Need advice on building a 4 player cabinet

[omehegan]

Hey guys, I'm looking for advice on building a 4 player MAME cabinet. For some background: I built a 2 player cabinet for my company a few months ago. I bought a broken Neo Geo cab for $100, added a 21" CRT, Windows PC, and an X-Arcade dual joystick. Did some woodworking to fit everything in and put a few classic arcade titles on the system, and then set it up in our office kitchen. It has been a *huge* hit, much more so than I expected. Recently we've added games like NBA Hangtime, etc., and people have started clamoring for a 4 player system.

I think that just converting our current system to 4 player wouldn't work very well - it seems like you'd want a bigger monitor and more space for 4 people to stand side by side. I think I can get a budget to build an entirely new system, so I'm trying to figure out the best approach to take. I'll break this down by component I guess.

1. What should I use for a cabinet? It looks like a lot of people go for a showcase cab. That certainly looks like a good form factor, so unless people tell me it's not I will probably go that route. Next question is, where should I get one? There doesn't seem to be any point in paying for a working game and then gutting it. Are non-working showcase cabs common at all? I've looked at the North Coast showcase cab, and that seems pretty appealing in spite of the price.

2. What should I use for a monitor? The North Coast cab mentions that it fits a 33" arcade monitor, but I've never seen one that big for sale. Do I just buy a CRT TV?

3. What should I use for a control interface? The Lono2 looks good, but I've also looked at the KeyWiz boards. I guess I'm not really sure what the difference is or how to choose.

4. How many buttons should I plan for? I think I remember reading on another thread that you really only need 4 per player for the 4 player games. So I was thinking of making two 6-button stations for 2-player games, and two 4-button stations for 4-player games, for a total of 20 gameplay buttons (plus insert coin and player-select buttons).

I guess that's it for the moment. Thanks in advance for any advice you guys have!

[PL1]

Welcome to BYOAC.   

FYI, you should read this thread about MAME and the workplace.

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=120050.msg1272786#msg1272786


Scott

[paigeoliver]

Ok, all your classic 4 player machines (TMNT, Simpsons, etc) had a 25" monitor. I would mimic that design if going with a CRT display.

If going with an LCD display you are going to want to mimic something closer to a showcase cabinet as LCD displays still have issues with viewing angles.

8-way joysticks with 4 buttons per player cover all the 4-way games (2 buttons per player covers 90 percent of them).

Make sure all the joysticks point up in the right direction, the side ones do not get angled (only the location of their buttons gets angled).

Also, if you already have a working 2 player system you can just make a second cabinet next to it with another 21" monitor with the player 3 and 4 controls installed, all running off the PC in cabinet 1.

[DaveMMR]

For inspiration - The best scratch-built 4-player cab design (assuming it'll get done - but it's well on its way):
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=115203.0

It follows the plans of an actual arcade cabinet so there's no overcompensation for space you often see in a lot of 4-player rigs. And since you're plopping it in the office kitchen, you may be better off with this than going with the showcase cab. Plus I feel those types of cabs are more common to find than showcases (though I am wildly guessing basing on how many TMNT cabs I saw vs. showcases.)

As for your other questions, there's little difference between a regular cab and a 4-player (other than needing an encoder with more inputs) so what worked before will work with the 4-player cab.

[paigeoliver]

For inspiration - The best scratch-built 4-player cab (assuming it'll get done - but it's well on its way):
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=115203.0

It follows the plans of an actual arcade cabinet so there's no overcompensation for space you often see in a lot of 4-player rigs. And since you're plopping it in the office kitchen, you may be better off with this than going with the showcase cab. Plus I feel those types of cabs are more common to find than showcases (though I am wildly guessing basing on how many TMNT cabs I saw vs. showcases.)

As for your other questions, there's little difference between a regular cab and a 4-player (other than needing an encoder with more inputs) so what worked before will work with the 4-player cab.

So after all that reading in the thread I found a black painted TMNT cab with nothing in it!

[DaveMMR]

For inspiration - The best scratch-built 4-player cab (assuming it'll get done - but it's well on its way):
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=115203.0

It follows the plans of an actual arcade cabinet so there's no overcompensation for space you often see in a lot of 4-player rigs. And since you're plopping it in the office kitchen, you may be better off with this than going with the showcase cab. Plus I feel those types of cabs are more common to find than showcases (though I am wildly guessing basing on how many TMNT cabs I saw vs. showcases.)

As for your other questions, there's little difference between a regular cab and a 4-player (other than needing an encoder with more inputs) so what worked before will work with the 4-player cab.

So after all that reading in the thread I found a black painted TMNT cab with nothing in it!

Heh, I said they weren't done. But I should said "cabinet design". I'll go fix that.

[omehegan]

Thanks a lot for the tips guys, this is very helpful!

