gauntlet: MAME ROM Information.
History:
Gauntlet (c) 1985 Atari Games.
Gauntlet is a maze-based shoot-em-up for up to four players. Heavily influenced by classic fantasy conventions, players take on the role of either Thor the Warrior, Thyra the Valkyrie, Merlin the Wizard, or Questor the Elf and must play cooperatively as they explore and fight their way through the enemy-packed mazes. Competitive play is encouraged as players must fight for the limited amount of food, treasure, magic potions and power-up items that litter the dungeons.
Each of Gauntlet's four characters have different strengths and weaknesses: Thyra has the strongest armour, Thor is best at hand-to-hand combat, Questor has the fastest speed and Merlin has the most powerful magic attacks. The object of the game is simply to survive as long as possible while exploring Gauntlet's mazes in search of treasure, food, magic potions and, ultimately, the exit that leads to the next dungeon.
The potions - shown as blue bottles - that litter the levels offer either improved character abilities (such as 'speed' or 'extra shot power') or can be used as a 'smart bomb', destroying some or all of the on-screen monsters. Potions are also the only way to kill the game's 'Death' character that appears in many of the stages. Magic potions can be kept and used at the player's discretion by pressing 'Magic' button, although each potion can only be used once.
The first seven mazes are always the same, but from level 8 onwards, players will find themselves on any one of over a hundred different mazes. If players survive for long enough, the mazes will be repeated in a different order. How long a player lasts depends upon the player's 'health' level. Health continually depletes as time progresses and further health is lost by contact with various monsters or their projectiles. Health can be replenished by consuming the food found in the mazes or by inserting more credits. The many treasure chests that litter the levels can be plundered for points, and collecting treasure increases a player's score multiplier when two or more players are playing the game.
- TECHNICAL -
Game ID : 136037
Main CPU : 68010 (@ 7.15909 Mhz), M6502 (@ 1.789772 Mhz)
Sound Chips : YM2151 (@ 3.579545 Mhz), POKEY (@ 1.789772 Mhz), TMS5220 (@ 650.826 Khz)
Control per player (4): 8-way joystick
Buttons per player (4): 2
- TRIVIA -
Released in December 1985.
Gauntlet was originally going to be called 'Dungeons' and was inspired not only by TSR's tabletop RPG, 'Dungeons & Dragons', but also by another Atari game called 'Dandy'. Dandy's creator, Jack Palevich, tried fruitlessly to get his name added to the list of credits in Gauntlet. In lieu of public recognition, Atari Games Corp gave Pelvich a Gauntlet cabinet, and he in turn agreed not to sue Atari.
Two character names were changed before release. The Valkyrie was originally named 'Amazon' and the Warrior was 'Hulk'" The first character art was produced on January 1, 1984.
Gauntlet's revolutionary, non-linear game-play gave players multiple choices, as they were no longer forced into taking a linear route through the game. Like 'Dungeons & Dragons', Gauntlet players could choose their own path, searching for keys, treasures, food and transporters to take them to other levels. Unlike most other games at the time, the player didn't always have to fight; a simpler route through the dungeon could sometimes be found, or players could simply try to make a run for it.
In the early '80s, arcades were struggling. Manufacturers created more elaborate games that operators could charge more money for ($.50!), but players were resistant to the increase. The question at Atari was: How do we get extra earnings? The idea with Gauntlet was that with four players you earn four times as much with every play. It was a drop-in/drop-out design so if someone died they could immediately rejoin or someone new could step in -- there was no down time, so the quarters just kept coming. Another choice made specifically to increase the coin drop: there was no end to the game. Gauntlet would recycle levels by flipping them horizontally and vertically once the players had run through all of them. Gauntlet was a big success in 1985. But the marketing team at Atari was actually worried about the four-player cabinet. They weren't sure four strangers would want to play a game together and they also had concerns about the four separate coin shoots (which were known to break easily). Confident in his game, Ed Logg convinced the marketing team to just go with it.
