This basically came out about 3 hours before I went on holiday so was a bit of a rush to get out, hence the fact of no release announcements thus far.

However if you are interested in my latest release, whizz over to M1Adness and download!

This is also the first time this has been available on £6 JP as far as I know, so good for a play if only for the more original experience.

Usual thanks etc can be found in the readme file, however a special mention to RussDX for providing the resources for this machine in a rather unorthodox way

Get it now from madness.fruitemu.co.uk

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Another missing link in my personal all time want list for FME. As you know previously I released a classic for "Top Take", the older brother of this machine. Now the rom has made an appearance from Top the Lot I can complete the set at last

Design wise they are practically identical. However for Top the Lot the JP was increased from £1.50 to £2 all cash (with the introduction of a JP ditty, a synthesised version of "The Entertainer") and the gamble tweaked so the top win was no longer all or nothing.

For me this machine has the edge over Top Take. Although almost identical, the increased JP and missing "all or nothing" make the machine much better. Now instead of only playing for Top Takes / Top the Lots there are two ways to earn, the JP can be gambled out very regularly whilst saving nudges up for Top the Lots and possible mega repeaters.

A joy to work on this one, it has been completed in a very similar style to the Top Take layout from before, unsurprising really as it is based on the same layout with some tweaking!

Many thanks go to Superbank at The MPU Mecca for providing the rom that made this layout possible, plus a good quality image of the JP symbol, and to Quattrohead once again for providing the other reel scans used in both Top Take and Top the Lot.

Working on machines like this that were a big part of my childhood years is an absolute pleasure, and is what gets me out of bed in the morning FME wise.

I hope you enjoy this absolute classic machine as much as I enjoyed working on it

Both rom and layout (two separate downloads) are available from the Download Area.

You may remember I released a classic layout for the Barcrest machine "Top Take". The fantastic news is that roms have been made available for the follow up machine, "Top the Lot" - a machine I have been waiting for since the earliest days of FME!

With thanks to Superbank for posting the rom, I have been working on a quick conversion of the Top Take layout to reflect the increased Jackpot and slightly rejigged functions. Just awaiting a Top The Lot JP symbol to be posted by Superbank and this will be ready for release

Here is a taster pic, a couple of minor bends to straighten out and all will be go!

You may remember some time ago I discussed the 2p/£5 variant of Crap Hot Roll, amazingly followed swiftly by an ebay sale of said machine. Those amongst you with eagle eyes will in fact have noticed that the variant in the ebay pic is in fact showing 10p play on the top glass, so the machine in fact remained fabled.

Not so any more. A trip to Prestatyn in North Wales yielded a small back road arcade with a varying assortment of classic and not so classic machines. Obviously geared up squarely for the local 2p-10p players (i.e. kids of course) this included some newer machines like the ubiqutous Crazy Fruits, and some rarely seen machines like 8th Wonder and Copperpot.

However I wasn't quite prepared for the rear of the arcade. My eyes were definitely not deceiving me, my memory had not been unjustly clouded by the passing years, I had indeed seen this machine before and here it was again in all it's "glory"...



So as you can see I did the right and proper FME thing and grabbed a picture, which after the initial excitement at "proof" these things did exist in the flesh, the subsidence brought stomach churning mixed feelings. As you will recall I am not a lover of these machines because of the horrific way Barcrest programmers treat players of machines of this type, with the almost impossibly hard to get maximum "Red Hot" feature paying £3. Not only this, but a 2p machine with a £5 JP can only mean one thing, every pound is 50 credits of click, click, click repetition, with possibly the occasional nudge to break the monotony, of course being the machine that it is, even vague entertainment seemed unlikely. Anyway what the heck, what harm can a £1 do?

So the £1 went in, and predictably so did another, and another. Before you know it it's £7 in without a sniff of a win, next to no nudges (certainly none of any use), and the same old heart sinking, stomach wrenching feelings came flooding back.

Now being a 2p machine, the JP is in effect the same as playing 20p play £50 JP. Whoever thought this kind of ratio was a good idea should be shot. After all, its only 20 years or so since many club machines had a £50 JP. Even on 5p play this is the equivalent of a £25 JP, so lets face it JP's are hardly going to flow like water, and chasing one is going to be a six day trek through a scorching desert barren of any form of pulse racing play. As for repeats, it's rarer than a Retrofruit layout release to see one on a 50p/£35 play machine, so what hope do you have on a 20p/£50 equivalent? I mean why design compensated machines in this way with ridiculous stake/prize ratios? The code can do little other than choke. Are they just having a laugh, or is there intentional malice that goes into the design of these things? £50 equivalent JP's aimed at children? Grrrrrr.

To be honest at this stage I knew where this was going, so I did something I find very difficult to do and walked away. Certainly in my younger years I would have just kept shovelling the quids in, increasingly irritated by the lack of wins and boring gameplay, yet so compelled to "beat" the machine and get my money back that all common sense is forgotten amongst the swelling anger.

So I went and played 8th Wonder instead, which turned out quite nicely, turning £2 into £5.

A little while later the family arrived, and they started wandering around, begging for 10p/20p here and there. So I went to see the missus who was playing some strange machine that I can't remember the name of. Rather predictably this was next to the 2p RHR that had whipped me earlier on. You can just see the edge of the machine she was playing in the image above, if you recognise it let me know.

So as they say in the best problem pages, one thing led to another and before you know it more nuggets were shovelled down the slot. Amazingly the machine then gave nudges for a roll, which naturally happened to be mixed. Now bear in mind that at this stage I am about a tenner into the machine, and my reward is a mixed roll that pays, wait for it, 30p. Obviously with my personal history of incredible payouts from this machine, this came as somewhat of a shock. Yeah right. In fact of course it is absolutely typical of what I have seen on these time and time again - the machine then goes dead. Click, click, click, occasional nudge, goodbye.

Why oh why do I put myself through this, it isn't even entertaining. It's one thing playing and winning, another playing and losing, either way if you get some entertainment out of it and it hasn't cost you a mortgage payment then it's not so bad. There just isn't anything mildly entertaining about this style of play, and you can only put it down to the crap code initially, then coupled with even crapper adjustments to give it the equivalent of 20p play £50 JP.

The point of all this is, that where gambling is concerned, I can be a right plonker at times. I know this machine is going to be crap, I know this machine is going to cost me money, I know this machine is going to bore me to death, yet I *still* play it, ever the optimist that once, just once, I can find a version of this machine that can actually pay out and give just the tiniest enjoyment.

I am sure you can see where the story went next, several more £'s later I am about £20 in to the machine, now desperately seeking the "RED HOT ROLL" streak of JP's. Ho hum.

Eventually the machine did indeed pay something back. The RED HOT ROLL of course never materialised, instead a couple of mixed rolls, a blue roll that paid a £1 and a final mixed roll that made up the rest of the balance. As is usual with this machine, the lowest win does some bizarre things, and rolled in the three Red Sevens to top off the combined streaks at the midly irritating £10 and 10p. The 10p goes back in, then a £1, nothing happens at all, not even a nudge, and cutting my losses we head for the door.

Another wonderful example of Barcrest coding. Many thanks.

I leave you with a rare sight, a £5 JP on a 2p machine. Shame it cost £20 to get it - eventually I will learn. My impossible quest to find a playable RHR continues.



P.S. Despite the pic, this was not a "Red Hot Roll", some of the bulbs in the feature were back to front

A pleasure once again to release a BFM layout for MFME.

Here we have a 1280DX of Party Time, one of the most awesome streaking £6 machines ever released by BFM.

If you have not played this machine before, you can be forgiven for not fully understanding just how ground breaking this machine was when released. Although at first glance it looks like your classic lower tech machine, few reel wins exchangeable for basic features, under the hood there is a lot more going on. Similar to ACE machines "Band-Aid", Party Time has hidden features awarded by lining up all main reels to the same position. So for example, if you can get all reel stops on stop 16, you are awarded hidden feature "JACKPOT"! Cleverly, you are not shown any guides on the real machine as to where these features are, and generally the first you will know about it is a slower reel spin followed by PARTY TIME on the dot matrix, and a feature being awarded.

OK so no big deal you may be saying, except this machine takes it to extremes. As an example, it can spin one of the JACKPOT lines in, then spin another JACKPOT line in another four times on successive credits, so in effect you have won £30 tokens for just £1 in!

This just scratches the surface of the hidden features, there is a lot to see and learn with this machine, and at times streaks will appear on top of each other for some huge payouts (for the day of course, relative to stake/prize).

