After a LONG time (countless nights and a few week-ends), I've finally completed my tiny Mame-based Ms. Pac Man arcade cabinet.
It all started with the wonderful tiny Donkey Kong that Bender created (
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=111395.80): an incredible piece of art I immediately fall in love with.
One afternoon I was watching with my brother the videos of this amazing small arcade machine; we both agreed that it would have been nice to find it in a store; then my brother came up with "why don't you build it"?
At the time, I was skeptical; then I started looking for information, and discovered that it was easy enough to find a Gamepark GP2X Wiz (the portable console Bender's DK was based on; more info at
http://www.gp2xwiz.co.uk/wiki/Main_Page). By the way, I believe Wiz is far better than the newer Caanoo, which is bigger, has an analogue joypad (no good for rewiring) and a larger LCD display; the Wiz sports an OLED display which is far superior in terms of contrast, angle of view, colours and black level.
The project started with an order to Play-Asia, where a used Wiz was available. Meanwhile, I had to decide what cabinet to reproduce. Several games came to my mind: Mr. Do, Q*Bert, 1942, Bubble Bobble, Commando, Mikie.. At the end, I chose Ms Pac Man because the plans for the cabinet and the full artwork were easy to find; moreover, I've always liked Ms Pac Man and the cabinet is very nice, cheerful and with bright colours; it is a character so famous that even somebody who is not very fond of videogames will recognize at once.
A word of warning: when I started this project, I really underrated the complexities of it.
You should consider that this was a "first" for me in many aspects:
- first wood model I have ever built;
- first model I have built from scratch (not from a kit);
- first model I have built since I was 8-year old
Moreover, I'm no expert in electronics and I use the welder once in a while, to build some cables; wiring the Wiz was a totally different league.. First, I had to determine "what" to connect; then, I had to solder contacts the size of a hair split, in between other components. Soldering a single cable sometimes took me half an hour; needless to say I had to use a magnifying glass and flux, because all the directions and buttons require to solder directly on the trace under the pad (which is almost invisible).
You need brain-surgeon hand, exceptional patience and dedication. I must admit that if I had known in advance how much time this project would have taken me, I probably would have never started.
Anyway, back to my story.
When I received the Wiz console, I found that it was missing the battery, which I later had to source from another shop; while I was waiting for it, I designed the cabinet on 4 mm plywood; that was the easy part: I just printed the pieces on A4 paper, fixed the paper to the wood sheet and then cut them using a cutter. Every piece was created in two sizes: one for the outside and the other for the inside; the second was 4 mm smaller on all sides and was later pasted to the first using wood construction glue, so every side in the cabinet is actually 8 mm thick (the completed cabinet weighs about 700 g).
In the original cabinet, the monitor was not mounted upright: in my project I had to change the position to full upright (the display is directly connected to the motherboard), so I lowered the control panel; this was also needed because the joystick (even if very small) might get into your line of sight otherwise.
Since the original Ms Pac Man was painted using stencils, I thought that maybe I could recreate the effect if I printed the artwork on transparent film and then attached it to the wood. The film was printed using a Xerox dye-sublimation printer (I made the prints at a Mail Boxes Etc shop). I prepared the wood using Pebeo White Gesso for the outside (this was the background for the film) and Pebeo Black Gesso for the inside (to absorb light). To protect the prints, I covered them with clear spray varnish (2 hands). I don't know if I did not use enough varnish (I'm no expert, remember?), but when I was applying the film to the wood I discovered that it was easy enough to scratch the surface; the varnish was bound to the wax of the print stronger than the wax was attached to the film! So I decided to cover the varnished film with another sheet of clear, unprinted film; this would make for the final protection (or at least I hope!). Avoiding bubbles in the two phases (film on wood and film on film) was a real nightmare..
For the controls, I followed Bender's suggestions and I ordered a 4-way joystick (GH7455-ND) and some buttons (CKN1121), from Digikey. I also ordered a rocker switch (CH865), no-clean flux (SMD291NL; you'll need it!) and heatshrink PVDF (QKY018B), that I decided to use to simulate T-Mold. In fact, I wanted something soft and round on the edges, so that you could grip the cabinet comfortably. The hard part was to split the tube in half: I needed a few tries to achieve acceptable results; luckily enough, this particular tube was surprisingly rigid and this feature helped a lot. I filled the two halves with black gesso and used Bostik glue to paste them to the edges of the cabinet: this was actually the finishing touch.