Another Gauntlet milestone was in the game's use of sound effects. Synthesized human voices had been used sporadically in games in the early eighties and while it had proved, on most occasions, to be moderately successful, was still considered something of a novelty. Gauntlet, however, revolutionized the concept of in-game speech and added immeasurably to the game's superb atmosphere. The deep timbre of Gauntlet's very own 'Dungeon Master' would guide players through the levels, informing them that 'Elf needs food, badly', or that 'Wizard is about to die' and the always-good advice that is 'Remember, don't shoot food.'
Note: The game contains exactly 212 sounds (including digitized voices, effects and musics).
It was common practice to test a new arcade game at select locations before wide release. The operator was given the cabinet for free, but in exchange they couldn't promote it (as a precaution against competition) and they would share the coin drop numbers of it and all the other machines at the location so that Atari could evaluate the new game's success against current games. But when Ed Logg came by to check on Gauntlet during its field test, he found developers from SEGA snapping photos of the cabinet. Atari pulled it from that location and didn't work with the operator henceforth. A year after Gauntlet's release in 1985, SEGA released a four-player arcade game called "Quartet" (although it was side-scrolling).
7,850 units were sold in the U.S. A few thousand more were sold in Japan and Europe. Even though Atari considered Gauntlet a success, earlier games like Space Invaders and Ms. Pac-Man sold hundreds of thousands of cabinets. One of Gauntlet's contemporaries from Atari, the excellent Temple of Doom game, sold just 2,800 copies.
Note : There were 20 officially released versions (see Updates section for detailed info), including 6 '2-player' versions and various Spanish, German and Japanese versions. Counting 4-player English variants alone, there were 7 releases with various bug-fixes.
The default high score screen of "Cyberball 2072" features names of many Atari arcade games, including GAUNTLET.
Charles Nagle holds the official record for this game with 4,401,169 points on March 28, 2003.
Pony Canyon / Scitron released a limited-edition soundtrack album for this game (That's Atari Music Vol.II : G.S.M. Atari Games 2 - PCCB-00070) on 21/09/1991.
- UPDATES -
Revision 1 (4-players)
* First world release.
Revision 2 (4-players)
* Added an option called 'Disable Speech?' in the operator menu.
* Fixed some texts in attract mode.
Revision 3 (4-players)
* German release only.
Revision 4 (4-players)
* World release.
Revision 5 (4-players)
* World release.
Revision 6 (4-players)
* German release only.
* Added 'All walls turn into exits' trick (see 'Tips And Tricks' section).
* Added ability to stop the attract mode with the fire button.
Revision 7 (4-players)
* World release.
Revision 8 (4-players)
* German release only.
* Added an option called 'Reduce Text?' in the operator menu.
Revision 9 (4-players)
* World release.
Revision 10 (4-players)
* German release only.
Revision 12 (4-players)
* Japanese release only.
Revision 13 (4-players)
* Japanese release only.
Revision 14 (4-players)
* World release.
* Sequence of boards may be different : After Level 8, either every other level may be skipped (Level 9 = Level 10, Level 10 = Level 12, etc.), or every two levels may be skipped (Level 9 = Level 11, Level 10 = Level 14, etc.), or boards may be played in their normal order. (It may depend on the route taken to Level 8.)
Revision 15 (4-players)
* Spanish release only.
Revision 1 (2-players)
* German release only.
* Based on the latest 4-players revision.
Revision 2 (2-players)
* Japanese release only.
Revision 3 (2-players)
* World release.
Revision 4 (2-players)
* German release only.
Revision 5 (2-players)
* Japanese release only.
Revision 6 (2-players)
* World release.
- TIPS AND TRICKS -
* Hints for Game Play : The following hints will help you use your health more effectively and score more points per coin :
1) Play cooperatively.
2) Allow the player with the best ability to use magic (usually Merlin the Wizard, unless one of the other players has acquired the magic potion for extra magic) to pick up the magic potions.
3) Save keys and potions and use them conservatively.
4) Pay attention to your marching order. Allow the players with the best fighting ability and armor (usually Thyra the Valkyrie and Thor the Warrior) to lead the way and fend off attacks.
5) Avoid contact with the ghosts : they take away your health very quickly and you cannot fight them hand-to-hand.