Sadly this type of machine didn't last long. Perhaps it was one of the Bacta rules about outcomes not being predetermined across credits, or obvious streaks, or maybe it was complaints from arcades about having to constantly refill tokens, who knows. All I do know is that thanks to the sterling efforts of mufcmufc, the roms and artwork were made available and I can now bring you a 1280 DX of a truely classic BFM streaker, one that until recently we were sure we may never see again.

My personal experience of this machine was brief (but very intense), as it didn't last too long in the local arcade. Playing it for real, with real cash, it is a major adrenaline rush. As soon as that slow spin starts, it kicks in, and the heart pounds before pressing start to see if another JP follows. This machine really was first class amusement, a major buzz, fast paced and huge rewards possible. Having enjoyed this machine so much in real life, it is a pleasure to have the chance to bring you the DX.

Supreme thanks go out from me to mufcmufc for providing the roms and resources to make this layout a reality. We have worked together closely for some time on this, and hopefully the result is worth it.

As a bonus, the download contains three versions of the layout. These are TFT, CRT DARK and CRT LIGHT. Personally I run a dual monitor setup, with my trusty ADI Microscan CRT and a newer Samsung TFT. The differences in image are very noticeable, the TFT is far inferior to the quality of the CRT and has an almost insane level of brightness. This is not to say that the Samsung is poor by any means, it certainly isn't, just that no TFT can match a decent CRT as yet. So you have three versions of the layout to choose from, quite simply use the one that fits your particular monitor the best.

Please note that there are known issues with this machine and how it works on different emulator revisions, please see the readme file within each version directory or the layout notes from within the emulator. Best played on MFME3.2.

Remember that you will also need roms for this machine, a copy needs to be placed in the directory of each version of this layout you are using. It is recommended that you download the roms from this site rather than the roms already released, as the naming is different. If you want to rename your existing roms, see the readme in the main directory for the rom names.

I hope you enjoy this outstanding BFM machine.

Roms and layouts available from the Download Area.

Well, well, well.

This machine speaks for itself. To be honest, I didn't think the roms for this machine would ever show up, but thanks to money monster2 at www.fruitemu.co.uk they have.

As this is one of the first machines I ever asked for in FME (the other being the sister machine Top the Lot, which appears ever rarer!), when the roms turned up I just had to make a layout for it. So here it is, Top Take, largely from memory.

The machine itself is Barcrest MPU4 fare circa 1986. It is 10p play and has a £1.50 all cash Jackpot. That in itself is probably enough to put off many of the members of FME from playing it. However this is not one of the most requested older machines for no good reason. The £1.50 JP has an insane repeater which could, on a good day, give 10+ repeats. In the days of £3 token JP's, this machine could literally give you a £16.50+ all cash JP. Now obviously this happens more rarely, but it is not uncommon to at least get two or three repeats from this feature, which puts it in the realms of a 10p play £6 JP machine, except with much better gameplay!

There are no graphics available for this machine unfortunately, so until that stage we have to be content with a classic layout. It's been a while since I did a classic layout, and in this case I have selected the old style classic for this release. I feel that graphical heroics on a classic are best reserved for later more complex machines, and this style more fits the era the machine is from. Thanks to some pulling together between members it does at least have mostly accurate reel symbols, albeit without the 24 stop overlap that the original enjoyed. That would have to wait for a DX. The classic has also been created from memory, so if you think there are any errors please let me know at www.fruitemu.co.uk. Note the blue tinge to the background is my Windows colour scheme and may be different on your machine.

In my own personal opinion Top the Lot is the better machine, but this is certainly up there with it and well worthy of adding to any historical FME collection. If you liked Smash and Grab or Tuppenny Cracker, you will certainly like this

Additional thanks for this layout go to money monster2 for supplying the roms, TTX for dumping them, and Quattrohead for some excellent reel scans. Thanks also to the playtesters Quattrohead and Pete_W.

Both roms and layout are available from the Download Area. Roms in the Roms section, and the layout in the MFME2.x or greater layout section. Remember that you need both rom and layout extracted to the same directory for the layout to work!

I hope you enjoy this classic slice of Barcrest history

As you may know there has been a leak of an unofficial version of MFME. I am not going to give any screen space to details, if you want details I am sure you can find them on other FME sites.

Suffice to say that this release has been created from unofficial code. The exact specifics of the leak (despite many theories and counter theories) remain unknown for now.

Personally I am not interested in this emulator whatsoever. It is a real kick in the teeth for Wizard (the primary author of MFME) and in my opinion shows a complete lack of respect for him. Similar to the stand I took with the JPeMu leak, I will not be downloading this emulator, and I will not be covering any of the "releases" for it on this site (not that anyone reads this site, so I guess it's no great loss ).

The net result of this leak is that work has now ceased on MFME and there will be no more releases. This is the thing that saddens me most of all, particularly as I had several layouts in development that needed bug fixes to be properly releaseable, as did Pook and perhaps other layout creators too. It is true to say that you can wait an age for me to release a layout, and it is unfortunate that the layouts I have chosen to do recently have turned out not to be fully functional in the emulator , and thanks to this leak it looks like they never will be. This certainly motivates me to do more layouts

Once again certain elements of the "scene" are showing their true colours, circling around with cries of "release! release! release!" just hours after the leak occurred. The feeling seems to be well now it's out, lets use it. Not a feeling I share quite frankly. Just because a trailer overturns on the motorway and spills monster truck toys all over the road, does not mean it is right to take them and use them.

Obviously the loss of future public releases of MFME is a massive, massive blow. Although other emulator authors have been around in the past, at this stage we have lost our only active developer. I have only ever been in this for the older machines, and I have no interest whatsoever in recent ones. So now for the sake of people getting their hands on a few recent machines the true purpose of why we are here is now lost.

FME already relies on a lot of goodwill, and I can only hope that any manufacturers reading this can see the true picture and appreciate that some of us are here purely to re-live the golden days of machines, most of which are incredibly difficult if not impossible to find in real life.

What lays ahead? Who knows. There is certainly a lot of speculation. One thing is sure and that this has a way to run yet, and certain forums have never been buzzing with activity quite so much. Me, I will be watching from the sidelines and can only hope and pray that the scene doesn't do anything incredibly stupid, which could get us shut down for good.

Well the site is back up and running following the recent hack of the server by our friends in Russia.

Many thanks to Pete for his work in getting this fixed :)

On the 4th Feb I posted that a DX of Crazy Pays had been released. Since that day I have been living in hope that we could actually play some decent roms for this machine, ones where basic CP features like hold 7 and double 7 for one nudge up or down were implemented as they should be, as opposed to the released roms that ripped the heart right out of the machine.

Thanks to a mini rom "flood" announced by Troutman over at the Mecca we now can!!

OK so the JP is £10 but that doesn't seem to affect the machine, most people would be playing for blue double sevens and the expected holds anyway. I have put about £100 through it already and it's great.

No doubt there will be some decal updates for the existing DX's out there to deal with this new rom, if like me you cannot wait for that then go to this page http://www.fruitemu.co.uk/v...=1802 for details of the £10 rom and slip it in to your existing DX :)

Now finally we can cast the previously released rom into the pits of hell, and play a decent rom instead. It would be nice to have a £6 or even a £4.80 set with all the features intact, but this is the best that can be done for now, and it's infinitely better than the last rom. Enjoy!

Bit of a buzz at the Mecca these days as several machines are getting (or will shortly be getting) their first outing on the emulator.

Time for a roundup of what I have been playing for the last week or so.

Firstly we have the candidate for what is probably the biggest rip off of another manufacturers machine yet seen. Now whether this machine is the rip off, or Barcrests machine is the rip off, it is unclear - but it should be perfectly obvious which machine this is based on (or indeed that Barcrests machine is based on this one should that be the case).

So here we have a DX for a machine called Golden Mile, by ACE. DX by Pandy.

The layout is pretty obviously flyer based, and is not the best source. Pandy has done what he could with the art but it was never going to be a Van Gogh. The lamping is good, some classic omni "dog ear"ing on a couple of lamps but nothing major. Best played on a decent CRT, on a TFT the contrast is not as good. Some excellent work on the hidden lamps in particular, many layouts hidden lamps stick out like a sore thumb as the creator isn't always aware of what should be there and takes a "best guess" which in many cases isn't in keeping with the rest of the machine, not so here. I am not sure about the bizarre looking reels that appear to be showing part of the vac plastic/bulb holders inside the machine though - probably something on the flyer but it doesn't quite look right from the displayed perspective. However a great overall effort from Pandy once again, although I can only imagine the suffering he went through play testing this. Why? For the answer to this it's over to the machine itself...

