Happy Birthday LanMan247

IndyDDR's online socialization center: general topics not related to specific coverage areas

Moderator: Moderators

Post Reply
User avatar
Merk
Lady Banned Son of Switzerland
Lady Banned Son of Switzerland
Posts: 8274
Joined: Wed Feb 02, 2005 9:33 am
Location: Bloomington / Ft. Wayne
Contact:

Happy Birthday LanMan247

Post by Merk » Wed Mar 31, 2010 7:58 am

This is a tribute to LanMan247 who turns 25 today. This nugget of information is this poster's only post:
Hey, some of you may know me. My name is Chris Platzer (a.k.a. LANman247), and I'm the one who has hacked/fixed/upgraded/etc the DDR Extreme and ITG2 machines at Putt-Putt Golf and Games. I've been told a few times that I should post here, so I figured I would post any information here that you guys might want to know, or that I think you should know about the machines. Even though I've been away at school, and it seems the machine dance scene has been dying down a bit, I do what I can to keep the machines up-to-date and able to present new content for us players that still love to play. I also want to give credit to Kyle, who works at Putt-Putt and physically maintains the machines, replacing sensors, buttons, monitors, etc. More arcades need guys like him, he's helped us stay alive by allowing me to do to the machines what I need to, and by listening to our complaints and requests. Anyway, now to the business...

Last year, the DDR Extreme machine had been broken for several months so I offered to convert it into a Stepmania cabinet. Putt-Putt liked the idea, so I had Kyle use a J-PAC to interface the cabinet and a PC, which was actually an old Boxor from when the machine was an ITG2 upgrade. We also used an ArcadeVGA card to interface the monitor properly. I set the machine up with Katze's Extreme theme, and gave Putt-Putt my collection of DDR-mix ONLY songs from the Purdue Music Gaming Club (which I've been running at Purdue, if you're down there and interested). I wanted to make the machine feel like an Extreme machine, since that's what it was prior to it breaking down, and chose to restrict the mixes to DDR only (the ITG machine is for the miscellaneous songs).

Side note: Both machines have been synced as accurately as possible, compensating for lag from the different hardware present in each one. For the DDR machine, I have synced it using the Audio Calibration feature from the ITG PC Demo. For the ITG2 machine, I have synced it using the SyncMachine feature of StepMania along with the sync audio+stepfile I ripped from the ITG PC Demo. SyncMachine isn't as good of a method as Audio Calibration, but I've synced the machine as accurate as possible with it.

Because I'm only in Fort Wayne a few months out of the year, I've converted the ITG2 machine to an OpenITG machine. This makes it easy for Kyle to add songs and make changes to the machine. We're still using the PIU-IO circuitry for pad and light control. I've been keeping the machine up-to-date with the latest builds as they are released, and I've made it capable of properly signing your profiles on your flash drives so that they're compatible with Groovestats. As of right now we're running the pre-beta build of OpenITG, and I've changed the theme to ITG3OG pre-release. I believe that the theme is really well done, and is the next step for all ITG2 machines, but I will leave that up to you. If the majority of you don't like it, tell me and I will revert my changes. I have increased the menu timer to 120 seconds, and have added plenty of speed mods to make everyone happy. The reason the timer isn't turned off is because people will walk up to the machine, play one song and walk away, leaving the machine stuck on the song wheel. This annoys the hell out of the staff, who must tend to the machine to end the round.

Kyle and I are working on a drop-in replacement for the sensors in, at least, the ITG2 machine. We've designed the replacement pack using pressure sensors with a series of op-amps, instead of the simple "floor sensors" that are in virtually every machine dance game. We're doing this in hopes that we can have more accurate, longer-lasting, trigger threshold-adjustable sensors for the dance games. I'll post back here to let you know what our results are.

If you have any questions about the machines, or requests (although I can't ever make promises), please post here or contact me in person. I'll be in Fort Wayne until the end of February, but I will be living in Germany from then until August, so any major changes should be taken care of now.

Oh yes, and I've been told Putt-Putt is planning on purchasing one of the new Guitar Hero machines when they come out.
Informative, well thought out, and executed beautifully. This is a stunning example of an excellent first (and only) post. Let's all offer him our hearty congratulations as he adds another notch to the great belt we call life.
Image

User avatar
Fluffyumpkins
Moderator
Moderator
Posts: 6592
Joined: Wed Feb 02, 2005 1:53 pm

Re: Happy Birthday LanMan247

Post by Fluffyumpkins » Wed Mar 31, 2010 9:37 am

I heard he never came back from Germany.

User avatar
chocobojoe
Heavy
Heavy
Posts: 2455
Joined: Wed Feb 02, 2005 1:43 pm
Location: Fort Wayne

Re: Happy Birthday LanMan247

Post by chocobojoe » Wed Mar 31, 2010 10:03 am

He came back from Germany. He pretty much lives at Purdue and DJ's on the weekends.

User avatar
Merk
Lady Banned Son of Switzerland
Lady Banned Son of Switzerland
Posts: 8274
Joined: Wed Feb 02, 2005 9:33 am
Location: Bloomington / Ft. Wayne
Contact:

Re: Happy Birthday LanMan247

Post by Merk » Wed Mar 31, 2010 10:18 am

chocobojoe wrote:He came back from Germany. He pretty much lives at Purdue and DJ's on the weekends.
Joe you're so good at fake posting I can't tell if you're being serious or not.

I have never met Mr. Man247 but I'm happy for him and wish him all the best.
Image

User avatar
DAVE101
ITG4LYFE
ITG4LYFE
Posts: 905
Joined: Fri Jun 06, 2008 9:25 pm
Location: Bloomington/Westfield
Contact:

Re: Happy Birthday LanMan247

Post by DAVE101 » Wed Mar 31, 2010 1:57 pm

chocobojoe wrote:He came back from Germany. He pretty much lives at Purdue and DJ's on the weekends.
He speaketh the truth
Image

User avatar
Merk
Lady Banned Son of Switzerland
Lady Banned Son of Switzerland
Posts: 8274
Joined: Wed Feb 02, 2005 9:33 am
Location: Bloomington / Ft. Wayne
Contact:

Re: Happy Birthday LanMan247

Post by Merk » Wed Mar 31, 2010 2:47 pm

Well that's neat. Someone get him to tell us about his experiences in the Fajaland

Specifically in this thread
Image

Post Reply