* If you remain motionless (or basically aimless) and stall off about 30 health, all of the doors will open. Everybody knows this, and the game even tells you about it. The game doesn't tell you that if you stall off about 200 health, all the walls will turn into exits! (work on Revision 6 and +) The game designers had to include this because there are some levels which require you to pick up a key before you exit. If you are already filled up with keys, and the doors are all gone, then it would be IMPOSSIBLE for you to exit, and you would starve to death. What they didn't anticipate, is that certain levels of the game which are really difficult, which would require you to take massive health losses to finish, become very simple if all the walls are exits. Or they can be effectively skipped altogether. Because the game has Monty-Hall levels with lots of food on them, you can use this cheat to only play levels which are a wash or increase your health dramatically, and cut your losses to 200 on all the really hard levels.
* The best character to play, in the LONG run, is the elf. His magic is just as good as the wizard's and his fight ability as good as Thor's. His ability to shoot through cracks in addition to all this (when he has the power potions) makes him the best. The Valkyrie is the worst, although some people regard this as a challenge...
* To manipulate the point value of Death, shoot him. Death's point value takes the following progression : 1000-2000-1000-4000-1000-6000-1000-8000, and then back to start. His value keeps from the previous game.
* You can kill Death painlessly by teleporting on top of him.
* If a previous game ended beyond Level 8, Level 8 in the next game becomes the level that the previous game ended on. If you got a really good sequence of boards in a game and you want to repeat them, turn the machine off and on again after you've entered your high score.
- SERIES -
1. Gauntlet (1985)
2. Gauntlet (1985, PlayChoice-10)
3. Gauntlet II (1986)
4. Gauntlet - The Deeper Dungeons (1987, Level pack for 8-bit computers)
5. Gauntlet - The Third Encounter (1990, Atari Lynx)
6. Gauntlet III - The Final Quest (1991, Atari ST)
7. Gauntlet IV (1993, Sega Mega Drive)
8. Gauntlet Legends (1998)
9. Gauntlet Dark Legacy (1999)
10. Gauntlet Seven Sorrows (2006, Sony PlayStation 2 & Microsoft XBOX)
- STAFF -
Designer / Programmer : Ed Logg (ED )
Game programmer : Bob Flanagan (BF )
Video graphics : Video graphics : Sam Comstock (SWC), Susan G. McBride (SGM), Alan Murphy, Will Noble, Dave Pettigrew (D F)
Engineer : Pat McCarthy (PMC)
Technician : Sae Oh (SMO), Cris Drobny (CAD)
Sound designers : Hal Canon (HAL), Earl Vickers (EAR)
Cabinet designer : Ken Hata (KEN)
- PORTS -
* Consoles :
Atari Lynx (1990)
Sega Master System (1990)
Sega Mega Drive
Sony PlayStation (1998, "Arcade's Greatest Hits - The Atari Collection 2")
Sega Dreamcast (2000, "Midway's Greatest Arcade Hits Volume 2")
Sony PlayStation 2 (2003, "Midway Arcade Treasure")
Nintendo GameCube (2003, "Midway Arcade Treasure")
Microsoft XBOX (2003, "Midway Arcade Treasure")
Sony PSP (2005, "Midway Arcade Treasures - Extended Play")
Nintendo Game Boy Advance (2005, "Gauntlet / Rampart")
Microsoft XBOX 360 [Xbox Live Arcade] (2005) [Retired in 2010]
* Computers :
Atari XL/XE [Cassette] (1985)
Atari XL/XE [Disk] (1985)
Amstrad CPC (1985)
Atari ST (1985)
Commodore C64 [Disc] (1986)
Commodore C64 [Tape] (1986)
Tandy Color Computer (1986, "Gantelet")
MSX (1986)
Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1987)
Amstrad CPC (1987, "Solid Gold")
Apple IIgs (1987)