The machine itself is based around a holiday theme. That to be honest is about all I can bring myself to say about it. The machine is absolutely awful. It has excellent graphics and a great sound package, but the code plays like typical awful ACE code. Marvel as you throw a six from the start then get binned off the feature from the parking meter. Wonder as you get House Full from the Showtime theatre. Amaze as you spin two red sevens as you enter the feature with the third always 8 nudges away, which you will never get. Puzzle as you land on the terrible weather square for the thousandth time. Daze yourself as these repeat themselves almost every single feature.

That's not the worst of it. Should you get a reel win (which is relatively common, the one saving grace of the code of the machine) you may be able to exchange to the feature. Cry with laughter as you exchange a £2.40 win to the Rollercoaster square, which is then autocollected and it offers you one rollercoaster cart for a maximum win of £1. Pat yourself on the back at such a fantastic exchange. Even holds after nudge are not wins in the true sense, as you have to hold the pair rather than spin them all - beware!

I am not at all shocked that in all my years of playing machines I have never seen one of these in real life. The very thought that they ever got out of the factory sends a shiver down my spine. It is absolutely one of the worst machines for gameplay that I have ever had the misfortune to experience, and no doubt any that did make it to arcades were quickly smashed up by players.

It's actually worth the download just to see how badly it is possible to treat a fruit machine player, and the contempt shown as the machine hungrily eats your money. Me, the only advice I can give you is that if you really do want to play the machine, then play to get Shuffle-N-Match as this can offer red sevens. Personally, I am looking forward to watching Songs of Praise more than I am playing this one again.

If you really must play this one then you can find a release thread on the forums if you look hard enough.



Leaving that one quickly behind to gather virtual dust, we have another DX from Pandy, this time JPM Five Liner. It may not be the machine many of you remember as we are not talking about the features one side cash the other with streak matrix at the top, but a much earlier £4.80 machine with up to five winlines (and always five winlines on a 777 matrix).

First the machine. I must admit, this is a machine that I avoided. Usually because at the time these were about I didn't have a lot of money, and it was very difficult to get wins on this for a small investment. So whilst I was playing Tuppenny Cracker, I left this one for the "big boys". Thankfully it can now be played in DX form on the emulator so I can now try and get to grips with it.

Now I consider a Bar-X to be a low tech, so god only knows what this is as it doesn't have any nudges, just holds. The concept is that wins can be paid on five winlines, the normal three rows and two diagonals. There is also a five winline matrix of 777 on the top glass, when a 7 lands in the main reel window the corresponding 7 on the top is also lit, and these can hold over between games. That is pretty much it as far as the machine goes. Play wise wins can be quite frequent depending on mood, although of course these are usually 40p wins. Surprisingly if you hold two symbols the other does drop in quite often, including the £ and JPM's, although JPM's will usually just roll in. £4.80 is offered more infrequently usually from a hold over of the matrix on the top glass, with the last required seven dropping in.

There does appear to be a streak in this machine, with several JP's available from 777 and two lines of JPM's rolling in, mixed with other smaller wins. It is also possible to get a £4 win just from lines of £'s, and the machine can hold wins when it desires (don't worry you won't miss this, it is made perfectly obvious!).

The one thing I don't like about the machine is that I cannot seem to win anything on it. Even when streaking as such, the amount out seems to correspond with the amount in, there is no major dump of £30 say in a £10 of credits. The bank count after a win can also grate.

Overall I am coming round to this machine though, it is not the beast I once thought it was and can be good for a quick £20 when you don't feel like getting involved in an in depth feature based machine.

The layout itself is excellent thanks in part to some excellent effort by TTX with regards to the source art and correction of lamp numbers. The lamping overall is excellent and in particular I like the reel symbol showing through the glass cut out touch (missing decal on the machine), it is one of the most realistic things I have seen on an FME layout.

I also took up the now infamous "20 minute challenge" of putting the line overlays back on the 777 matrix, this version is available from www.fruitemu.co.uk if desired. Overall there isn't much to fault on the layout. You may see some black pixellation on the cash bank if you are playing on MFME3, this appears to be an emulator limitation as it doesn't appear on MFME2. If I have one complaint (and you know me I usually do) it is that I think the white behind the 7's matrix is a little bright, but this is a very minor point and down a lot to personal taste.

It is great to see Pandy being very open about this layout and inviting public tweaking too. Definitely one for your collection.

Available now from (direct link to release thread) http://www.fruitemu.co.uk/v...=1789



Now a couple of layouts very much for the Old Skool, not one but two MPU3's.

Personally I love to see a new MPU3 make it to the emulator. Not because I have any particularly fond memories of MPU3 based machines, but because I know just how hard these are to source and every release brings us ever closer to a full catalogue of complete MPU3 emulation, which can only be a good thing.

First we have a "Classic" layout by Moco and MPU_PC of Special Circle. I say "Classic" because that really does sell this layout short. It is definitely a PDX and a very good one at that.

The machine itself is very basic club machine, as you may expect from an MPU3. The released version is £50 JP. The machine has reel wins which can be gambled and a "Special Circle" feature. Obtain 7 or more on the Special Circle and you will be awarded with a reel win for every number lit, so get 8 and you get 8 reel wins for example. If you manage to get 12 (which means you need to obtain 3 3 3 3 on a single reel spin, no easy task) then you are awarded with £50 straight off the bat.

The layout itself is a delight quite frankly. I am not going to sit here and fault it at all, because it is probably the best PDX I have seen, at least in terms of its similarity to the real machine. A lot of effort has gone into this one that is clear, and it is an essential part of any enthusiasts collection. Note that there is currently some confusion over the meter settings for this machine so they may not work as expected on some versions of the emulator.

Obtain it now from (direct link to release thread) http://www.fruitemu.co.uk/v...=1793



Lastly for this round up we have a rare treat indeed, a PCP MPU3 machine called "Rock Pile". In this instance it is a Bugs and Trouty classic layout.

I have fond memories of PCP as there were many 2p play machines which offered great value for money. One in particular I am looking forward to one day is Cashcade, should the roms ever show up. Anyway I digress, how about Rock Pile? This is a machine I haven't seen before, probably because it is 10p a go and £3 JP, and holiday camp amusements in the early 80's where I had all of my initial experience with fruit machines tended to have 2p play machines.

The premise is that there are four piles of rocks, Golden Award, Nudge, Match Play and Super Series (where would a PCP machine be without the Super Series???). To obtain these features you must fill the pile of rocks, which means 6 numbers on the reels with possible feature holds to assist also. This can be quite annoying as the machine insists on this lengthy process of filling the rock piles for every number that spins in, which is just about every spin, so this does slow play down a lot. Great when you are young with limited funds to spend, a much longer game, but no so great now. The machine also sports the now legendary PCP "stake change" on gambles, so you can cut out the gamble from 1 to 2 to 3 etc to £3, to just 1 to £3 or 10p if you desire (just don't expect it to go often).

The layout is standard Bugs/Trouty, not a lot more to say, fully functional from what I have seen so far (apart from one meter error which doubles the in meter, which should be fixed shortly, or read the release thread for a fix) and well spaced, but I wouldn't say it was the best they have ever done. Given the type of machine this is though it is only ever going to look at its best as a DX, doing piles of rocks as classic lamps is never going to quite cut the mustard. Another unemulated machine ticked off the list and an essential download.

Available from (direct link to release thread) http://www.fruitemu.co.uk/v...=1796

Thanks to an incredibly busy period in my life I have fallen behind with releases somewhat, so over the next few days I will be catching up with a few releases that have appealed to me.

All I can say is thank 777 Heaven for Project Coin emulation. Many of you will remember this as a "hybird (tm)" release when Procon wasn't on the emulation table for consumption, I know I certainly remember the release but thankfully avoided it like the plague (as I do with all hybrid releases), safe in the knowledge that one day it would be available in its proper form. I have never been able to "get" the motivation behind a hybrid release, various arguments have been floated from it being the closest that we have now to just being something to do, but playing a layout that looks like a certain machine but actually plays nothing like it (in particular the sound) is like buying your favourite fondant fancies only to find they have filled the box with fig pie, it just isn't the same.

Anyway, the main thing is that after a long wait Procon was emulated, and the latest layout to cross my screen is this cracker from CompostCORNER.

