So I've been kicking the idea around for a long time. My brother-in-law and I finally decided to work together on building an arcade cabinet. We've been working on the concept for a few months and are just about ready to start buying some things. I was thinking of starting with a cardboard prototype of the CP. Anyway, here is what we are going for:
- MUST be 4-player. Yes, it absolutely will get a lot of 4-player play.
- Try to keep it under $1,000.
- It should look nice- lit marquee & buttons, art, etc... but doesn't need to be arcade-perfect. No coin door, for instance. (Budget!)
- Should play as wide as possible variety of (arcade only!) games without a frankenpanel or going out in the weeds for weird or rare games.
- 6 buttons for players 1 and 2, 4 buttons for 3 and 4, as is fairly standard. (Yes, we'd play D&D.)
Here are the features I'd like to have, but I are less critical:
- Trackball (this is actually more or less critical, but I could be persuaded to drop it as a good one is pretty expensive)
- Two guns (probably Aimtraks with recoil)
- Start button for each player lights up when credits are "inserted". (Is this hard to do?)
- "Active" (usable) buttons for each player light up, depending on what game is being played. (Is this even harder?)
- A button (or maybe a shift button) that starts a random game
- If the machine is left on, rather than sit on the menu it just boots up a random game, switching games every half hour or so
- Split screen for emulating connected machines (this one is a bit out there, so if anyone has tried this, let me know)
My bro has an auto-cad file of the basic design which I'll post another time. Basically, I'm the research guy, the finances, the project management, and grunt work, while he is the engineer for both the physical and software build. Yeah, yeah, so he's doing all the work. I'm not as handy as he is.
So some other details: We went back and forth on the old CRT vs LCD debate, but ultimately settled on LED. I'm not overly nostalgic about the classic look of CRTs, though we may toy with software emulation of the look. I know- it's not as good. We already have a 32" LCD, though, so that saves some money. And they are cheap and easy to replace if need be. Even though we're not putting in a coin door (I might put in a coin door decal, though,) I want to put the credit buttons on the front- preferably where the coin door would be. I like the idea of reaching down there as though I were inserting a coin. Reject button assemblies are cheap. Is it possible to wire those up as credit buttons?
Now here's something I haven't found anyone else doing. (I've read various threads, but there's no way I can read everything, so I'm sure SOMEONE somewhere has done this.) I'm planning on using FOUR U360 joysticks. Yes, they are expensive, but their high programmability makes them ideal for a wide variety of games. In addition to working as 4-way or 8-way, they of course also work for analog games. (Or even weird configurations, such as diagonal 4-way like in Q*Bert.) Plus, analog joysticks work for most driving games as well. (Not so much for Pole Position, I've read.) Heck, I even tested using an analog joystick for Warlords (a game known for using 4 spinners,) and while I couldn't beat the CPU, if playing with 4 people it could at least be fair. I at least got to where I could catch the ball regularly. I know some (such as ChanceKJ- in a thread I'm sure most of you know well) used two U360s, but I know that with Offroad, at least, I'd need 3 analog sticks. I'm actually not sure how many 4-player games would need these, but if we go with the split-screen idea, we definitely would need them as most linked machines are driving games. I also got a promise of a discount for buying so many- because apparently no one does this. The retailer's shipping is very high, though, so I want to make sure of everything I will need from them before I order. (Tips on this are greatly appreciated.)
I have seen the numerous reminders to remember to angle the P3 and P4 joysticks! Very good advice, which I might not have thought of otherwise. But then I saw one cautioning about dual-joystick games such as Smash TV. Smash TV and Total Carnage are high on my must-play list! So now I'm in a bit of a quandary. I really don't want the make the CP a straight line- it looks so boring and seems like a janky way to play for 4 players. What to do? One thought came to mind: What angle do you put them at? If it's 45 degrees, then it would be pretty simple to program the U360s to read the diagonals as straights and the straights as diagonals for those games. It could probably be done at any angle, but the map wouldn't be as neat, I think. Thoughts?
I'll post more details later. I don't want to cram so much in here no one will read it (too late?).