Amstrad CPC [Tape] (1987, "Les Tresors d'U.S.GOLD")
Amstrad CPC [Disc] (1987, "Les Tresors d'U.S.GOLD")
Commodore C64 [Tape] (1987, "Les Tresors d'U.S.GOLD")
Commodore C64 [Disc] (1987, "Les Tresors d'U.S.GOLD")
Sinclair ZX Spectrum [Tape] (1987, "Les Tresors d'U.S.GOLD")
Sinclair ZX Spectrum +3 [Disc] (1987, "Les Tresors d'U.S.GOLD")
Amstrad CPC [Tape] (1988, "Arcade Force Four")
Amstrad CPC [Disc] (1988, "Arcade Force Four")
Commodore C64 [Tape] (1988, "Arcade Force Four")
Commodore C64 [Disc] (1988, "Arcade Force Four")
Sinclair ZX Spectrum [Tape] (1988, "Arcade Force Four")
Atari ST (1988, "Arcade Force Four")
Amstrad CPC (198?, "El Lingote")
Amstrad CPC (198?, "Gauntlet And Gauntlet II [Limited Edition]")
Amstrad CPC (1988, "History In The Making")
Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1988, "History In The Making")
Commodore C64 (1988, "History In The Making")
Amstrad CPC (1988, "Les Geants De L'Arcade")
Apple II (1988)
PC [MS-DOS] (1988)
Amstrad CPC (1990, "Micro Club No.02")
PC [MS Windows, CD-ROM] (1998, "Arcade's Greatest Hits - The Atari Collection 2")
PC [MS Windows, CD-ROM] (2004, "Midway Arcade Treasure")
* Others :
LCD handheld game (1988) released by Tiger Electronics : contains 9 stages in your quest to find the long-lost Sacred Orb. There are 5 different worlds for your search through and battle evil demons : The Castle, The Dark Forest, The Lost Caverns, The Unseen, and Volcana.
- SOURCES -
Game's rom.
Machine's picture.
MAME Info:
0.31 [Aaron Giles]
0.30 [Aaron Giles]
Bugs:
- gauntlet and clones: Possible missing attract mode sounds. Machone (ID 01801)
WIP:
- 0.137u4: Lord Nightmare fixed swapped stereo in Gauntlet and Gauntlet II. Thor (warrior)'s/red player's coin slot is toward the left, and specific sounds for that player (coin insert gong, death ditty, etc) should come from the left speaker, not the right. Verified with schematics. TODO: Merge Gauntlet audio into atarijsa.c since the Gauntlet audio hardware is clearly the direct ancestor of the Atari JSA-i audio board, and currently is missing most of the chip specific volume controls, etc which are already implemented in atarijsa.c. Hooked up the YM2151 reset bit to the sound cpu in gauntlet, and fixed sound reset to properly reset all the sound chips and volume latches.
- 0.134u1: Lord Nightmare added TMS5220C variant: Implemented reset for TMS5220C if /RS and /WS are pulled down together. Inserted LNs email and corrections as comment into source. Created a TODO section. Couriersud updated Gauntlet to use "new" TMS5220 interface. Replaced TMS5220 speech with TMS5220C.
- 0.114u4: Aaron Giles fixed 'game starts with 1 credit added for all players'.
- 0.105u4: Added proms ($0, 200, 400 - timing, flip control and position/size). Full address map verified from schematics.
- 0.76: Aaron Giles added clones Gauntlet (rev 1), (rev 2), (rev 4), (rev 9), (Japanese, rev 12), (Japanese, rev 13), (Spanish, rev 15), (German, rev 3), (German, rev 6), (German, rev 8), (German, rev 10), (2 Players, rev 3), (2 Players, Japanese, rev 2), (2 Players, Japanese, rev 5), (2 Players, German, rev 1) and (2 Players, German, rev 4). Changed description to 'Gauntlet (rev 14)' and clones '(Intermediate Release 1)' to '(rev 5)', '(Intermediate Release 2)' to '(rev 7)' and '(2 Players)' to '(2 Players, rev 6)'. Fixed gfx1 rom ($0) length to 8kb. Fixed rom names. Renamed (gauntir1) to (gauntr5) and (gauntir2) to (gauntr7).
- 17th October 2003: Aaron Giles added a few new Gauntlet, Gauntlet 2 and Vindicators Part II ROM sets, and cleaned up the drivers.
