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omegrace: MAME ROM Information.

History:

Omega Race (c) 1981 Midway.

When playing this game, you are the pilot of an Omegan Space Fighter in training to defend Omega's Star Colonies. You are stationed in space to destroy as many waves of attacking enemy droid ships as possible.

You begin your training with a small number of droid ships in the first wave of attackers and gradually build your skill until there is a maximum number of 12 attacking droid ships per wave. These attaching ships not only move independently and fire at you, they also drop two different kinds of space mines to block your path and your shots at them.

As your skill level increases, the speed with which the droid ships attack is gradually increased and their shots at you become more accurate.

Bonus ships are awarded to you periodically throughout the game as you reach or pass certain preselected point values. Each enemy ship and mine has a point value.

The object of the game is to survive as long as possible while destroying as many attacking droid ships and space mines as you can. As you do this, each following wave of attackers will be harder to destroy.

- TECHNICAL -

[Upright model]

[No. 929]

Main CPU : Z80 (@ 3 Mhz)

Sound CPU : Z80 (@ 1.5 Mhz)

Sound Chips : (2x) AY8910 (@ 1.5 Mhz)

Screen orientation : Horizontal

Video resolution : 232 x 264 pixels

Screen refresh : 40.00 Hz

Palette colors : 32768

Players : 2

Control : Spinner knob

Buttons : 2 (FIRE, THRUST)

- TRIVIA -

Released in June 1981.

Omega Race was Midway's only vector game created.

According to Arcade Engineering co-founder (and former Allied Leisure designer) Jack Pearson, the idea for Omega Race came when some designers obtained a copy of Atari's "Asteroids" and created a new game by putting masking tape on the screen to create a track and they ignored the asteroids and were trying to fly around the track.

Omega Race differed significantly from "Asteroids" in a few respects. First, there was no 'wrap-around' (where you exit on one edge and return to the opposite edge). The walls would stop the player's fighter if it impacted them. Second, all the information such as high score and ships left were in a box in the middle of the playing field. Last, you could be expected to encounter multiple attackers in each wave. Although Omega Race wasn't a big seller, it still created a following. Unfortunately, this game came out when games such as "Pac-Man" were at their peak.

One thing of note is that the high score table will not display the initial FUK or FUC (early censorship at its best).

Thomas Gault holds the official record for this game with 3,290,900 points.

Official products:

Omega Race [Upright model] [No. 929]

Omega Race [Sit-Down model] [No. 894]

Omega Race [Cocktail model] [No. 930]

Omega Race [Mini-Myte model] [No. 931]

Unofficial products:

Delta Race

- SCORING -

Photon Mine : 350 points

Vapor Mine : 500 points

Droid Ship : 1000 points

Command Ship : 1500 points

Death Ship : 2500 points

- TIPS AND TRICKS -

* When you start the game, your fighter will be in either the left or right corner of the screen. The enemy Droid Ships will be in one of the lower corners diagonally opposite from your fighter. Your job is to eliminate all the enemy Droid Ships in order to advance to the next wave. You will start with six enemy Droid Ships in wave one. The number of Droid Ships will increase by two until you will be dealing with twelve enemy Droid Ship per wave. Not only will you have to deal with enemy Droid Ships, you will also have to deal with the mines that they lay.

* The spinner knob is very sensitive on this game. That means you don't have to turn it too much to make your fighter respond. This can be very helpful if you are attempting to line up a shot and you 'overspin' the knob, thereby leaving yourself vulnerable to an enemy attack.

* Go down the side opposite of where the enemy Droid Ships are. Since you have rapid fire, try to destroy as many enemy Droid Ships as possible. This will become important in later waves since multiple Command and Death ships will appear amongst the enemy Droid Ships.

* When moving around the screen, make sure you keep firing toward the enemy ships. Although shots in this game have a limited range, if you put up a wall of fire, you can catch the enemy Command or Death ships in a nasty trap. Keep in mind that your rate of fire is only limited by how fast you can push the fire button.

* If you accelerate too much in one direction, turn your fighter toward any one of the walls so that you ram it. This will cause your fighter to instantly stop so that you can get your bearings again to deal with enemy threats.

* After the second wave, the enemy Droid Ships tend to migrate around the middle box in a direction opposite of where your fighter appears. After the fourth wave, the enemy Droid Ships tend to split up with a Command ship with each of these groups to make your job even harder.

* Command ships located in the pack of enemy Droid Ships will not pursue your fighter. This doesn't mean, however, that they aren't helpless. If you get too close to one of these packs, that Command ship will fire on your fighter.

* Enemy fire isn't the only danger you will have to deal with. Command and Death ships also deposit mines. If you don't destroy the Photon mines, they eventually become Vapor mines. Both of these mines can present a major obstacle if you are trying to get away from the enemy or trying to set yourself up into a better firing position.

* If you take too long to bring down a Command ship, it will transform into a Death ship. Death ships are much harder to hit because they fly quickly around the screen shooting and laying mines.