It sounds like I don't necessarily have to do a showcase cab in order to make room for 4 players. That said, we do have space for a showcase cab if we decide to go that route. But maybe I'll check around and see if I can get a 4 player TMNT, Simpsons, or other similar cab locally first. I'll see what I can come up with, and then report back if I have more questions.

Thanks again!

[omehegan]

Make sure all the joysticks point up in the right direction, the side ones do not get angled (only the location of their buttons gets angled).

So! I finished my "build," by which I mean I bought an Ultimate Arcade II from Mameroom/North Coast and put a Makvision 29" CRT in it. I ordered a 4 player control panel from them with a custom layout which I'm happy with. BUT, I took your advice and oriented all four joysticks the same way, and I'm not liking it. When standing at the player 1 or 4 position, it doesn't feel intuitive to push straight towards the monitor for "up."

I'm considering changing the sticks to orient more in line with the buttons. See below for an image. Any thoughts on this?

(I also think I'm going to move players 1 and 2 to the middle two positions, and 3 and 4 to the outer two.)

[paigeoliver]

Ah, there is your set of problems. First you bought a kit cabinet with a 4 player control panel that has the screen straight up and down, a non-showcase 4 player cabinet needs to have the screen angled back 30 to 45 degrees. It both helps the visibility for everyone and helps to minimize the awkwardness of playing on the side spots. Basically every 4 player cabinet from the introduction of Gauntlet until the day the arcades died had the monitor tilted way back (only notable exception is Quartet, and remember that thing about Quartet where it bombed and no one ever heard of it or played it, yeah).

Player 1 and 2 should indeed be the middle positions. Playing a single player game far off to one side would be weird no matter how your sticks were. Honestly, 4 player cabinets were more about being a gimmick to get more coin drop at peak time than they were about playability. If they were built for playability then they would have a control panel 5 or 6 feet wide.

Whatever weirdness you think you are feeling now will be far worse with the sticks angled. There is a reason why only a couple factory built cabinets every angled the side sticks. There is equally a reason why many people who did it have come back and mentioned it was a mistake.

[omehegan]

Hmmmm, interesting, no one mentioned the monitor angle before. I might be able to modify it to accomplish that actually. I'll do a little research, thanks for that tip!

I was thinking the weirdness I'm feeling with the side sticks was because my control panel is curved. I was noticing it when playing fighting games. I just looked at the control panels for the NBA games, and they're rectangular so it seems like it would make more sense to orient all the sticks the same way. Gauntlet is different but since it's a top-down view it doesn't seem like it would matter.

I guess I can always try changing the orientation, it's not a big issue. If it seems worse I'll just move them back. I'll do some play testing

Thanks a lot for the info!

[paigeoliver]

Playing Streetfighter from a corner spot would be tough indeed.

[omehegan]

Playing Streetfighter from a corner spot would be tough indeed.

Yeah. I'm definitely going to move the 1 and 2 positions to the center, but I have a feeling the NBA games will still be weird for the corner spot players if I don't re-orient the joysticks. We'll see!

[hypernova]

DO NOT ANGLE THE STICKS!

Take it from me.  I refused to listen to convention.  I regret that decision every time I look at it, and even more so when I try to use it.

And I'm too lazy to fix it, because it would involve pretty much removing a bunch of stuff and a whole crapload of wiring.  I might fix it someday.  But it'd be smart to fix the PC inside first, cause it doesn't even run.

PS.  Any chance you can do something to rectify that color barf for the buttons?  Single colors for each player looks 1000x better to most people.  I won't speak for your office, but I have to be honest here.

Go yellow for your "coin" buttons...or whichever.  And choose from your remaining colors for the rest.  If you have to, buy the extra few buttons.  (I see 4 of black and white, and 5 of the other colors.)  It'll do a world of good for the look.

[omehegan]

DO NOT ANGLE THE STICKS!

Take it from me.  I refused to listen to convention.  I regret that decision every time I look at it, and even more so when I try to use it.

And I'm too lazy to fix it, because it would involve pretty much removing a bunch of stuff and a whole crapload of wiring.  I might fix it someday.  But it'd be smart to fix the PC inside first, cause it doesn't even run.

PS.  Any chance you can do something to rectify that color barf for the buttons?  Single colors for each player looks 1000x better to most people.  I won't speak for your office, but I have to be honest here.

Go yellow for your "coin" buttons...or whichever.  And choose from your remaining colors for the rest.  If you have to, buy the extra few buttons.  (I see 4 of black and white, and 5 of the other colors.)  It'll do a world of good for the look.

In my case changing the sticks would be a half hour exercise including drilling new holes, but maybe I'll wait and see if anyone else complains since I don't actually give a ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- about NBA Jam anyway

As for the color barf, I hadn't thought of it. I could rearrange things easily enough, but on my X-Arcade I find it a little annoying to have all the buttons the same color. I can never remember which one does what in which game. I thought using different colors would help make this easier. I'll give it some thought though.