- 28th September 2000: Aaron Giles sent in an Atari games update with working speech in Gauntlet attract mode and transparent graphics in Atari System 1 games.
- 11th September 2000: Nicola Salmoria fixed Gauntlet and some other Atari games from crashing.
- 0.37b3: Fixed gfx2 rom loading.
- 0.36RC1: Aaron Giles fixed shadows in Gauntlet and other Atari games. Changed 68010 CPU1 clock speed to 7159090 Hz, M6502 CPU2 to 1789772 Hz, YM-2151 to 3579545, Pokey to 1789772 Hz, TMS5220 to 650826 Hz and palettesize to 1024 colors.
- 17th February 2000: Aaron Giles cleaned up the Atari drivers a lot, and fixed Gauntlet's shadow rendering.
- 0.35RC2: Ernesto Corvi and Nicola Salmoria fixed the slapstic emulation in Gauntlet 2.
- 0.35RC1: Brian Lewis and Andrea Mazzoleni added new tweaked VGA modes: 384x240 (for CPS1, Pang etc.), 384x256 (for Lode Runner etc.), 336x240 (for Gauntlet and other Atari games), 320x240 (for NeoGeo and others).
- 0.35b13: Changed palettesize from 1024 to 1056 colors.
- 0.35b11: Replaced 68000 CPU with 68010.
- 12th April 1999: Aaron Giles has gotten Gauntlet working again by implementing the interrupts correctly.
- 0.35b2: The CPU cores are still in a state of flux. Most of the problems in 0.35b1 have been fixed, however Gauntlet doesn't accept coins.
- 0.33b7: Changed description of clone 'Gauntlet (2 Player)' to '(2 Players)'.
- 0.33b3: The Gauntlet drivers are now color-reduced (faster & better) [Aaron Giles].
- 0.31: Aaron Giles added original Gauntlet and clones Gauntlet (2 Player), (Intermediate Release 1) and (Intermediate Release 2). Note that only the original version are now supported, the slapstic hacked ones no longer are. Aaron Giles fixed sprites in Gauntlet and added 16 bit color support for games which need it (e.g. Rastan, Gauntlet, Black Tiger, and many others). Known issues: The Slapstic protection MIGHT cause some level layouts to be screwed up. Let us know if you notice one.
- 0.30: Aaron Giles added Gauntlet (Atari Games 1985). Aaron added a cpu_reset() call so that a single processor can be reset during execution; Gauntlet needs this to work properly. Only the hacked version which doesn't require a slapstic is supported. Known issues: Colors are accurate, however the palette is reduced from a 16-bit IRGB (4-4-4-4) to 8-bit RGB (3-3-2) color space.
LEVELS: 999 (endless)
Other Emulators:
* FB Alpha
Recommended Games (Fantasy):
Krull
Mystic Marathon
IGMO
Zwackery
Gauntlet
Gauntlet (PlayChoice-10)
Gauntlet II
Gauntlet Legends
Gauntlet Dark Legacy
Rock 'n Rage
Shackled
Devil World
Snezhnaja Koroleva
Dungeon Explorer (Tourvision PCE bootleg)
Magician Lord
Asylum (prototype)
Slashout
Romset: 474 kb / 20 files / 239.9 zip
MAME XML Output:
| | <game name="gauntlet" sourcefile="gauntlet.c"> |
| | | <description>Gauntlet (rev 14)</description> |
| | | <manufacturer>Atari Games</manufacturer> |
| | | <rom name="136037-1307.9a" size="32768" crc="46fe8743" sha1="d5fa19e028a2f43658330c67c10e0c811d332780" region="maincpu" offset="0"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-1308.9b" size="32768" crc="276e15c4" sha1="7467b2ec21b1b4fcc18ff9387ce891495f4b064c" region="maincpu" offset="1"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-205.10a" size="16384" crc="6d99ed51" sha1="a7bc18f32908451859ba5cdf1a5c97ecc5fe325f" region="maincpu" offset="38000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-206.10b" size="16384" crc="545ead91" sha1="7fad5a63c6443249bb6dad5b2a1fd08ca5f11e10" region="maincpu" offset="38001"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-1409