured that this was just one of the many bugs in this game and were hoping someone found a work around.

Well, I do know the optics from around this era are sometimes buggy. I had to replace both of my trough optics. As cheap as they are, it might be worth a shot. They can test good, but malfunction during play

I just hooked up my oscilloscope to the trough opto receiver board and when blocked it is outputting a nice drive pulse, so that is working as it should. While I have never replaced them I am fairly certain that they have been replaced in the past because they do not look like originals.

Messed with the switch adjustment some more but I cant seem to get the thing to behave. This is just so incredibly frustrating because everything I can think of to test for this is working fine. I just wish that I could plug into the main board like a PLC and see what the software is truly looking for and what is causing it to hang up.

Just picked a nice ripleys, great game. Had a question about the lights though. The 2 spotlights in the back by the head don’t work along with a few g.i. In the back left. Swapped out bulbs, nothing. Fuses look ok for the light sections. Checked the wiring, looks ok. Any suggestions or anyone else that has had any light problems on this game? Thank you!

I have some n o s Ripleys parts that I no longer need. I’ve got a complete plastics kit, a complete decal kit, and both red plastic ramps with flaps. All new and unused. $300 for all, shipping included. Located in Maryland. Thanks!

PM sent

Before I go tearing into it, has anyone replaced the super jackpot optics? I've replaced the shrunken head optics easy enough, but the SJ optics look much more involved. Any tips or pointers?
Update: got them swapped out. It wasn't too bad. It looked way worse than it was. No more phantom hits!! Although it was nice to collect a free super jackpot every now and then....LOL

Just as an update, a day or two after writing this the hyperactive switch issue just disappeared; didn't do anything, it just started working never could find anything wrong with it.

Now the Idol opto is going crazy and registering phantom hits constantly. The optos are brand new, the opto board is brand new, the wiring is fine and for shits and giggles I replaced the resistors and transistor for that section of the switch matrix. Not surprisingly everything works perfectly fine is test mode.

This game is buggy as fu*k and I am about ready to call it quits and put it up for sale.

Try cleaning the pf area above the idol magnet. It might be dirty affecting the opto beam.

That was probably the first thing I did, cleaned both the top and the underside of the play field right there.

At this point I am looking into what components I need to swap out on the board to reduce the sensitivity, or how powerful of a led I can stick on a transmitter board without cooking any of the wiring.

Honestly it sounds like a wiring issue if it's happening in several places on the game. I would re-pin the connectors, and re-flow the solder joints at all the connectors.

Shooter Lane Switch #16
and Idol Opto Switch #24
Are on the same row, next to each other. So your issues are likely related, a grounding issue or diode, or something.
I can't remember what the symptom differences are between rows and column issues, so maybe some expert can chime in here.

LED or LCD for Rbion? I'm joining the club with a project game and ordering parts. Which do people prefer? I usually got with LCDs, but some games LEDs look better on.

LCD all the way!

Lcd. Welcome to the journey trying to get to Frog Frenzy.

Just wanted to point everyone to this thread, which links to an additional thread that tackles a specific issue that tends to pop up when you put the head down while moving the game. If you guys are having opto and magnet issues, make sure you check here. Easy fix.

https://pinside.com/pinball/forum/topic/ripleys-help-needed

How do you reach frog frenzy?

Get all Super Jackpots then 1 more

For those that have this game and DI. Do they shoot similar ?

Not at all no.

I used to own both at the same time.

I always thought the two games were very similar rules-wise, disasters vs continents, collecting sim cards vs Ripley's letters. They both have lackluster callouts.

I didn't feel they shot the same though. I eventually found DI to be less fun after the thrill of experiencing the new technology wore off.

I like Ripley's better.

I have both and I agree they don't shoot the same. I think DI is a little more flowy, but both are good games in their own right IMHO.

Yeah right orbit & shrunken heads are dead ends on RBION but not on DI.
For me getting those Dialed In letters seems a lot harder. Seems like a big ask getting all of them.

