Manufacturers

Loading

Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu)

  1. Game infos
  2. Parent and Clones
  3. Sound
  4. Driver
  5. Inputs
  6. Controls
  7. Display
  8. Dipswitchs
  9. Roms list
  10. Chips list
  11. Serie
  12. Categories
  13. MAMEinfo
  14. History
  15. High scores
Download mooncrst.zip (25 KB)
Snapshot

Game infos

Description Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu)
Name mooncrst
Manufacturer Nichibutsu
Year 1980
Runnable yes
System arcade /
Number of players 2P alt
Added to MAME .009
Romset size 25 KB
Romset file 13 files
Romset zip 16 B
Language English
Evaluation 70 to 80 (Good)
Genre Shooter

Parent and clones

Parent This game is the parent

Sound infos

Sound_channels 1

Driver infos

Driver status good
Driver emulation good
Driver color good
Driver sound good
Driver graphic good
Driver cocktail
Driver protection
Driver savestate yes

Inputs infos

Input service no
Input tilt no
Input players 2
Input buttons
Input coins 2

Controls infos

type ways minimum maximum sensitivity keydelta reverse
joy 2 no

Display infos

type rotate flipx width height refresh pixclock htotal hbend hbstart vtotal vbend vbstart
raster 90 no 768 224 60.606061 18432000 1152 0 768 264 16 240

Dipswitchs

Roms list

console name bios size crc md5 merge sha1 region offset status optional
arcade mc1 2048 7d954a7a a93ee403cfd7887538ad12d33f6dd6c71bea2a32 maincpu 0 good no
arcade mc2 2048 44bb7cfa 349c2e23a9fce73f95bb8168d369082fa129fe3d maincpu 800 good no
arcade mc3 2048 9c412104 1b40054ebb1ace965a8522119bb23f09797bc5f6 maincpu 1000 good no
arcade mc4 2048 7e9b1ab5 435f603c0c3e788a509dd144a7916a34e791ae44 maincpu 1800 good no
arcade mc5.7r 2048 16c759af 3b48050411f65f9d3fb41ff22901e22d82bf1cf6 maincpu 2000 good no
arcade mc6.8d 2048 69bcafdb 939c8c6ed1cd4660a3d99b8f17ed99cbd7e1352a maincpu 2800 good no
arcade mc7.8e 2048 b50dbc46 4fa084fd1ba5f78e7703e684c57af15ca7a844e4 maincpu 3000 good no
arcade mc8 2048 18ca312b 39219059003b949e38305553fea2d33071062c64 maincpu 3800 good no
arcade mcs_a 2048 631ebb5a 5bc9493afa76c55858b8c8849524cbc77dc838fc gfx1 1000 good no
arcade mcs_b 2048 fb0f1f81 38a6679a8b69bc1870a0e67e692131c42f9535c8 gfx1 0 good no
arcade mcs_c 2048 24cfd145 08c6599db170dd6ee364c44f70a0f5c0f881b6ef gfx1 1800 good no
arcade mcs_d 2048 13932a15 b8885c555c6ad7021be55c6925a0a0872c1b6abd gfx1 800 good no
arcade mmi6331.6l 32 6a0c7d87 140335d85c67c75b65689d4e76d29863c209cf32 proms 0 good no

Chips list

name tag type clock
DISCRETE discrete audio
Galaxian Audio Custom cust audio
Speaker speaker audio
Z80 maincpu cpu 3072000

