Pool Sharks

Partial

Bally1990bally.pool-sharks.1990

OPDB IPDB bally/pool-sharks-1990.mdbally/pool-sharks-1990.json

Wire it up

what an authoring tool needs first
Bind this ROM
pool_l7

6 ROM sets resolve to this machine. Clones share the definition unless a hardware difference is listed.

Controller platform
Not determined
Displays

No display inventory recorded yet.

Address space
Switches
13–44 (23)
Solenoids
6–13 (3)

Coverage

Partial

Real evidence exists, but authoring requirements are still missing or in conflict. Verify before shipping a table.

Completion13%

Progress is derived from the fixed author-readiness requirements. It helps rank unfinished work, but only a 100% author-ready definition passes the publication gate.

Catalog Identity
validated
Address Enumeration
unknown
Semantic Naming
unknown
Physical Wiring
unknown
Mechanisms
unknown
Variant Coverage
candidate
Recreation Knowledge
unknown
Still missing · 14
Driver MappingController PlatformInput EnumerationInput SemanticsOutput EnumerationOutput SemanticsDisplay InventoryMechanism InventoryMechanism BehaviorPolarityVariant DifferencesRecreation NotesProvenanceSpatial Placement

Switches

The addresses PinMAME reports as closed. Numbers are the public API values, not matrix hardware pins.

23 addresses

Switch map

Sequential addresses, grouped in columns of eight.

used unused
 
+0
+1
+2
+3
+4
+5
+6
+7
1–8
9–16
17–24
25–32
33–40
41–48
Hover or tap an address to identify it.
23 shown
# Name Device ID Evidence
13
Sw13
switch.sw13 candidate
14
Sw14
switch.sw14 candidate
15
Sw15
switch.sw15 candidate
16
Sw16
switch.sw16 candidate
24
Sw24
switch.sw24 candidate
25
Sw25
switch.sw25 candidate
26
Sw26
switch.sw26 candidate
27
Sw27
switch.sw27 candidate
28
Sw28
switch.sw28 candidate
29
Sw29
switch.sw29 candidate
30
Sw30
switch.sw30 candidate
32
Sw32
switch.sw32 candidate
33
Sol Divert
switch.sol-divert candidate
35
Bumper2
switch.bumper2 candidate
36
Bumper1
switch.bumper1 candidate
37
Bumper3
switch.bumper3 candidate
38
Sw38
switch.sw38 candidate
39
Left Sling Shot
switch.left-sling-shot candidate
40
Right Sling Shot
switch.right-sling-shot candidate
41
Sw41
switch.sw41 candidate
42
Sw42
switch.sw42 candidate
43
Sw43
switch.sw43 candidate
44
Sw44
switch.sw44 candidate

Controlled devices

Everything the ROM can energise, grouped the way a table author builds it.

Coils, magnets & motors

3
3 shown
# Name Device ID Evidence
6
Sol Divert
coil.sol-divert candidate
10
Sol Gi
coil.sol-gi candidate
13
Shark Mouth
coil.shark-mouth candidate

Recreation notes

Working knowledge that has no schema field yet — edition differences, tuning values, pitfalls.

Coverage: partial - machine identity plus candidate-only I/O attachments. Playfield devices, wiring, mechanisms, and behavior are evidenced only as unverified candidates.

This record was promoted from the generated catalog stub stub.pinmame.pool_l7 by the catalog-wide identity pass of 2026-08-29. The promotion resolves machine identity and carries the catalog's residual driver grouping over unchanged, the platform and device attachments below were added by the 2026-08-29/30 candidate passes and assert nothing beyond candidate provenance. Every requirement in the definition's coverage.missing is genuinely outstanding.

Identity

  • PinMAME catalog: root driver pool_l7, description "Pool Sharks (LA-7)", manufacturer "Bally", catalog year "1991".
  • OPDB record GR68o-M0o2O (IPDB 1848) names this machine "Pool Sharks" (Bally, manufacture date 1990-06-01); the resolved identity rests on the agreement of the PinMAME catalog and this reviewed mapping.
  • The definition's driver list is exactly the clone tree PinMAME declares under pool_l7; whether every listed driver really runs on this physical machine is unverified.

