I would try cleaning the NZ opto(s) down in the trough. Could be that it isn't seeing the ball fall down there. Might as well clean them all while you are down there. The trough looks super intimidating to clean and work on, but it's really not bad at all to remove.

Trick question. The neutral zone doesn't have an opto!! What you describe is exactly what happens when the ball falls in the hole but does not hit the NZ standup target. Normal behavior. To minimize it make sure your NZ standup target is gapped correctly and triggering easily.

I get this too. I'm adjusted that switch super close, but still there are shots that hit that target and don't trigger it.

I mean the one down in the trough. There are lots of them down there that tell the game where the ball is. If there wasn't one for the NZ, then how would the game know the ball fell in the hole?

Also he mentioned that the sound effect was triggered as the ball fell in, which should indicate the switch was hit and registered.

Honestly I think that's just Star Trek. All the ones I've played do stuff like that.

There isn't one in the subway. The next one in the subway is for registering the hole to the right of the ramp (command decision hole?).

For the NZ to activate, I believe a hit on the tall center target, combined with the opto for the command decision hole right after activates that.

I went through this exact issue on mine, and thought the same thing - ah opto in the subway for the NZ, only to find there isn't one.

Sounds like normal behavior based on how mine plays - I always attributed it to the absence of a sensor (optic or rollover) below the switch.

It's been awhile since I've been in my trough so I'm sure you are right. At either rate, those optos are known trouble spots and it wouldn't hurt to make sure they are clean and working 100%. If the one that works in conjunction with the switch hit is flaky it could be that is the issue. The fact that he's getting the sound effect when the switch is hit makes me think it is not the switch but rather the opto that works with it. Of course it could be that one of the side switches is getting hit at the same time as the center one and that's causing the sound.

STTNG is a bitch! It's a wizard mode alone keeping it working correctly.

In the LX7 rom (should be the same as LA7 except for additional languages) the logic for detecting the NZ hole is like this:

Hitting any of the three NZ targets starts a 3.1 sec timer.

Triggering the Top Hole opto (behind the drop target), which is in the same path in the subway as the NZ/CD/AIR opto, starts a 4 sec timer.

To score the NZ hole the NZ opto much be triggered before the 3.1 sec timer runs out *and* the TH timer must not be running. This seems simple enough but what can happen is shooting a ball hard into the NZ or CD/AIR hole sometime causes the ball to travel backward up the subway triggering the TH opto and thus inhibiting the NZ detection, it can instead be detected as a TH hit depending on the Drop target state.

So both the NZ and TH optos are involved in detecting the NZ hole and must be working correctly.

i think you probably nailed it. the fact that the "shuttle flying away" animation plays proves that the opto by the command decision hole is working, and the phaser sound effect proves that the neutral zone switch is working. these two in conjunction SHOULD trigger the neutral zone mission. your explanation that the TH switch is being inadvertently triggered at the same time sounds like the most likely explanation for the neutral zone mission not starting.

Well...that certainly explains ALOT of weird things that STTNG does once in awhile! LOL! Great info...thanks.

on a related note, the game and its code are brilliantly designed. i'm continually amazed at how well it handles weird situations or breakdowns. i had one of the controller arms on a cannon snap, and the game was smart enough to realize this mid-game and only load balls into the other cannon, and adjust the objectives to only be targets hittable by the working canon. i've seen it lose a ball and continue the game pretending it had all 6 accounted for, too. it also cleanly deals with the top drop target not working properly - if it detects a problem, it will decide to leave it down and in order to light lock, make you hit it into the hole twice, instead of knocking down the target once and then hitting it into the hole once.

Yes absolutely, this is very thought out and complex firmware, and as you said keeping the game running even if the hardware broke down has most likely been a top priority, there's just so many different situations that can emerge and needs to be controlled.

There's i.e. several places where the FW keeps track of which switches the ball *will* trigger when it is on a certain path, and those switches are then monitored if they actually also are triggered, if not the FW will trigger them by command instead. So i.e. if any of the inlane (eddy sensors) fail and the ball is detected making either the Alpha ramp or Beta ramp going down the wireforms, you'd still light up Warp and get the Hurry up or Super spinner if they are lit.