.7a" size="32768" crc="6fb8419c" sha1="299fee0368f6027bacbb57fb469e817e64e0e41d" region="maincpu" offset="40000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-1410.7b" size="32768" crc="931bd2a0" sha1="d69b45758d1c252a93dbc2263efa9de1f972f62e" region="maincpu" offset="40001"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-120.16r" size="16384" crc="6ee7f3cc" sha1="b86676340b06f07c164690862c1f6f75f30c080b" region="audiocpu" offset="4000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-119.16s" size="32768" crc="fa19861f" sha1="7568b4ab526bd5849f7ef70dfa6d1ef1f30c0abc" region="audiocpu" offset="8000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-104.6p" size="8192" crc="9e2a5b59" sha1="3bbaa92e4612b0a26837ca67cfa4e36d0f2295fa" region="gfx1" offset="0"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-111.1a" size="32768" crc="91700f33" sha1="fac1ce700c4cd46b643307998df781d637f193aa" region="gfx2" offset="0"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-112.1b" size="32768" crc="869330be" sha1="5dfaaf54ee2b3c0eaf35e8c17558313db9791616" region="gfx2" offset="8000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-113.1l" size="32768" crc="d497d0a8" sha1="bb715bcec7f783dd04151e2e3b221a72133bf17d" region="gfx2" offset="10000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-114.1mn" size="32768" crc="29ef9882" sha1="91e1465af6505b35cd97434c13d2b4d40a085946" region="gfx2" offset="18000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-115.2a" size="32768" crc="9510b898" sha1="e6c8c7af1898d548f0f01e4ff37c2c7b22c0b5c2" region="gfx2" offset="20000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-116.2b" size="32768" crc="11e0ac5b" sha1="729b7561d59d94ef33874a134b97bcd37573dfa6" region="gfx2" offset="28000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-117.2l" size="32768" crc="29a5db41" sha1="94f4f5dd39e724570a0f54af176ad018497697fd" region="gfx2" offset="30000"/> |
| | | <rom name="136037-118.2mn" size="32768" crc="8bf3b263" sha1="683d900ab7591ee661218be2406fb375a12e435c" region="gfx2" offset="38000"/> |
| | | <rom name="74s472-136037-101.7u" size="512" crc="2964f76f" sha1="da966c35557ec1b95e1c39cd950c38a19bce2d67" region="proms" offset="0"/> |
| | | <rom name="74s472-136037-102.5l" size="512" crc="4d4fec6c" sha1="3541b5c6405ad5742a3121dfd6acb227933de25a" region="proms" offset="200"/> |
| | | <rom name="74s287-136037-103.4r" size="256" crc="6c5ccf08" sha1="ff5dbadd85aa2e07b383a302fa399e875db8f84f" region="proms" offset="400"/> |
| | | <chip type="cpu" tag="maincpu" name="68010" clock="7159090"/> |
| | | <chip type="cpu" tag="audiocpu" name="M6502" clock="1789772"/> |
| | | <chip type="audio" tag="lspeaker" name="Speaker"/> |
| | | <chip type="audio" tag="rspeaker" name="Speaker"/> |
| | | <chip type="audio" tag="ymsnd" name="YM2151" clock="3579545"/> |
| | | <chip type="audio" tag="pokey" name="POKEYN" clock="1789772"/> |
| | | <chip type="audio" tag="tms" name="TMS5220C" clock="650826"/> |
| | | <display tag="screen" type="raster" rotate="0" width="336" height="240" refresh="59.922743" pixclock="7159090" htotal="456" hbend="0" hbstart="336" vtotal="262" vbend="0" vbstart="240" /> |
| | | <input players="4" buttons="2" coins="4"> |
| | | | <control type="joy" ways="8"/> |
| | | <dipswitch name="Service Mode" tag="803008" mask="8"> |
| | | | <dipvalue name="Off" value="8" default="yes"/> |
| | | | <dipvalue name="On" value="0"/> |
| | | <driver status="good" emulation="good" color="good" sound="good" graphic="good" savestate="unsupported" palettesize="1024"/> |
|
|