The machine itself should need no introduction. Quite simply this machine was responsible for the biggest shift in arcade machine population there has ever been. The £4.80 era shifted focus from the ever increasing involvement level with £4 machines to a new easy to play, high speed gameplay type of machine that had widespread appeal with players, and for a long time Project Coin ruled the roost in this regard (at least by arcade floorspace). So much so that it wasn't uncommon to find an arcade that was populated with 25% or more just with this machine, I seem to remember a seaside arcade that had about 5 rows of them, and they were even more popular with the older generation than Bar-X, and any machine that can have that effect is certainly something special!

Although this machine has been seen with various stake/prize and JP levels, thankfully this layout has been created with a £4.80 romset on 20p play, which is the original incarnation. Indeed this could be quite an early romset, as the £2.40 win doesn't play the JP tune but a simpler shorter ditty, and if I remember correctly this was only changed later to match the JP win (to signify it was still a JP, albeit the cash one).

There have however been complaints on the forums with regards to the emulated Project machines thus far, specifically that they do not streak as they should. I can concur with this to some degree, the way the machine is currently playing indicates a "pub" style profile rather than an arcade one. Paying £30 in tokens is no big deal for an arcade machine, but in a pub you want to limit this as much as possible as you don't really want customers walking out with all your tokens. Whereas one or two JP wins are probably going to be put straight back in to the machine, collecting six in quick succession not only means the winner is going to walk off with them all (or most of them) but everyone else in the pub will then avoid the machine like the plague, so a flat profile is the order of the day. I suspect that this is a dip switch or machine switch setting that needs to be changed, particularly as on the £10 redesign of this machine (with the pull handle) it was made clear what setting the machine was on by a set of blue lit symbols on the top right of the lowest glass, proving that even for a low tech different play profiles existed. Hopefully some experimentation can be done to determine how these emulated machines need to be configured, as they all seem to be affected in the same way.

The layout itself is the latest in a line of Project Coin machines from Compost Corner, who is making quite a name for himself with this series. There isn't much to say about this layout except that it is excellent. I really like the lamping and the work that has gone in to the photos that it was created from. Of course I can find a couple of minor points (would you expect any less from me), such as the reels being a little underlit (backs are but symbols are not), the coloured speckles all over the coin mech plate (very noticeable on a TFT monitor) and the fact that for some reason key 0 doesn't enter £1 coins, but there are no reasons not to have this in your collection. Another great release from Mr Corner and an essential download.

Available now from www.fruitemu.co.uk



For many a year "Find the lady" has been the staple food for any "wooden box in the park" hustler. Simply show the queen, mix up the cards and invite the player to find the queen to double their money (these days for about £20). It takes a skillful hustler indeed to remove the card, and this type of skill is not unlike the pseudo skill you will find on a fruit machine (i.e. fixed). However thankfully you can now play a rare treat for FME fans as a game of *true* skill (yes really) comes to our screens. In this case it is a game called "Find the Queen" which I have never heard of, but it has been commented on the forums that this is probably "£10 Challenge" which I do remember.

The basic premise is, put in your money, press start and the cards will flash quickly in front of you, and you have to select the last lit card. For every one you get right you progress up the trail. However unlike your regular fruit machine where skill is usually pseudo (i.e. forget it), this machine is true skill all the way up to the £10 JP!

As expected people have already slowed this down in the emulator (thank god for modern technology!) and prooven that it is indeed true skill.

I was quite young at the time of these being released and I remember trying them a few times, without progressing very far. I think the main reason for this was that the speed really does get ridiculous, and when you are standing close by it is difficult to track what is happening due to both differing focus levels and the fact that lamps don't just switch on and off, there is a transition phase of warming up and cooling down. So in effect it is very easy to see two lamps lit at once!

Although true skill the machine cannot afford to pay out £10 for every 20p credit in real life! Therefore it does employ a number of tricks to try and trip you up. For example it will often flash the same two cards several times in quick succession making the off time very blurred! Also the more it pays out the less help it will give you, so after a couple of quick tenners do not expect to see more than a couple of the trail lamps lit when you start.

The layout itself is classic Bugs and Trouty fare, crisp, clean and fully functional. It is a machine that you will bore of very quickly on the emulator, but nevertheless it is great to see a machine of this type make it to playable form.

Available from www.fruitforums.com

A rare event indeed from me, a layout release!!

A DX for an ACE club machine called Club Money, with a £100 Jackpot.

It is my intention to release a DX for every club machine that I played whilst growing up. This is one such machine from four in total, so only about another 8 years to go before all four are released

In situ for one season, this machine was quite a departure from the machine that was in the club before it, Solid Silver 60. The sounds were a lot more basic and gameplay was significantly slower.

There appeared to be limited options when playing this machine. Although at first glance (and when you first play it) you could be forgiven for thinking that this is a machine that does not pay well, there are a number of features that can pay very well indeed. For example the fruit pot (when full) will spin a 3 or 4 of a kind win for each lit symbol, which when the single bar is lit can mean a very nice return. Also the Club Money chance gives you an all or nothing shot at the pot (there doesn't seem much point collecting the £2.40 or less when a nice pot is on offer) and the Money Trail, whilst often offering 20p, can gamble high on the cash ladder.

My experience of this machine was that it liked to save. Cash gambles tended to stop at £20 max before losing (although £50 was seen once) and most features did not pay much back. Aside from the rarer Club Money pot and even rarer Fruit Pot, little seemed to happen. However one day this all changed when the machine suddenly decided it was time to roll in some high wins, and over the course of two days four double bars rolled in, three triple bars and four single bars. This was accompanied by a £40 Club Money pot, a couple of full Fruit Pots and some nice £5-8 wins on Money Go Round. I don't claim all this went to one player (certainly not me!) but it did serve as proof that the machine was saving a large pot in the background. Overall a good machine, but not as fun to play IMHO as Solid Silver.

This layout has been created from a flyer as source material, therefore it is far from fantastic, but I have done what I could with it, as far as enthusiasm allowed. To create the lamps this layout uses a widely used technique called black masking. To be honest I am not a fan of this technique particularly, but on flyer layouts it is a good way to achieve a reasonable result. I always wanted to have a go with it and see if it was in any way difficult to do, I was at a loose end early last year so decided to give it a shot! This is the end result.

Originally created during the early part of 2005, I held off releasing it for a while due to the random reset bug that System 1 emulation had in MFME2, and to be honest I forgot about the layout also! I am pleased to say this bug is now fixed in MFME3.2 or later, so MFME3.2 is the recommended emulator of choice for this layout. Around the time I originally planned to release this Pook also announced he was working on it (and released it), so this coupled with the fact that the machine didn't work properly in the emulator meant that I kind of forgot about it until more recently (indeed the artwork on the layout is dated April 2005!).

Like I say the source art wasn't the best so don't expect a Rolls Royce layout in terms of quality, but it has turned out ok. Note that this layout may still not be 100% functional in MFME3.2, things happen in test mode that don't seem to in real mode, therefore the layout is released as is, I do not claim it is 100% finished or working, but should be functional enough. Unfortunately I do not have a real machine to compare it with.

Things I am not particularly happy with:

1. Reels, these are from the classic and are unedited, I did not have access to the original symbols to improve these further. This is not helped by the fact that the real machine used tube lighting, therefore no reel lamps is not an emulation failing.
2. Feature text
3. Some high contrast pixel crawl apparent with the cash trail
4. Possible overburn on Fruit Pot symbols
5. Transparency on the CLUB MONEY trail is not perfect

As I don't anticipate having the time to tinker with this layout further in the near future prior to a release, I am releasing as is. I may however of course return to this layout in future to update it.

I hope you enjoy this almost 100% layout!

If you find any additional problems, please post them at www.fruitemu.co.uk and I will bear them in mind for future updates.

I would like to thank Pete_W and Dialtone for the original classic layout that this DX was based on, Wizard/Dialtone for the MFME emulator and also Wizard for fixing the System 1 reset bug that left this machine partially unplayable.

You can obtain the layout by clicking "Download area" to the left, then going to the MFME 2.x or greater section. Roms for this machine if needed are available from the ROMS download section.

It's been a busy week for MDS over at the Mecca (www.fruitemu.co.uk), not only with the release of a whole new stack of classic roms that he has sourced/dumped/been donated, but the release of a classic layout too.

The layout on this occasion is Road Runner, a System 80 JPM machine. System 80 won't mean a lot to many viewers, but suffice to say it's not really something you are going to find in quantity out in the wild anymore.

I am always impressed with the ongoing efforts of the MDS-SAS/MPU3-SAS in bringing the much older machines to the emulator for us to play. It is hard enough to find Scorpion 1, MPS/2 and MPU3 machines these days, often only coming up for sale on ebay via collectors, let alone machines of this age.

