Out of wall space

[2084]

Hey good sir. I had pm'ed you a while ago, but i personally sometimes never notice i have messages so i figured maybe id resurrect this for some pointers. Im basically aiming to build dedicated mini cabs for a friend, much like your idea, (although you rocked it beyond anything)... My PM has more details, but being brand new to pi as it is, i wanted pointers on how you boot single games for each cab. I am using a raspberry pi 2, and as much as ive looked, there is minimal help on booting to a single game for this purpose. Of course im assuming you have them set up to boot to their dedicated game. Being new to pi this may be a stupid question, but is there an sd image that would be able to help me do this? or is it all about advmame and scripts or what have you?  While im busy learning EVERYTHING about pi, i wanted to know if you can help in that department. Being new, i dont want to spend a week learning the raspberry pi, just for you to reply and say "hey man heres the sd image, just replace the rom in the folder and youre good" lol. thank you for any help, and incredible job. I saw your work on google a long time ago and never knew who did it. I had that picture saved forever.

There are several ways to do this.  A simple way would be to create a shell script  that runs automatically (e.g. "~/.profile")  that contains a command like "advmame robotron" which would automatically launch robotron on startup.  Of course this assumes you already have advmame and the robotron rom installed.  In most of my games I launch a simple python program that allows the user to choose a different rom at startup (e.g. with Stargate it is possible to have it run classic Defender also) by pressing certain buttons or to choose which program to run.  These programs are specific to each cabinet and the way the buttons happen to be connected, etc.  For someone who is not familiar with UNIX it would probably be easiest to start with a disk image such as the ones available at piplay.org. 

[2084]

Love these!!!!  Great work.   Can you open one up and snap a photo inside?  Or do you have a build thread on here?

Thanks!

Dezi

Thanks for the complement.  Unfortunately I didn't document building these with has much detail as perhaps I should have.  I have a picture earlier in the thread of my latest build (Galaga) with the back off one of the machine.  Now with 7 games up and 1 I gave away I really am out of wall space, and have no plans to build any more. 

[aldub516]

I am working on the basics of the pi and getting the emulator/front end running. But as i said i dont want to spend time digging in the wrong hole, are you saying i first need to have advmame/other emulator up and running and playing robotron.. then from there its a matter of script/commands? Any specific details you can add for programming the pi to boot and load to one specific game everytime, that would be great. Im at a weird crossroad of learning a whole new platform, as well as figuring out its work arounds to achieve my goal. Is there a possibility of using an sd image of yours to achieve this? Lets say i successfully piplay or retropie, what would my theoretical next step? Im sorry to swarm you with questions. As i said, hours of searching turned up only one response on some forum, also discussing script usage.

[dezmond]

One quick question, what's the read board in the back on the left bottom used for?

[2084]

One quick question, what's the read board in the back on the left bottom used for?

That is a GP-Wiz40 USB interface.  I get them from GroovyGameGear.com, although the ones on their website are a different color.  It basically allows the joystick, buttons, etc. to enter the machine via a USB interface.  It would also be possible and cheaper to use the GPIO pins for this (which I have done on some other games) but the GP-Wiz40 was easier and the cost wasn't a major issue for me.

To answer another poster's question, I'm not interested in providing SD card images.  I have several reasons for this: They wouldn't work unless you had the exact same hardware set up I do (e.g. same monitor resolution/orientation, same controls and outputs wired the same way), they are huge files (8GB), and it raises legal issues regarding my rights to distribute some of the software on them.  There are others who are willing to provide such images (e.g. piplay.org).  There is a lot available online and in books with regard to setting up shell scripts, python code, etc.  I think these tools and the Raspberry Pi platform work well, but I also recognize that they are not for everyone and others may be more comfortable in a Windows type environment.

[aldub516]

I understand not trading sd images, and I'd honestly rather do it myself. So I guess the pointers are what I'm looking for. I suppose I shall try and get piplay or Retropie running then start researching shell scripts. Anything you think of that may help, please feel free to drop knowledge. It would help a lot. Great work again! Knowing it can be done is half the battle

[DeLuSioNal29]

There is a thread about SD image sharing here:  http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,141859.0.html

D
[Fixed link, was causing a browser error in Firefox. - Scott]

[aldub516]

so ive been doing my fair share of learning on the pi 2. Theres a lot of cool stuff going on. But even so, im still not sure which direction i should be really digging in. If i provide my options and what im trying to achieve, would you be able to atleast point me down the right path. Being a beginner, ive practiced setting up rasbian jessie, the N00BS setup which was nice and easy, as well as the retropie sd image. I also have found things like ultra slim which boots into a big emulator station and allow navigation of all your emulators and apps. BUT, as i said, my only goal is to turn the pi on, and boot directly (or as close to) a mame rom (robotron for instance) and nothing else,ever. I know im going to have to do a lot of reading on python, and scripts and everything in general, but can you provide your general setup? **IE youre running rasbian, with retropie installed, and running a shell script to start retropie and a specific game** or any other such combination? The ultraslim setup looks like it could be what i want, but for all i know it has no support for any kind of script or whatever. A simple program flow would really help me along my way. Thank you for all your responses thus far and advice

[haynor666]

Fantastic, I wish I had money and space for such cabinets

[2084]

Fantastic, I wish I had money and space for such cabinets

The main reason I made these is that I did not have space for traditional cabinets.

[haynor666]

Still You have free wall. On my four walls are shelves for games

[2084]

If you don't have any wall space then these aren't for you.

[polyomino]

Hi...

I'm new here.

Question, if you have a moment: What port of MAME are you using and what's your setup for the spinner input?

(Background. I'm doing a Tempest project with raspberry Pi and it looks like you're very well down this path. 
Currently using mame4all and a mouse input, the spinner doesn't have infinite movement. It stops after a couple times around, I BELIEVE because the "mouse" has hit the side of the screen. Any wisdom appreciated.



I'm MAME-ing an original cabinet.)

[the_Beaver]

I'm wondering if you could post the plans/dimensions for Robotron.

[Slippyblade]

I'm MAME-ing an original cabinet.

You're fired.

[yotsuya]

I'm MAME-ing an original cabinet.

You're fired.

I agree. That looks horrible.

[DesiredOutcome]

This is awesome and glad i found it. This would free up space for other things in my cave. Seems you have to do alot of fiddling. A more intermediate/advance level project as far as pi is concerned. I need to read more.