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Simplified understanding of making a cabinet
ChanceKJ:
--- Quote from: DarakuTenshi on November 12, 2013, 10:41:17 pm ---My advice is, do your homework and put your all into the build.
My first cab that I built about 10 years ago, though was very fun to make and play, I was very disappointed in the end product. Take time and spend the extra cash where you can to build it right the first time.
Don't get me wrong because I enjoyed building it 10 years ago, and I'm enjoying it this time around. But, maybe I would have kept my old one had I done it right.
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See, this is the school of thought I'm on. Don't get me wrong, the others have very valid points about 2 player vs 4 players, etc, but I felt go big or go home. In fact reading your original post in this thread took me back about a month when I pulled the trigger on my build. Those were the EXACT same goals and questions I had. (Minus the pedestal, you're nuts and on your own with that :p ) but like I wanted Simpsons and TMNT with some NES/SNES. Now I'm half way through a monster, money guzzling project that will only end with tears and a high ebay feedback rating. DarakuYenshi's logic is sound... If you have some disposable income you can go a long way down this rabbit hole.
I've based my build and design goals off many of the best cabs on this site. I could not be at the point I am now without them (well, Neph caused me to be BROKE with the bad ass LED lighting ideas, but that's on his head). Before you spend a dime, take a few more moments to learn from our mistakes (Rit dye) and our victories. Read why we made decisions on button count, spinners, Lono2 vs Ipac, display size, etc. you will learn a crap ton of cool things (like maybe how to crimp d-Sub!), solve major design problems that will make you want to pat yourself on the back, and generally just have fun doing it all.
Bottom line: Take your time to plan it all out. Don't spend a dime till your sure those fancy parts fit your goals, and don't cut a bit of wood until you're sure it will be the right cut...
Felsir:
--- Quote from: PL1 on November 12, 2013, 06:49:16 pm ---The wiki is a bit out of date, but has a lot of good info
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Yeah, it would have been so good to be able to point to some of the wiki pages. :-(
To contribute to this post:
The biggest thing I learned from my first cabinet, is "what games do I actually like?" A lot of games have a rose tinted nostaligia glow around them, and were better in my memory than they actually were. So I made a list of games I fondly remember and were "must have" according to my memory. Then I installed emulators and actually played those games first. It narrowed down my list considerably. Then I based my controlpanel around that list of games.
I also went the USB optional controllers route for the 4 player games. Works great :-)