So lets talk a bit about the machine. Here we have a single climbing trail with losing spaces but feature holds, similar to Barcrests Line-Up or Maygays Rovers Return. Along the trail there are boosts, nudges and cash squares, with the final square being JP (£3).

Seeing this I was already worried. Climbing trails with losing squares are usually a big turn off for me, it is all to easy to go for very long periods without landing on anything of consequence, always being one away from what you need, which can lead to an incredibly frustrating game. Initially I thought I was in for more of the same here. However having played this machine a bit more I was pleasantly surprised, thanks to the low JP the machine is quite prepared (and able of course thanks to the stake/prize ratio) to land on winning squares regularly, and the ability to gamble nudges and cash is also a big plus on this kind of machine.

Now of course if you are the kind of player who expects booming stereo sound, pulse racing high speed gambles and built in LCD feature games, this machine is going to leave you sadly wanting. If however like myself you appreciate a nice healthy dose of contrast in FME, this is definitely a machine to download and play.

The layout itself is typical MDS/MPU3 SAS, the layout is very clear, lamping is kept simple just like the machines they emulate and best of all the layout has a very good resemblance to the layout of the real machine, always a massive plus for me in a classic layout. One slightly offputting thing for me is the plum without a number on the reels, which looks like one of the numbered plums had the insides coloured in, unfortunately with a colour much darker than the numbered plums. This however is a very minor point. A very worthy addition to the layout collection from MDS.



Proof that with source material available, there are very few reasons why a classic layout resembling the real machine cannot be produced :



Now onto Top Shot. There is one thing I will never be able to doubt with Pandy and that is his complete commitment when it comes to MPU3, and this layout is no exception.

Top Shot (Barcrest) is a sister machine to Big Shot, so if you liked Big Shot, it's more of the same here. From the cabinet, it appears to be one of the later MPU3's, the same cabinet was used in a few early MPU4 machines also.

The Shoot, Nudge and Zapp on the bottom glass are lit from left to right by overprinted numbers on the reels. Already alarm bells are ringing as playing this proves that once again features like this don't really work. The trails are short and therefore very difficult to fill, and yes you have guessed it the usual "take the mickey" Barcrest code is alive and well, second O in shoot lit, first P in Zapp lit, D in Nudge lit, in spins a !, no prizes for guessing which lamp gets lit next. I did actually manage to fill Shoot a couple of times which gives you a skill chance on the trails (more like psuedo for the intial stop, then true skill for the single line skill) but the skill stops go pretty fast, and considering the wins usually on offer I decided pretty quickly that the effort involved in filling the trail plus doing the skill was better spent elsewhere.

It is a much better idea just to avoid this altogether and concentrate on reel wins. These can be exchanged for nudges with a chance of holding on over to the next credit. As it only takes 80p to get 8 nudges which leaves you just one gamble away from the £3 on the nudge trail, this is the method of choice to play this one, and you will be rewarded accordingly, just don't expect to start doing this from the off as the machine builds its percentage, you can easily put in £8 or so emulated pounds without a single gamble going past 20p. Thankfully the machine soon settles.

So how about the layout? Well its another stunner from Pandy. With MPU3 we have come to expect nothing less, and this layout shows that the dedication he has to this type of machine is as far as I am concerned second to none when it comes to MPU3 DX's. The lamping is pretty much spot on with excellent saturation and bulb effects.

Initially this was released with Reflect Tech. If you are unfamiliar with this, parts of the machine lamping are reflected onto the surrounding cabinet, However in this case I would say take my advice and download the later non-reflected version. The reflected version is completely unrealistic (although to be fair Pandy never claimed that it would be) in terms of the reflection positions on the cabinet and can be very distracting during play (particularly the three reflections on the start button which defy the laws of physics somewhat!). Taking nothing away from the effort put in to reflect tech, it just doesn't work on this machine in the same way it has worked so well on other machines Pandy has released. Pandy also recommends to turn off animated buttons in the emulator. With them on it will be obvious why, personally I just leave them on and live with it. It's a bit of a shame on the non-reflected version as a quick resize of the button windows on the lower glass would have avoided the whole button surround jumping up and down, but I guess even the best layouts have the odd issue to live with. Overall it doesn't detract at all from what is a very well polished machine.

It is clear from the past that the reels on this layout are not going to be to everyones tastes. Personally, I love them. Every time I see this type of reel on MPU3 it reminds me of a Line Up machine I played in a small holiday camp amusements in Essex. It is a great representation of the mix of ambient sunlight and the backlighting used in MPU3 machines, so it gets a big thumbs up from me.

Overall this is a great layout for a reasonable machine. It won't win the RF award for longevity due to the limited gameplay options to actually get anywhere, but the layout itself will certainly be filed away under the must haves - the effort put in to this layout certainly shows and was worth every minute. I mean look at the screen shot below - what possible graphical reason could you have for not wanting it now?

You can obtain this now from the Mecca, direct link to the thread here (the non reflect version is at the end of page 1) http://www.fruitemu.co.uk/v...=1571

If you read my last roundup you will be aware of my comments regarding the existence of a 2p/£5 Red Hot Roll machine. Amazingly* such a machine has come up on ebay.

My own views on the forums about the stunning coincidences between mentioning a machine and the machine suddenly appearing for sale are clear, you can also read my most recent take on this in "Retrofruits Rambles" with the article "The EBay Empire Strikes Back".

This particular model is 10p play, but the cash win values are the same so is probably switchable to 2p play. No real reason for posting the picture here except to just make you aware of the existence of another rarer version of a copious machine. As you can see the cash value font is obviously not authentic to the original, in fact it wouldn't look out of place on a machine like Kung Fu from ACE.

Maybe one day we will see this version of RHR roms make it to our screens, so I can once again get excited about the prospect of playing it* and have another opportunity to rant about the abysmal coding, this time probably talking about the "so rare it was probably left out of the code" RHR feature that has great delights in taking £20 to the cashbox before awarding a 60p "Red Hot Roll".

I honestly can't wait*



For those of you already salivating at the thought, heres a closer pic of the top glass where you can see the vast amounts of effort that went into ensuring the use of an authentic font*




* subject to insanity checks

With the Grand National having been run recently and Numbersixvalverde coming up trumps for yours truely on a £5 win, life couldn't get much better. That was until I saw NQ jumping up and down demanding an alpha for a lesser known ACE machine called Grand National. I am pleased to report that Pete_W did the business and the result was a new classic layout release!

It is days like today that make me remember that wasting hours, days and weeks of my life creating layouts for release is indeed all worth it. There are now very few machines left that I would like to see emulated that haven't been, and it is fair to say that this is just about the only sp.ACE based machine that I have been looking forward to. Sometimes amongst all the dross that fills an arcade you can find the odd gem that will surprise and delight you, and this machine is no exception.

When I first played Crimewatch on the emulator I was surprised to see that there was indeed another well balanced playable sp.ACE based machine that I could happily have a good evening session on. Not quite up there with Grand National, it was pretty damn close.

So what is it in particular that I like about this machine? Quite simple really. In a sea of completely unplayable ACE machines this stuck out as something great. For every manufacturer (well almost every) there are one or two absolute must plays where if I see them on my limited travels I will always play a few pounds through them, just for the chance to enjoy a little piece of history. It remains baffling how ACE managed to release so many absolutely awful programs for their machines, and as this machine has much in common with Crimewatch I can only assume it was the same team that developed both machines. If that is the case, I doff my cap to you sirs.

This machine is quite quirky, which is something that attracts me. The racket in the arcade when someone got Run Wild always made me smile, not only was it entertaining it was also nerve wracking as you waited to see what surprise awaited you. The features on this machine are also very good, Pick A Win being a good way to shortcut to the Winners Enclosure and Nudge Bolt/Run offering some very good wins also. The code is not shy when it comes to awarding payouts, often giving you enough nudges to achieve a win as opposed to one less than you need which seemed to be the fate of most ACE fare.

OK, OK, so it is clear that I love this brother to Crimewatch, so how about the layout?

The classic has been released by Frankster, and is a good reminder of how classics used to be in the early days. If you are expecting a Rolls Royce of classics, this is certainly not it. To be honest? I couldn't care less. There are times in life where the ends more than justify the means, and whereas with the well known godawful machines that are out there that need a flawless Da Vinci DX just for me to even contemplate playing it, there are equally machines that it wouldn't matter if the layout looked like something out of Tracy Emins dustbin, that's just fine with me, at least we have a fantastic machine to play. If I have to make one comment about the layout it would be that the number reel is absolutely ghastly, it looks like a resized up JPM Rollercoaster reel, and given that this layout had some assistance from CC (of Crimewatch classic fame) it is surprising that it doesn't use the same reel, as the styles in real life are very similar.