I’ve owned both games twice, and I did (and do) see similarities between the two. DI has better flow, and is more refined. But they do feature some similar shots and gimmicks (upper right flipper, magnet up the middle) and the rules are sorta similar (start modes on both, spell RIPLEYS vs spell DIALED IN). Lots of differences, to be sure, and I still own both. They are more different than alike. But they are at least 2nd cousins!

Thanks for the reply's. Phew that's good as I have a DI incoming but don't want to get rid of Ripley's and can't really have too many similar shooting games as space is at a premium. When this arrives I will be one over so my collection will need to be tweaked a bit..

Its a pretty standard PL layout.

Still having issues with this game, I originally posted this in a different thread a week ago and never got any responses so I thought I would try here.

Having walked away from this game for about a month I started looking at it again the problem is as follows.

-Ball 1 and 2 Idol will be lit at the beginning of play, it will not trigger until opto is broken and will score 1 idol hit as it should.
-Ball 3 idol will light for less than a second after ball served into shooter lane you will hear the idol audio and the opto will turn off, this is not counted as an idol hit.
-During the entire game a shot into the lower bumpers or the scoop will only light the idol for 1-2 seconds before you hear the Idol audio and the opto truns off, this also will not score an idol hit.
-During muliball the idol will be on an score hits correctly.
-The only time when I am getting extra idol hits scored is during the bonus countdown; it will add a idol hit and then score one more than the number of hits. (ie. upon draining you have 5 idol hits, when the bonus countdown starts it will always add one extra and you will hear the idol noise, the display will then tell you that you had 7 idol hits even though it only added one, beginning of the next ball it will display that you have had 6 idol hits.)

This is 100% repeatable, I have never seen the game award a extra idol hit when the transmit opto is on and waiting for a ball to break the beam (ie. beginning of ball 1 and 2, as well as during muliball). The only time I get random "hits" is when the transmit opto is off and should not even be expecting hits.

Hopefully someone maybe has some insights, because at this point I am thoroughly confused especially the bizarre behaviour during the bonus countdown.

This probably isn’t your problem, but my idol was acting very strange and sometimes awarding phantom hits and other times not registering at all. I decided to unscrew the optos and thoroughly clean them both, and then I cleaned the clear insert the beam shoots through from under the playfield. After that, it worked 100% correctly. But yours sounds so specific and repeatable, it makes me wonder about something with a rom or on the board? Someone smarter than I will know. Post the answer when you find out.

Yeah, everything is new and clean, for now I have just unplugged the receiver opto and the game plays normaly in the "opto not working" mode. I am really hoping that there is something wrong with the ROM because I have no clue what else it could be. The only time i get extra idol hits is when the transmit led is off and should not even be looking for them and during the bonus countdown.

I no longer have access to a ROM chip writer any more, so for now I am just going to play it the way it is.

Roms are cheap and easy to swap. Id just by a set and try it out

I figure next time I have to order something from Marco I'll order a chip to see if that fixes this. I have a hard time spending as much or more on shipping than what I am actually getting...

I was lucky enough to join the RBION club this past weekend, and I'm really enjoying it so far.
I love my Monopoly pin, so figured Ripley's would be a safe bet. It has the same feel, but a very different layout, art style and sound package, so they compliment each other well in the collection.
I did have to tweak the lower outkick hole, as it was sending a lot of balls sdtm. But with some minor tweaking it really seems to have mostly eliminated the sdtm shots, at least for now. The right outlane can be rough at times, but overall the game feels tough but fair. I'm starting to dial in my shots, and look foward to working my way to seeing Atlantis.

Good luck on Atlantis, I've still never made it!! One thing to check on the scoop, is the weld that holds the scoop hood to the body below the playfield. It breaks sometimes due to the high impact hits the scoop takes. That can cause all sorts of bad eject issues. Congratulations on the purchase, it's a great pin. Underrated in my opinion.

Yeah, you defenetely should check the welds on the scoop seems to be a very common issue. Another thing to check is with the scoop is see if it is centered in the hole. On mine they mounted the scoop assembly so far to the left that sometimes the ejected ball would hit the left side of the hole an then get deflected sdtm. I had to elongate the holes in the scoop assembly to shift it over to the right to center it, I have never had a sdtm from the scoop since.