Serie

Serie : Moon Cresta
  1. Eagle (set 1) (1980)
  2. Eagle (set 2) (1980)
  3. Eagle (set 3) (1980)
  4. Fantazia (bootleg?) (1980)
  5. Moon Cresta (Electrogame S.A. Spanish bootleg) (1980)
  6. Moon Cresta (Galaxian hardware) (1980)
  7. Moon Cresta (bootleg set 2) (1980)
  8. Moon Cresta (bootleg set 3) (1980)
  9. Moon Crest (Moon Cresta bootleg) (1980)
  10. Moon Cresta (bootleg set 1) (1980)
  11. Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu) (1980)
  12. Moon Cresta (Gremlin) (1980)
  13. Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu, old rev) (1980)
  14. Moon Cresta (SegaSA / Sonic) (1980)
  15. Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu USA, unencrypted) (1980)
  16. Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu UK) (1980)
  17. Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu UK, unencrypted) (1980)
  18. Space Dragon (Moon Cresta bootleg, set 1) (1980)
  19. Space Dragon (Moon Cresta bootleg, set 2) (1980)
  20. Steraranger (Moon Cresta bootleg) (1980)
  21. Moon Cresta (Petaco S.A. Spanish bootleg) (1980?)
  22. Super Moon Cresta (Gremlin, bootleg) (1980?)
  23. Space Thunderbird (1981?)
  24. Eagle (1983)
  25. Eagle (1983)
  26. Terra Cresta (YM3526 set 1) (1985)
  27. Terra Cresta (YM3526 set 3) (1985)
  28. Terra Cresta (YM2203) (1985)
  29. Terra Cresta (YM3526 set 2) (1985)
  30. Ufo Robo Dangar (4/07/1987) (1986)
  31. Ufo Robo Dangar (9/26/1986) (1986)
  32. Eagle (1986)
  33. Moon Cresta (1986)
  34. Moon Cresta (1986)
  35. Moon Cresta (UK) (1986)
  36. Eagle (1987)
  37. Terra Force (1987)
  38. Terra Force (Japan, bootleg set 2) (1987)
  39. Terra Force (Japan) (1987)
  40. Terra Force (Japan, bootleg with additional Z80) (1987)
  41. Terra Force (US) (1987)
  42. Moon War (Moon Cresta bootleg) (198?)
  43. Starfighter (Moon Cresta bootleg) (198?)
  44. Moon Cresta & Terra Cresta (1992)
  45. Eagle (Spa) (19??)
  46. MOONCRST (19??)

Categories

MAMEinfo

0.09 [?]

0.05 [Nicola Salmoria, Robert Anschuetz]


Artwork available


Bugs:

- eagle, eagle2: Incorrect color palette. mameguy (ID 06300)

- eagle2: Original PCB videos. Smitdogg (ID 04013)

- Clones mooncrgx, mooncrsb, mooncrs2: The demo sequence is way out in left. Fujix (ID 00447)

- Clone mooncrgx: Sprite cutoff in cocktail mode incorrect. Robbbert (ID 02074)

- Side-byside test. Gary Walton (ID 01666)

- Clone smooncrs: In cocktail mode, you can't see player 2's shots and enemies' bullets go in the wrong direction. Gmitra (ID 00451)


WIP:

- 0.172: Roselson added clone Moon Cresta (SegaSA / Sonic). Changed description of clone 'Super Moon Cresta' to 'Super Moon Cresta (Gremlin, bootleg)'.

- 0.150: Added 'Galaxian Custom' sound.

- 0.149: Roselson (from AUMAP) added clone Cresta Mundo (Laguna S.A. Spanish Moon Cresta bootleg).

- 0.148u5: Ricky2001 (from AUMAP) added clone Moon Cresta (Petaco S.A. Spanish bootleg). David Haywood added alternative coinage to it and fixed c+p error. Roselson (from AUMAP) added clone Moon Cresta (Electrogame S.A. Spanish bootleg). Note: Similar to the spcdraga 'Space Dragon (set 2)' set but with original Moon Cresta gfx roms.

- 0.148u2: RevisionX added clone Starfighter (Moon Cresta bootleg).

- 0.147u4: Robbbert and MisfitMAME added clone Moon Crest (Moon Cresta bootleg). Robbbert fixed loading of gfx roms in clone 'Super Star Crest'.

- 0.145u8: Andy Welburn added clone Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu UK, unencrypted).

- 0.142u2: Robbbert fixed corrupt graphics on 3rd and 4th stages in clones Moon War (Moon Cresta bootleg), Space Dragon (Moon Cresta bootleg, set 2) and Moon Cresta (Galaxian hardware).

- 0.141u4: Marcello Mancini, Silvio Finotti, Augusto Garcia and hap added clone Super Star Crest.