Drivers this record holds

  • pool_l5 (1989, Bally, clone of pool_l7).
  • pool_l6 (1990, Bally, clone of pool_l7).
  • pool_l7 (1991, Bally).
  • pool_l7c (2019, Bally, clone of pool_l7).
  • pool_le2 (1990, Bally, clone of pool_l7).
  • pool_p7 (1989, Bally, clone of pool_l7).

VPX script candidates (candidate)

  • 1 retained community table script(s) declare this machine's driver; their extracted switch/lamp/solenoid/GI candidates are carried as 26 candidate devices. When curator work weighs sources, a retained script outranks emulator-derived candidates for runtime semantics, but every device here is still a candidate until a known-working table is verified against this exact physical machine.

What a curator must establish next

Controller platform from the pinned PinMAME driver source; full input, output, and display enumeration with semantic names; physical wiring and polarity; mechanism inventory and behavior; variant differences across the clone tree; recreation knowledge from a manual, schematic, or known-working table; runtime provenance; and a normalized spatial placement for every physical device. No manual, schematic, or runtime-harness evidence is retained for this machine yet; the candidate sections above are the only retained I/O evidence so far.

ROM sets

Every driver that resolves to this physical machine.

ROM set Description Year Parent Hardware
pool_l7cPool Sharks (LA-7C Competition MOD) 2019pool_l7—
pool_l7Pool Sharks (LA-7) 1991——
pool_le2Pool Sharks (LE-2 Europe) 1990pool_l7—
pool_l6Pool Sharks (LA-6) 1990pool_l7—
pool_p7Pool Sharks (PA-7 Prototype) 1989pool_l7—
pool_l5Pool Sharks (LA-5) 1989pool_l7—

Parent set: pool_l7 — clones share this definition unless a hardware difference is noted.

Pinball memory maps

External source LGPL-3.0-only1 map

RAM layouts published by an independent project and mirrored here at a pinned commit. They are not part of this machine’s definition: nothing below was used as evidence for the definition, and none of it counts towards coverage. Check claims against the upstream project.

Upstream
tomlogic/pinball-memory-maps
Commit
d8693b9

This program makes use of content from the Pinball Memory Maps project.

pool_l7.map.json

williams-system11-48Kv4format 0.8

maps/williams/system11/pool_l7.map.json

Applies to ROMs
pool_l7
Sections
auditschecksum8game_statehigh_scores
Map JSONMap sourcePlatform JSONPlatform source

williams-system11-48K defines the RAM layout this map’s offsets are read against — the map is not interpretable without it.

Evidence

Every claim above traces to one of these. When they disagree: a known-working VPX script wins on controller addresses and causality, the manual wins on wiring and construction, pinned PinMAME wins on emulator routing and display layout.

  • PinMAME catalog

    BSD-3-Clause

    pinmame.catalog.8371478a7640

    PinmameGetGames

    8371478a7640
    by
    PinMAME contributors
    rev
    8371478a7640

  • VPX script

    vpx-script.92dab05b0a7eae78

    vpxtable-scripts: Pool Sharks (Midway 1990) v600.vbs

    0c036bb61b4b
    by
    Authors credited in Pool Sharks (Midway 1990) v600.vbs and repository contributors
    rev
    0c036bb61b4b
    sha256
    92dab05b0a7e…

Something wrong or missing?

This definition still has 14 unmet requirements, listed under Coverage above. Fixes belong in the definition itself — editing on GitHub forks it for you and opens the pull request.

Cite a source for anything you change — a manual page, a line in a working VPX script, PinMAME source, or a reading from the machine's own service menu. Claims without provenance cannot be validated.

Edit the definition Edit the note Report a problem
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