Anyway, enough of all that, this is a classic of a must have machine for your collection, end of.

Available now from www.fruitemu.co.uk and www.fruitforums.com (look for the Grand National release thread, the layout is attached to it).



So moving swiftly on, we have a DX of a more recent Crystal machine called Hot Dogs, which is a £1k JP club machine.

Yes that's really all you need to know about it to know that it probably isn't going to be worth any of your time, and to be honest, it hasn't been worth any of mine. It was really the Hot Dogs theme that got me interested in downloading it, could it actually be possible that a more recent machine could proudly carry the flag for it's classic namesake? Well the fact that the original was a 20p/£6 JP machine and this is a 50p/£1k JP machine says it all, no, it can't.

It appears to be built around a similar codebase to Viva Rock Vegas and Thunderbirds, in otherwords just play for max Winspins and hope for the best. Me? I couldn't be bothered. However much I tried to force myself to play on I just couldn't, I had to break up some branches from a small tree in the front garden which was more than enough of an excuse to shut this down once I had obtained my first (very brief) feature.

So good luck to you if you like this kind of thing, I have more motivation to go fox hunting than I do for playing this (and for that I have no motivation whatsoever).

The layout itself is good, the two holes in the top left are a dead giveaway that this was a flyer (or the graphics that would have made it onto a flyer at least), as just about every JPM flyer I have has the same holes. Unfortunately some nice lamping and reels just cannot save an awful codebase.

The machine is bought to you by Fido & Co, and I really can't be bothered to type anymore about this machine. £1k, JPM style, more than enough to put me off for life.

If you really do want to download it, try www.fruitforums.com.



So how about this one then, a new DX of Cash Connect released at DX'Cellent. Our friend Mr Pook after releasing what at one stage seemed to be about 20 layouts per day, settled in to a "two a month" schedule. However like anyone reading this who has had children will know (myself included), FME means nothing when you have a screaming baby demanding your attention dozens of times per day, and as such this is the first release at DX'Cellent for a few months. Quantity of course means nothing in FME, it's quality, which I am happy to say this layout has.

Some lovely lamping (albeit not always accurate) as ever, this is now the layout of choice for Cash Connect fans. Me? The machine is not really my thing. Infinitely better than the last machine above, I never really got on with this type of Barcrest. Trying to glean a win of any consequence out of these machines is an effort in itself, most likely you will just get very low wins offered most of the time, a sneak preview of what was to come in the next generation of code.

One nice thing was the Mr Do! style tune for the JP, but you will hear this so infequently it may as well not exist.

The layout is self is nice, clean, clear and lamped very well. The source material is not the best and this does show through with some obvious grain, but this is more than a worthy addition to any collection.

You can get it from www.dxcellent.com



So far this is nowhere near the most positive update I have posted, but this is far from the layout authors fault. The next machine unfortunately is no exception to this, and things appear to be getting steadily worse.

Here we go, with Crap Hot Roll. Now when this machine was intitially out and about, crap hot absolutely meant that something was fantastic. Thankfully some years later I have moved on, and crap is once again what it should be.

Here we have a 1600 resolution layout of "Classic" Red Hot Roll released by Ploggy. So lets talk about the machine first of all.

For me this machine symbolises everything that is wrong with Barcrest coding. It appears deliberately designed to alienate players in the worst way possible. Picture this, you are in an arcade, it is getting late, you are £150 down on the day, £70 of which has gone into "Red Hot" Roll. It is reasonable to expect that after so much in, a large payout is just around the corner. Obviously you must have caught the machine just after a previous large payout, hence why you have had to invest so much. You probably don't expect to get your money back, but you do expect to get a chunk of it back.

Woo hoo! It's five minutes before closing and after chasing a Red Hot Roll for getting on for two hours on and off, it finally nudges in. Lets get spinning in those £10 multiples, collect and breathe a sigh of relief. Except of course, that the "Red Hot" Roll you have been chasing so hard and for so long, spins you mixed sevens. Then another mixed sevens. Already you can feel your stomach sink below the pits of hell, as another mixed sevens rolls in and the feature ends. £3. You hear the dreaded "no more credits please", you whack in the £3 quickly, get nothing back but empty spins, then leave the arcade once again dejected for the five mile walk home in the rain.

It's quite simple Barcrest, players expect to be rewarded for obtaining the top feature, that can be oh so hard to get. Is it really so difficult to code a minimum £3 for mixed, £5 for blue and £10 for Red rolls, especially given that said rolls can be so impossibly hard to achieve? Where is the logic in a mixed roll suddenly paying 10 times more than the Red Hot Roll that went before it?

The fact is that Barcrest fails the player in this regard, and fails them big time. I am a firm believer that the payout of a feature should reflect how difficult it is to achieve it, both in time and investment. If you are willing to play hard ball to its conclusion, you should be rewarded accordingly. So unlike Rollercoaster, Crazy Fruits, The Simpsons, Pure Madness, or umpteen other manufacturers machines, Barcrest are more than happy to cheat you and award you a piddling win with absolutely no regard for how hard it was to achieve the so called "ultimate feature" the machine has to offer. Something that you no doubt still see even today in Barcrest "streak" type machines like Gold Rush (although the word streak is a very loose term indeed).

So, rant over. Almost. See I knew just how bad this machine is, and I keep promising myself that no matter how many more versions the slaves of FME belch forward, I will not download and play them - and just as before, I just can't help myself and I have to download and play them, just to see if somehow this romset may just be different. Ever the dillusional player I guess.

So on to the layout. Its a 1600 release which thanks to the wonders of MFME3 means that you can play it at a good size no matter what resolution you use, but to get the best effect you do need to play it at 1600, or at least turn off resize in the emulator temporarily. The increase in clarity is rewarding, however nothing can get away from the fact that this is low cost flyer based artwork, and no matter how much extra time could have been put into this nothing would improve it much more than it is already, unless you are willing to get into the realms of redrawing.

So overall I am happy to take it at face value, and there is some good contrast lamping with excellent saturation levels. Two things do let this one down, firstly the pink background which would look much better as a darker colour, and the second being the ROLL lamps themselves on the top glass which appear very flat and not "lamped" as such. There is also noticeable pixel jumping on my screen between the grey, red and blue states, but this may be my monitor. Another very small point is the obvious "flashing outline" on the RED HOT ROLL (the one that lights when you get RED HOT ROLL) during a JP sequence. It is the same boxing that I have seen on Wild Zone and appears to be emulator related, with layered lamps. Not much that can be done with that one at present I guess.

So there you have it, another RHR machine for your collection. Unfortunately I know for a fact that there are other versions of this around, including a quite bizarre 2p/£5 version that I saw at a small holiday camp amusements several years ago. So no doubt another version will turn up at some stage, and I will be compelled yet again to download and try it, in the pointless quest to find a RHR machine that doesn't take the mickey out of the person who plays it. I doubt my quest will ever be fruitful.

Get the layout if you desire from www.fruit-emu.com



Good god, it's 12:52am, I have to be up early for work and here I am wasting time I could be putting to much better effect (like sleeping) on reviewing one of the worst machines ever released.

The fact is that sleeping is infinitely preferable to playing this next machine. Globals "Spotted Dick". The machine that attempts to take Carry On style innuendo and push the boundaries of what can be got away with in a Fruit Machine. Which of course is mildly amusing for the first five minutes, then downright annoying forever after.

So the positives. Are there any? Well one, in that the design of the machine graphically and aurally is very good. It appears to be another of those classic instances where the design and concept teams were let down badly by the coding teams.

So here you have a machine that attempts to take the best parts of Maygays The Great Escape and The Italian Job (i.e. blatantly rip of the feature) and apply it to the "unique" style of Global Games.

I can 100% categorically state that I detest Global Games machines, and it is all thanks to this particular machine in real life which was one of their first, and the awesome delights of "Bangin' Away" on the emulator.

The feature goes something like this:

1. Determine how much I am willing to offer the player. Either nothing, £2, £3, one less than JP or JP.
2. Quickly build up to that level.
3. Die.

Ho, ho ho. What delights we can have with this one then. A machine that basically follows the structure of die, die, die, die, die, die, die, die, die x 10, JP, die, die, die, die, die x 25, JP + repeat. So you are basically playing all out for the JP repeater, which on a good day (about once every 25 years) may pay you several JP's in succession. This is great for showing off a huge bank collect in an arcade, but makes for an absolutely awful emulated game.