- 18th August 2010: Smitdogg - Dave France sent an Eagle board set. All the roms are labeled differently than the sets in MAME but I dumped it and it matches "eagle2".

- 0.136u4: Andrew Welburn added clone Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu UK). Changed description of clone (Nichibutsu, unencrypted) to 'Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu USA, unencrypted)'.

- 9th February 2010: Smitdogg - Andrew Welburn dumped his Alca Meteor board. It's a bootleg of Moon Cresta/Super Moon Cresta.

- 0.135u1: Siftware added clone Steraranger (Moon Cresta bootleg).

- 0.133u3: Galaxian sound updates [Couriersud]: Moon Cresta and Galaxian now have their respective schematics emulated, i.e. Moon Cresta has a slightly different mixing stage. This fixed explosion of own ship sounds wrong.

- 0.133u1: Renamed (mooncrsu) to (mooncrstu), (mooncrsa) to (mooncrsto) and (mooncrsg) to (mooncrstg).

- 29th October 2008: Mr. Do - Looks like Ad_Enuff's getting back into gear again (woohoo!). He's cleaned up three more for us this time around: Addy took the existing Moon Cresta artwork, and cleaned it up quite nicely.

- 0.127u2: MikeDX fixed duplicated Cabinet dipsetting in clone Moon Cresta (Galaxian hardware).

- 0.125u7: Couriersud fixed corrupted enemies in 3rd + 4th Wave.

- 0.118u6: David Haywood added clone Moon War (Moon Cresta bootleg).

- 0.118u1: Fixed dipswitches in clones Moon Cresta (bootleg set 3), Super Moon Cresta and Space Dragon. Changed description of clone 'Fantazia' to 'Fantazia (bootleg?)'.

- 0.117u1: David Haywood added clones Space Dragon (Moon Cresta bootleg, set 1) and (Moon Cresta bootleg, set 2). The boards were marked 'Space Dragon' although this doesn't appear in the games.

- 6th July 2006: 3D ARCADE - New 3D cabinet model for Moon Cresta from Btribble.

- 0.105u3: Brian Troha added clone Moon Cresta (bootleg set 3).

- 20th April 2006: f205v dumped Moon Cresta (bootleg set 3).

- 28th December 2005: f205v, Gnoppi and Corrado Tomaselli dumped Space Dragon (Moon Cresta bootleg, set 2). It's a clone of "Moon Cresta (Galaxian Hardware)" different from the other "Space Dragon" on this same site.

- 28th June 2005: f205v dumped Moon War (Moon Cresta bootleg).

- 27th June 2005: f205v and Gnoppi dumped Space Dragon (Moon Cresta bootleg, set 1).

- 0.87u2: Chaneman added clone Eagle (set 3).

- 22nd January 2004: Pierpaolo Prazzoli added the color PROM to clone Fantazia.

- 0.78u5: Pierpaolo Prazzoli fixed the graphics in the later levels in clone Space Thunderbird.

- 0.78u3: Added clone Space Thunderbird.

- 11th January 2004: Pierpaolo Prazzoli added Space Thunderbird (an alternate version of Moon Cresta) to the Galaxian driver.

- 0.63: Changed description of clone (bootleg on Galaxian hardware) to 'Moon Cresta (Galaxian hardware)'.

- 0.61: MASH added clone Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu, unencrypted).

- 0.59: Added clone Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu, old rev).

- 3rd March 2002: Guru added an alternative version of Moon Cresta to the Galaxians driver.

- 22nd January 2000: Zsolt Vasvari fixed the speed of Moon Cresta.

- 24th November 1999: Tatsuyuki Satoh added more accurate noise sound to the Moon Cresta sound emulation.

- 23rd November 1999: Juergen Buchmueller fixed some problems with the new Moon Cresta sound emulation.

- 22nd November 1999: Juergen Buchmueller modified the way in which mooncrst sound is generated.

- 0.35: Added clone Super Moon Cresta.

- 0.35b12: Zsolt Vasvari added clone Moon Cresta (bootleg set 2). Changed description of clone (bootleg) to 'Moon Cresta (bootleg set 1)'.

