Hi Chaps,

Just got around to installing the v4 ROMs, really impressed!

It has left me with 4 sets of blank ROMs I could program up for someone, if there is anyone in the UK that doesn't have the ability to program their own just let me know and we can sort something out. Postage will be cheap and the chips were one a couple of quid each on eBay. I assume I'm not breaking any forum rules if there is no charge?

Also, installed the Metal sound track onto the Pinsound board this week. I have to say, what an upgrade that is! Totally different dimension to the game! Of all the tinkering and upgrades I've done on this machine over the past 10 years, this wins hands down! It has inspired me to have a go making my own sound tracks too. Anyone else tried that?

Cheers

Cris

Trust me, this video does not do this justice! I have upgraded speakers on mine, the sound quality is outstanding! You can still have the exact same Legacy sound, you can simply swap using the volume pot in the coin door. I love the sound on TFTC, one of the main reasons it's my favourite game, but this upgrade does add a whole new dimension. You can easily add your own custom tracks, I'm going to have a play with that next week.

The only trouble is the Legacy voice work is very poor in comparison. I did contact John Kassir's agent to get a ball park figure to get it re-recorded and lets just say it's way beyond the scope of possibility. If it had been reasonable I would have started a kickstarter or something to get it funded, but with the ball parks quoted there is little point I don't think!

Cheers

Cris

If you ever want to part with that let me know. My machine certainly does need it, and I've not had any luck finding an NOS one.

Cheers

Cris

Yes, I have one in my machine, along with a speaker upgrade.

It sounds amazing, but the original samples used for the voice really let it down. I did approach the agent of John Kassir to see if it would be possible to get the crypt keeper voice reworked, it would have been possible but it would have cost $10k plus commission and recording fees. So I didn't take the idea further.

I really like the heavy rock feel but it's a shame it's not instrumental. I did track down the album it was all taken from but couldn't find instrumental versions and didn't get as far as experimenting with my own choices. But it looks pretty easy to do.

Cheers

Cris

Anyone know if there is still stock of the full set of plastics for TFTC anywhere? I almost bought a set from Marco's the other week but got distracted by another project. Now they are out of stock.

I'm doing a playfield swap on mine, and thought I may as well swap out all the plastics while I'm at it...

Cheers

Cris

If you end up needing to replace the sound board I can highly recommend a PinSound, I have one in my TFTC and it's one of my favourite mods.

For a long time there was some kind of bug with the first version of the PinSound board that prevented it working very well on Data East machines. But this has been fully resolved on the latest versions.

Cheers

Cris

I've replaced mine with one from PinSound (you'd also need the pinsound board itself as well).

Not really impressed with it to be honest, spend quite a lot of time finding the right balance but never really got there. Either wayyyyy too much shake or not enough, as it's triggered by sound events and you can't build a sequence of events any other way I actually found it quite limiting and preferred the factory shake.

Cheers

Cris