I bought from a local electronic shop the other buttons (small buttons for credits and volume; buttons 3 and 4; power switch).
I decided to add a few variants to Bender's design.
The first variant came from the idea that in the original arcade the marquee is over your head, so the light is not annoying. But in the tiny cabinet it's right in your face. So for the marquee I bought a USB self-powered lamp for e-book (HAMA 00054309); I split it apart, built a small white diffuser (the lamp is so near to the marquee that otherwise you would see the two leds) then connected its switch to a small rocker switch on the back of the cabinet and the usb power line to a round power connector (this is used to charge both the Wiz and the lamp). In this way, you can switch off the marquee while playing, if you're in a dark room.
The second variant is an external joystick connector; even though the small joystick does its service very well, I really liked the idea of hooking up a real joystick. I had around this Wico Super Three-Way, an amazing joystick I have been using for more than 20 years: I originally bought it for my Atari VCS; later, I rewired it so that the two buttons became distinct, and it served well for Commodore 128 and Amiga. Then I built a digital-to-analogue adapter (for Soundblaster joystick port); finally, I converted a cheap USB joypad to a small adapter, and I'm still using this exceptional joystick on my PC. So I decided to use it for this new cabinet as an alternative to the built-in one: I added a DB9 connector on the back, that is wired in parallel to the joystick and the two big buttons in the control panel. Another advantage is that horizontal games may be played by putting the cabinet on its side, over a pile of books, and rotating the Wico joystick 90 degrees clockwise.
For the marquee, I cut a small piece of white transparent plexiglass I had at home, then pasted the film printed with the image (and varnished). To build the frame, I used fragments of a DVD black box; the same box was also used to cut the black frame around the monitor and to create the protection on the front edge of the control panel you can see in the pictures; there is also a small grid, which I cut from a floppy disk cover of an old PC cabinet. The marquee is stuck between the top of the cabinet and a "shelf" right above the bezel; roof and shelf are thinner (I used sandpaper to make them 3 mm); a smaller heatshrink tube, cut in half, is used to finish their edges. The "shelf" has a 1.5 mm gorge below, where the bezel is inserted; the bezel itself just snaps into place and can be removed, it's not pasted.
The bezel required some work; it was cut from a CD jewel case; the frame was printed on transparent film then pasted to white adhesive paper (to render colours correctly), then cut and pasted to a black frame (coming from dvd box); this was needed to avoid that monitor light changed the colours of the bezel. A second black frame is applied to the monitor inside, to cover contacts and other stuff.
For the control panel I used Bender's layout: two large buttons (B and X), two smaller buttons (A and Y) and the joystick. I had to create the artwork for it; I believe I kept the "spirit" of the original one.. It is covered with clear film, just like the sides; one of the hardest challenges (for me) was cutting perfect round holes after the film was applied to wood, over the button and joystick holes. I found that the head of a nail, when heated with a cigarette lighter, produced perfect round holes when applied to film; little by little, you can create holes of any size, without the defects that inevitably appear if you try to cut or drill holes.
For the coin slots I decided to go the easy way, by painting them: I created a fake 3D effect for the border and the coin return slots, and false lights for the coin slots; the two buttons (select and menu) are barely visible and are positioned directly under the coin slots. The effect is actually much better than I thought.
The speakers were mounted on a small wood tablet and hidden behind the small grid on the front.
The back of the cabinet is kept in position by using 4 magnets; it just snaps into place and since it is flush mounted on the sides it does not move and it's very solid.
On the back, from top to bottom, there are: marquee power button (rocker switch) and console power button (red, out of the way so you do not press it inadvertently); volume up/down buttons and left/right buttons; power led, power connector, DB9 connector for external joystick.
The power led, which is blue when the console is powered and red when it is charging, actually shows the leds on the Wiz motherboard; I cut a branch of my fiber-optic Christmas tree (it has many, it won't miss it
and used the fiber optics to route the light from the led (which is 10 cm above and positioned in the center) to the position besides the power connector.
I'm attaching a few pictures of the work-in-progress and of the finished product - I hope you like it, I'm happy enough of the result!
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Topic: Tiny Ms. Pac Man/MAME Cab (Wiz based) (Read 7944 times)