- 27th April 1999: Zsolt Vasvari added an earlier Moon Cresta romset to the driver.

- 0.35b11: Marco Cassili added clone Eagle (set 2). Changed description of clone 'Eagle' to 'Eagle (set 1)'.

- 9th April 1999: Marco Cassili added an Eagle clone, a Zaxxon clone and a Mr. Do! Run Run clone.

- 0.34b8: Barry Rodewald fixed clone Moon Cresta (bootleg on Galaxian hardware).

- 0.34b1: Added color prom.

- 0.33b7: Nicola Salmoria added clone Moon Cresta (bootleg on Galaxian hardware). Added original gfx ROMs to Moon Cresta, fixing graphics glitches on the title screen. Known issues: The "mooncrst" set has some bad graphics (e.g. missing (c) sign) due to missing original gfx ROMs. Wrong graphics and dipswitches in "mooncrgx".

- 0.33b5: Attempt at making the main Galaxian / Moon Cresta sound channel more accurate [Nicola Salmoria].

- 0.31: Al Kossow added clone Eagle (Centuri 1980). Known issues: Dipswitches for the alternate sets might be inaccurate.

- 0.30: Known issues: The graphics ROMs in the Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu) set are wrong.

- 0.29: Valerio Verrando added clone Moon Cresta (Gremlin). Changed description of clone (Gremlin) to 'Moon Cresta (bootleg)'.

- 0.28: Merged mooncrst, moonqsr and scramble vidhrdw into the new Galaxian driver [Nicola Salmoria].

- 0.27: Exchanged the infamous two sprite banks in Moon Cresta [Nicola Salmoria].

- 0.26: Known issues: In bootleg version, the highscore should show Gremlin logo. But probably available rom images are corrupted.

- 0.25: Robert Anschuetz provided infos about how to enable a shot sample with Moon Quasar, Moon Cresta, Galaxian and clones. Found the meaning of SW1 in Moon Cresta (Thanks to Mikiya Yadohisa).

- 0.24: Changed description to 'Moon Cresta (Nichibutsu)' and clone (Unencrypted) to 'Moon Cresta (Gremlin)'.

- 0.21: Fixed a bug in all games with starbackground: using a frameskip > 0 introduced slowdowns. Now the speed remains unchanged.

- 0.19: Changed noise_length and noise_rate values in Moon Cresta audio driver, so now noise is much more noisier!

- 0.18: Nicola Salmoria added some lousy noise to Moon Cresta.

- 0.16: Added clone Fantazia. The highscore should show Gremlin logo. But probably available rom images are corrupted. Not playable yet!

- 0.15: Nicola Salmoria added high score saving to Moon Cresta.

- 0.12: Gary Walton confirms that the colors in Moon Cresta and Moon Quasar are 100% accurate. Very good!

- 0.10: Thanks to Gary Walton and Simon Walls, we now have 100% accurate colors in Crush Roller and Uniwars/Japirem. Moon Cresta and Moon Quasar might be correct as well, but I'm not sure [Nicola Salmoria].

- 0.09: Added 'Moon Cresta'. These ROMs are encrypted and slightly different from the other version. This is very likely the version Chuck Cochems remembers (with aliens teleporting right in front of your ship). I renamed the other version (which looks like a mix of the code from a bootleg version and the graphics from the Gremlin original version) "mooncrsb" [Nicola Salmoria]. Changed 'Moon Cresta' to clone 'Moon Cresta (Unencrypted)'. Renamed (mooncrst) to (mooncrsb).

- 0.06: Star background in Galaxians & co [Nicola Salmoria]. The way I calculate it is probably not correct, anyway it looks reasonable.

- 0.05: Nicola Salmoria added 'Moon Cresta' (bootleg 1980). Game is playable with wrong colors and limited sound. Control: Arrows = Move around and CTRL = Fire. Infos from Robert Anschuetz (Arcade emulator). Known issues: Only one sound channel is emulated, and I'm not sure it's correct. No star background. What do the dipswitches do? Info on Bagman, Galaxians, Moon Cresta and many other games taken from Arcade Emulator by Robert Anschuetz.