* Don't get to close to any Command or Death ship since both of these ships have pretty accurate fire when they get close to your fighter.

* After Wave 5, a Droid Ship will transform into a Death ship near the beginning of the wave to create an even bigger challenge of getting through the wave.

- STAFF -

Designed by : Ron Halliburton (Founder of Arcade Engineering)

- PORTS -

* Consoles :

Colecovision (1981)

Atari 2600 (1983)

* Computers :

Tandy Color Computer (1982, "Space Race")

Commodore C64 (1982)

Commodore VIC-20 (1982)

* Others :

VFD tabletop game (1981) by Coleco : Unfortunately, this game was never released.

- SOURCES -

Game's rom.

Machine's picture.

F.A.Q. by Kevin Butler A.K.A. War Doc.

All In Color For a Quarter - Keith Smith.

MAME Info:

0.28 [Bernd Wiebelt]

Artwork available

Bugs:

- Corrupted music after completing first several levels. tamacula (ID 00785)

WIP:

- 0.139u4: Dave France and The Dumping Union added clone Omega Race (set 2). Changed parent description to 'Omega Race (set 1)'.

- 22nd August 2010: Smitdogg - Dave France dumped Omega Race (version or revision A). I don't know which version is already in MAME and if this one is newer or older but it's definitely different.

- 0.129u5: Couriersud added save state support to Omega Race.

- 0.125u9: Couriersud fixed assertions in Omega Race.

- 0.123u3: Mathis Rosenhauer added support for original Omega Race state PROM (user1).

- 0.115u1: Changed region proms to user1.

- 6th May 2007: Mr. Do - Cleaned up the cabaret bezel version of Omega Race, thanks to the BYOAC/CAG artwork. The overlay for Omega Race was based on various photos and RGVAC discussions.

- 0.114u4: Tafoid fixed and documented clocks in Omega Race. Replaced AY8910 sound with AY-3-8912A (1MHz).

- 0.113u3: Derrick Renaud fixed analog controls by adding back a faux VBLANK timing in Omega Race.

- 0.113u1: Justin Szczap added DIP locations based on information from the manuals for Omega Race.

- 12th November 2006: Mr. Do - Omega Race artwork has been "optimized" by Ad_Enuff; much smaller file size (up to 80%) with no loss in quality.

- 0.108u5: Mathis Rosenhauer rewrote the Atari vector generators, using the schematics and actual state machine PROMs. The state machine is now emulated so timing should be much more realistic. Clipping hardware in bzone and others is emulated instead of hardcoded. Improved accuracy of clocks and various other bits of cleanup. Added prom ($0 - DVG PROM).

- 25th August 2006: Mr. Do - Updated Omega Race with a new scan from Eric at TAFA, which now includes the speaker grill above the bezel.

- 15th August 2006: Mr. Do - Added Omega Race artwork.

- 0.106u6: Updated Omega Race built-in overlay for the new render system.

- 0.78: Stefan Jokisch added clone Delta Race (Allied Leisure 1981).

- 22nd December 2003: Stefan Jokisch added Delta Race (an Omega Race bootleg) to the Omega Race driver.

- 24th January 2003: Highwayman added an Australian version of Omega Race called Delta Race to the Omega Race driver.

- 18th January 2003: Marc Alexander dumped Delta Race.

- 0.61: Changed 'Unknown' to 'Unused' dipswitches.

- 12th February 2002: Aaron Giles fixed the Quantum and Omega Race vector graphics bugs.

- 0.58: Changed palettesize from 256 to 32768 colors.

- 28th October 2001: William Kucharski submitted a patch to add cocktail mode to Omega Race.

- 0.29: Bernd Wiebelt fixed the sound in Omega Race. It was playing too slow. Thanks to Stacy Joe Dunkle, Mike Cuddy and Al Kossow. Known issues: Keys react to fast. Use the mouse.

- 0.28: Bernd Wiebelt provided a driver for Omega Race (Midway 1981). Keys react to fast. Use the mouse. Control: Arrows = Left & Right rotate ship, CTRL = Fire and ALT = Thrust

- 29th April 1993: Dumped Omega Race.

STORY:

- In the year 2003. The Omega System developed a method of training its warriors to protect their star colonies. Over the city of Komar. Android controlled fighters raced to engage and destroy these Omegan warriors. The Omegan method is so successful. It commands fear and respect from all throughout the galaxies. The method is code named... OMEGA RACE

Other Emulators:

* AAE

* JAE

* Retrocade

Recommended Games (Starfighter 2):

Galaxy Game

Space Wars

Star Cruiser

Orbit

Star Castle

Eliminator

Omega Race

Solar Quest

Space Fury

Dark Planet

Zektor

Romset: 23 kb / 8 files / 14.9 zip

MAME XML Output:

<description>Omega Race (set 1)</description>

<manufacturer>Midway</manufacturer>

</input>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</dipswitch>

</game>

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