OK, so come on, I am not that stupid. I know that there are plenty of machines out there from other manufacturers that follow the same kind of pattern - but at least they *try* and give you a good go on the feature. You will be killed off the same way on this machine so many times (often without any kind of win) that it will seem life is pointless. Whereas a machine like The Italian Job will get to the £5 block, give you a ? which may hi-lo gamble, win, spin you to an equipment square, spin you to a nudge square, spin you to another equipment square, give you a ? and die, The Global Code basically says "right, £5, that's it, goodbye", so no matter what you have, no matter what the machine could offer you in addition without taking you over the block (like a takeaway square or an extra nudge, or an extra feature that will still only pay the same), its tough, you are dead. Which with an extra life will mean spin to ?, get hi-lo gamble, lose, use extra life, spin to another ?, get hi-lo gamble, die. Over and over and over again.

Right so why in gods name did I download this then? Well in all fairness it looked like a great layout, and I thought that I could get my "revenge" on the machine absolutely free of all charge. Problem is that it really is like getting teeth pulled with rusty pliers, absolutely excrutiating to play.

So on to the layout itself. The first downside is that you need to use BFMulator to play it, which is disappointing now that MFME has support for this tech. This unfortunately means that everything becomes square, reels have to have weird perspectives vs the cabinet, and button lamps with any kind of angle have lovely tail wagging shadow effects appearing out of thin air (keep an eye on the start button flashing!).

None of this of course is the layout authors fault (DAD in this instance, not my DAD, the FME DAD who is not the DAD of FME, if you follow) as these are emulator restrictions.

I am happy to say that if you like this machine (there must be someone out there who enjoys this kind of coding) then this layout is quite simply beautiful. The lamping is first class, the reels look lovely and it is absolutely clear that it has had some first class work put into it. I would be more than happy to add this to my collection if it wasn't for the horrific code.

So we have kind of come full circle, from proof that for a fantastic machine it doesn't matter if the layout has the graphical prowess of the original Nifty Fifty layout, to proof that no matter how good a DX is, if the machine is dreadful then there is still no real point to it.

With that kind sirs and madames, I bid you goodnight.

Layout is available from DADs FME, or posted on the www.fruitemu.co.uk thread.

A flurry of activity over at the Mecca at the moment regarding an older machine called "Crazy Crocs". Not a machine I am personally familiar with but given the positive remarks in the thread I am now looking forward to seeing what all the fuss is about. At first glance it appears to be Scorpion 1 based in the same cabinet as Spectre.

The machine has been bought by a consortium of members and will be picked up in the next few days, for emulation hopefully soon after.

Since the fabled PE No.1 fiasco of old there have been several successful team efforts to bring machines to the masses, a couple of which I have been involved in myself including my recent DX of Spectre and the purchase of the infamous "spinning dice" version of Only Fools and Horses. It is pleasing to know that the scene has moved on from that isolated incident and more members are now willing to be involved in public collaborations.

The seller of this machine doesn't appear to be a known FME user however it is worth commenting that it does remain disappointing that members of FME have machines that they are not willing to supply resources for, instead ebaying the machine for others to pay and then resource. Given the amount of effort that has gone into providing resources for people to download machines free of charge, it is unfortunate that some people are unwilling to give something back. I myself have been victim to this, purchasing a machine from someone who turned out to be a regular FME "eater", and even commented as such at the pickup (although he wasn't aware of who I was).

Here is hoping that the buy progresses well and the machine is in good working DX'able order.

Only a low quality ebay pic to show you, but it may jog a few memories.

Another flurry of releases that tickled my particular fancy.

Firstly its another previously unemulated machine from our colleagues at M1Adness - Classic Monopoly. Like me, it is probably not a machine that rings any bells, mostly as it is unlikely that you ever saw one. Mostly confined to Bingo Halls only, this is an attempt by Maygay at a lower tech machine based on the very popular Monopoly licence - and it appears to work very well. It has a few quirks which are quite shocking for a Maygay, including holding the JP. It is good to see that although other Maygay machines at the time tended to stick with the tried and tested gameplay options, the designers of this machine appear to have put their necks on the line and given the code a more unique identity.

Two versions of the layout are available, for the more regular £6 token JP and those masochists amongst you who like playing all cash £3.

Available now from madness.fruitemu.co.uk



Next up is a quick return to that BFM machine Double Chance. No sooner had I looked at the classic and hoped for a DX, than Ploggy comes up with the goods with a monster 1600 resolution DX via glass scans from Leeham.

Having played it I still cannot say that I am a great fan of the machine, although the problems with the skill stop have been fixed thanks to the different colours on the trail compared with the classic.

As for the DX, it is not bad but I wouldn't say exceptional. On my 19" monitor the flaws do show up more easily, for example the glass/perspex panels are in need of slight sharpening as they are too soft, and at 1600 resolution there isn't really an excuse not to have an absolutely pin sharp display particularly as these are from scans, greater clarity being one of the main arguments for the move to 1280 layouts let alone 1600.

Lamping is good overall, but it is disappointing not to see transparency used more. It keeps catching my eye in attract mode on the Double Chance graphic at the base of the machine, but I guess that is not an essential part of the layout anyway and is missing at 1280 if you run without resize mode on (which is recommended). Also the surround of the machine could do with being a dark colour to make the machine stand out more, the use of graduated light blue to white only detracts from the machine, and the machine should really be the star. I suspect however that this is directly copied from the flyer...

My main bugbear with the layout is the reels. On these machines it is the symbol that is lit not the surround. I know from experience that lighting reels is not great in the emulator with reel masks as there isn't currently a way to mask off the white surround as there is with standard lamps, but this layout has it all upside down, with the surround lit and the symbols very flat and not lit at all. This is a particular problem with the grape with BONUS on it, the first few times I got this I couldn't honestly see where the bonus was coming from.

Overall I don't want to sound too negative about the layout as it is a fine piece of work, it could just do with a little fine tuning. Definitely still one to add to your collection though - although if you are like me then your brain will soon become confused by the slightly strange perspective angles, its as though you are only 4 ft tall when playing!

Released at The Mecca but with a download link to www.fruit-emu.com



Finally we have a rare event indeed, an ACE sp.ACE hi tech machine release. In this instance it is a machine called Crimewatch and has been given the classic treatment by Compost Corner.

At first glance I couldn't remember this one at all, but after thinking about it I am pretty sure I have played it, just once, in a pub long ago. I remember levels and rooms, and the machine streaking for £30 (good streaks always help you remember, as opposed to the darkest days which the mind tends to cloud). I may be getting completely the wrong end of the stick (the stripper in the same pub on another occasion is slightly more memorable!) but regardless, this is not a machine I saw in any quantity.

This version is no exception to the memories of that day, with a good streak almost from the minute you load it. It is a shame to see a quality machine like this overshadowed by what were more well known but extremely inferior releases from ACE. Crimewatch is proof that a great well balanced game with a great streak wasn't out of reach of the development team, so it is surprising that so many poor programs were released for their other fruits. If you compare this with the ultra blocking ultra skill cheating low tech cousins, taking £30 without a win and giving it back slowly, it is somewhat paradoxical that those machines were more popular with players. Still, at least now you can all see the truth at last

The layout itself is clean, clear and colourful. It is nice to know that the distant days of bland classics are long behind us, just have DX's have moved on to another level so have classic layouts. The layout itself doesn't closely match the graphics of the original machine which is one downside, but having seen a small pic of the real thing I am not surprised! Another excellent addition to the collection from Compost

Available now from www.fruitemu.co.uk

Or should that be Seven Heaven? Anyway never mind, the important thing now is that the site move has been completed, so I can get back to telling you about the releases I have been playing recently. Before I start, all these releases have been announced at www.fruitemu.co.uk and download links are available from there in the new releases section.

Firstly, Pandy has been busy creating a new release for Barcode using the original flyer, the original layout having been redrawn from scratch. Now this puts me in a bit of a dilemma. As many of you will know I am a strong advocate of authenticity, but we now have a situation where we have a redrawn Barcode that is graphically stunning but not wholly authentic (for example it uses Barcrest style 7's), but on the other hand we have a flyer DX which is more authentic but of lower quality (as Pandy admits, it is far from ideal). So which one am I happier playing? Well to be honest the answer is both for now. Partly because I have grown quite attached to the original release, but I do like playing the more authentic release also, even though it is not as graphically alluring (the decal symbols being the worst affected). Tough call to be honest, I am going to have to sit on the fence for this one and hope that now a machine is available, it can be photo'd or scanned and another higher quality authentic release is made!