LEVELS: 10 (endless)


Other Emulators:

* FB Alpha

* GalEMU

* HiVE

* Retrocade

* Sparcade

* Tickle

* VAntAGE


Recommended Games (Space Shooter):

Cosmo

Dai San Wakusei Meteor

Galaxy Wars

Ozma Wars

Sky Love

Space Beam

Space Launcher

Devil Zone

Killer Comet

Magical Spot

Magical Spot II

Megatack

Moon Cresta

Moon Quasar

Phoenix

Quasar

Space Encounters

Space Firebird

Space Laser

Space Trek

Pisces

Altair

Astro Blaster

Astro Fantasia (DECO Cassette)

Black Hole

Challenger

Cosmos

Spiders

Terranean (DECO Cassette)

Battle Cross

Sky Base

Space Raider

Gyruss

Konami 80's AC Special (Gyruss)

Saturn

Space Warp?

Poly-Play (ZRE-PP) (Ufo)

Mega Phoenix

History


Arcade Video game published 39 years ago:

Moon Cresta (c) 1980 Nichibutsu

Moon Cresta is a single screen shoot-em-up with the player controlling an armed ship that moves horizontally along the bottom of the screen and must use their ship to destroy waves of attacking aliens.

The player begins the game with a small ship armed with a single laser cannon. Upon successful completion of the first four waves of alien attacks, the player's ship will be able to dock with the next 'stage' of fighter ship, although the docking procedure must be completed within a set time. This larger, two-stage ship has increased fire power (three lasers).

After successfully clearing a further two alien waves and surviving a meteor shower, the two-stage ship will be able to dock with the third and final piece, giving the player the largest and most powerful ship, which is now armed with five lasers. Bonus points are awarded depending on how quickly the docking procedures are completed.

If the multi-stage ship is hit, the player continues with whatever stages remain. If players achieve a score of 30,000, they are awarded a free game and their score continues to accumulate.

Upon completion of the first eight screens, the player's ship will revert back to its small, single-stage incarnation and the game begins again with an increased level of difficulty.

- TECHNICAL -

Model MCA-5001 (Upright)

Main CPU : Zilog Z80 (@ 3.072 Mhz)
Sound Chips : Tone generator & discrete circuits

Players : 2
Control : 2-way joystick (RIGHT and LEFT)
Buttons : 1 (FIRE/THRUST)

- TRIVIA -

Moon Cresta was released in July 1980.

Marcus McHaffie holds the official record for this game with 153,490 points.

- SCORING -

Scoring in this game is relatively simple. Each alien (except meteors and arrows) come in two different colors for each screen.
Eyes (Break in half) : 50 points
Eyes (Destroy other half) : 100 points
Flies : 30 points
Birds : 60 points
Fireballs : 200 points
Arrow Ships : 100 points

Docking is a big way to increase your score. You get the time remaining from 30 seconds multiplied by 100 for your docking bonus.

- TIPS AND TRICKS -

* When you start the game, all three stages of your ship will come from the bottom of the screen. After going halfway up, the ship on top separates from the other 2 and it settles onto the bottom of the screen ready for battle.

* Remember, you can only keep one set of shots in the 'air' at one time. This means you need to plan your shots out so you don't end up with a lot of misses when the aliens decided to come after your ship.

* In the later screens, the aliens start moving much quicker and you have to be on your toes to keep up with them and avoid being taken out.

* Although the aliens do not fire, they still can cause a lot of hate and discontent by their wild maneuvering. There is no real safe place on the screen from the aliens since they go into the lower corners of the screen, reappear from the bottom after they have apparently 'left' the screen, or just appear right above your ship.

* In the earlier waves, you have to split apart 2 eyes before the rest automatically split and come after your ship. In the later screens, the eyes automatically split upon entering the screen. That means eight instead of four aliens you have to deal with.

* If you manage to dock all three ships together, you will have a lot of firepower (5 shots at once) to send out. Here are some ways, unfortunately, you can lose ships and what ships are lost :
1) Besides the aliens, docking is the second way people lose a lot of ships. The only ship destroyed is the ship attempting to dock.
2) If an alien hits any part of your ships (if all stages are joined), only the stage hit is lost. This can create an amusing circumstance if you lose stage II and you only have stages I and III to fight with.

* Don't worry if you lose Stage I early in the game. One has to be very skilled to fight four screens with Stage I. Stage II is the best stage to fight with. It is a small target plus it has enough firepower to defend itself. Stage III on the other hand, is just a lumbering junkyard. The lasers are too spread out to do much good plus there is a very wide-open area in the middle for aliens to hit.

* The bird stages present the most challenge of the aliens. They appear and disappear at will. Sometimes they will appear right next to your ship so on these stages, be extra alert. If you see one disappear and don't hear the familiar bird chirp of it reappearing, assume it is on the screen somewhere still.

* The best place to 'hide' during the fireball stage is in the lower right corner. The fireballs will not hit your ship in this corner. You can do hit and runs by moving your ship out, shooting at a fireball, then going back to the corner again.

* During the arrow screen, the aliens will hover around the top, then turn into arrows and attempt to ram your ship. In the later screens, they won't even hover but just try to ram your ship.

* Your goal is to make it to 30,000 points so you can have a fresh ship waiting in case you lose all the stages of your present ship.

* Docking isn't that hard to do. After finishing off a wave just before the docking stage, try to center your ship on the screen. That way, all you have to do is move that ship left or right to successfully dock. You want to avoid using the thrusters unless your ship is in extreme peril. The docking bonus can be the most amount of points you score in the game. If you happen to miss a dock, then you will continue the next set of screens with the ship that failed to dock.

- SERIES -

1. Moon Cresta (1980)
2. Terra Cresta (1985)
3. Dangar - Ufo Robo (1986)
4. Terra Force (1987)
5. Terra Cresta II - Mandoraa no Gyakushuu (1992, NEC PC Engine)

- STAFF -

Moon Cresta was developed by game developer company Jorudan.

Designed & programmed by : Shigeki Fujiwara

- PORTS -

* CONSOLES:
[JP] Nintendo Super Famicom (may.26, 1995) "Nichibutsu Arcade Classics [Model SHVC-AACJ-JPN]"
[JP] Sony PlayStation (dec.29, 1995) "Nichibutsu Arcade Classics [Model SLPS-00184]"
[JP] Sony PS2 (jul.21, 2005) "Moon Cresta [Oretachi Geasen Zoku] [Model SLPM-62645]"
Nintendo Wii [Virtual Console Arcade] [JP] (mar.9, 2010)
[JP] Sony PS4 [PSN] (aug.26, 2014) "Arcade Archives - Moon Cresta [Model CUSA-00649]"
Sony PlayStation 4 [PSN] [US] (may.29, 2015) "Arcade Archives - Moon Cresta [Model CUSA-00982]"
Sony PlayStation 4 [PSN] [AS] (june.12, 2015) "Arcade Archives - Moon Cresta"
Sony PlayStation 4 [PSN] [EU] [AU] (sept.29, 2015) "Arcade Archives - Moon Cresta [Model CUSA-02669]"
Sony PlayStation 4 [PSN] [KO] (nov.13, 2015) "Arcade Archives - Moon Cresta [Model CUSA-00649]"

* COMPUTERS:
Microtan 65 [EU] (1985)
[EU] Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1985)
[US] Commodore C64 [EU] (1985)
BBC B [EU] (1985)
[EU] Amstrad CPC (1986)
[EU] Commodore C64 (1992) "Classic Arcadia 3"
[EU] Sinclair ZX Spectrum (1992) "Classic Arcadia 3"
[JP] Sharp X68000 (nov.20, 1992) "Moon Cresta + Terra Cresta [Model DP-3205023]"

- CONTRIBUTE -

Edit this entry: https://www.arcade-history.com/?&page=detail&id=1667&o=2

High scores

MAMESCORE records : 02/04/2017 13:01

kernzy_________________________61.500
gerhard_schindler______________61.300
germax_________________________38.700
cessna_________________________24.030
majygool_______________________20.680
warlike________________________19.880
didyeah_________________________1.580