Now on to the classic releases. FME has been through a few weeks of drought recently, but in the last couple of weeks we have seen several classics released. Here are the ones I have been playing.

Firstly we have a Bugs and Trouty release of a BFM machine called Double Chance. Anyone familiar with the original BFM Cash Explosion type machine, this is more of the same with a little twist. The standard trail has now been split on the feature levels, and progression depends on the colour of the number you spin on the number reel. It is fantastic to see rare machines like this being emulated, and my personal thanks go to Leeham for the work he has put in bringing the resources for this to the masses.

So what do I think of the machine itself? Well to be honest with you it is somewhat strange. The mix of sound effects used make me think that I am in some kind of medicated haze in an asylum. They seem very random and disjointed to me. As for the feature, I am not a great fan of it to be honest with you. The split levels seem to be implemented as a way to keep you from obtaining the features you need when you need them, and it can be quite frustrating to play. The skill stop is also quite hard on this, as you have less point of reference compared with the original artwork, with the classic lamps all merging into each other at high speed. For now although another great classic layout I will stick with Cash Explosion, but I eagerly await the future DX of this to revisit.



Moving swiftly on, and we have a classic for a Project Coin machine called Sevens Above. This has been released by Spa.

Firstly if you are expecting the streaks and fast play of 777 Heaven, forget it. This machine plays to a much flatter profile and the reel spins take longer. It is pretty obvious that this was designed to take advantage of the 777 Heaven fever that was around at the time of the original machine release, with the inclusion of a little twist. When offered, you are able to swap the middle reel for the symbol shown on the top reel, and if you do swap you are then able to nudge up one reel. This has several advantages and disadvantages. The advantage being that sometimes high wins can come out of nowhere at all, example today being a blue seven below the first reel, a blue seven above the third reel, and no blue sevens offered on the high reel, but three nudges given. The second swap was for a single bar which put a blue seven above the second reel, and with the nudge up offered it was an easy (albeit unexpected) JP. The main disadvantage of this is that often you will keep being offered useless symbols to swap to with no chance of making a win, and this can go on for quite a while with the machine offering half a dozen swaps, each one for the symbol that you had one swap before.

I was spanked a few times by this machine in real life, with a large investment for a streak that never came, and I didn't ever see it streak. At least you can play this for free now, but in real life I would recommend you stick with 777 Heaven (of which there are plenty still around, compared with very very few of this, which tells a story in itself).

Spa has done quite well with what I think is his first Project release, however the version I downloaded has the wrong JP decal (says £4.80 instead of £6), the high reel spins the wrong way and the files for the layout say Sevens and Melons, which these days are basic errors that shouldn't get past testing. Hopefully Spa can improve the minor points for the next layout.

Edit: There is an updated download available at the Mecca www.fruitemu.co.uk which may fix some or all of the above faults.



Last but by no means least we have the pick of the recent classic crop as far as I am concerned, an original £4.80 romset classic release of an ACE machine called Hi Flyer, bought to you by Pete_W and Compost Corner. I would wager that the majority of you reading would not have played a £4.80/20p play ACE machine in real life, probably the closest being a £6.00/20p play, if indeed you are old enough to remember these machines at all. If so, give yourself a treat and download this layout as it really epitomises what made the original machines so great.

Personally I also played very, very few original £4.80/20p play ACE machines, and received quite a few beatings on £6 versions before I just stopped playing them altogther, abandoned as a lost cause. However playing this release shows me that the dark and distant past was actually the ACE Garden of Eden.

I don't really need to say much more about this, just download it and learn how it plays. Then try a £6/20p machine from this series and see how just about every method you have learnt to get enjoyment out of these has been removed or blocked for 99.99% of gameplay, then imagine playing £50 of your real money on these in real life. Quite a sobering thought.

The layout itself is great, just to my kind of taste with clean and clear placings and use of colours. The shaped reel windows are excellent to allow the display of a single reel number, however the reel symbols themselves could be improved and I am not sure why the JP decal uses white sevens in the top left when the reels have blue sevens, hopefully this will be worked on before a DX release.

At last!

Not a lot else I can say. Regular FME viewers may recall Pandy releasing a DX of the all time classic BFM machine "Barcode", the machine that really did start it all with the triple bar, double bar, single bar reel combination which has been infinitely imitated. Unfortunately said release although graphically fantastic, was missing the most important element of all, sampled sound.

Thankfully now thanks to the efforts of Wizard and an ebay purchase (I am still quite amazed that a Barcode ever came up for sale, but it is proof that there is always hope) you can now play said layout with sounds!

Over at www.fruitemu.co.uk there is a Barcode thread containing both the sound roms and a new .gam for BFeMulator posted by myself which adds the necessary entries.

Finally this machine can be enjoyed as it was meant to be :)

Some other good news is that Pandy is also working on a new version of Barcode, so expect more of the same excellent quality.

A direct link to the thread containing the downloads is here : http://www.fruitemu.co.uk/v...=1461

The bar gets raised again with a fantastic DX by Pandy of Twilight Zone. This is one of the clearest DX's I have ever played, and although I am not an amazing lover of the machine itself this layout makes it a pleasure to play. An essential addition to anyones collection.

There is also a classic layout of Jumping Jacks by Bugs and Trouty. The layout is a fine release as ever, but as for the machine, you may as well start next years tax return early, it will be far more enjoyable than playing this machine which gives a whole new meaning to the flatness of pancakes.

In contrast to the abominable Jacks, we have another DX from Compost Corner, Project Coins Jackpot 7's. Another fine work of art and another must have for your collection.

All are available now from www.fruitemu.co.uk

It has been just a few short hours since the release of MFME Player 3.2, yet there are already releases to take advantage of it.

Firstly we have a classic by Pete_W of Twilight Zone, an ACE sp.ACE machine. Not my favourite series of machines by a long chalk, but worth downloading to at least try and find out why every machine you came across in the wild was as dead as a portion of crispy duck. As ever a very clean and clear layout from Pete

You can get this now from the downloads section at www.fruitemu.co.uk



Secondly a release of a particular favourite of mine, a classic of Manhattan Skylines. Released when the stake/prize ratio was at its optimum of 20p/£4.80, here is a classic example of how best to produce a fruit machine. Highly entertaining with plenty going on all the time, and a non-cheating skill stop to boot. Well worth half an hour of anyones time this evening.

You can get this now from the downloads section at madness.fruitemu.co.uk

MFME Player has been updated to v3.2 today. This release fixes a few minor bugs from v3.1 as well as some tweaking under the hood.

Original post by Wizard at www.fruitemu.co.uk

As no more bugs seem to have been reported, it's time to release v3.2 which fixes the following:

SpACE lamp issues
Game directory scanning
ASIN exception with Cash Connect
Extra dots in filenames
Not saving throttle value
Yellow blob buttons fixed

My apologies if anything else that has been mentioned has not made it into this release.

Enjoy

Wizard.

You can get it now from here : http://www.fruitemu.co.uk/v...d=203

An excellent DX of Crazy Pays has caught my eye today. It has been produced by CompostCorner and is available for download over at www.fruitemu.co.uk.

Unfortunately the roms are still dire (no nudge for bar and crazy with hold or seven with double seven and hold), so hopefully this can be addressed in future with some fresh roms.

Tha layout itself is first class with some excellent chrome and reflective work, and is up there with the best of them. Give your eyes a treat and download now!

Spectre DX has had a minor update to fix a lamp numbering problem with the Fruit Lines feature. With thanks to Wearecity and Ploggy at www.fruitemu.co.uk for their assistance with this.

The existing layout has been replaced with v1.1, use the same download link as previously to obtain.

A DX for a fantastic BFM machine called Spectre. Note that this must be played on the newly released MFME 3.1 - earlier emulators do not play the layout correctly and you may get incorrect reels displayed.

The machine uses the full height of a 1280x1024 display, so you may wish to f9 your meter bar away or set your start bar to autohide if you want to see the whole (non essential for gameplay) SPECTRE logo at the bottom.

Dedication
========

This layout is dedicated to Leeham. Leeham is a quieter member of FME who has sourced a large amount of resources for the scene, and continues to do so without complaint or incident. Spectre is one of his all time favourite machines and it was a pleasure to complete this work to a high standard to do it justice for him. Many of the layouts that you play today would not have been possible without the hard work of Leeham behind the scenes, and this layout is the least that could be done to acknowledge the investment that Leeham has made over the last few years.

Roms if required are available from the ROMS download section.

Get the layout here: http://www.retrofruit.co.uk...cat=4