Artistic preference: Button labels or no button labels?

[Crazy Cooter]

With controls.dat and Johnny 5, are button labels on the cpo needed?

[tetsujin]

I think first you have to consider what the button labels are for.  Are people going to know what "C" means when they're playing Defender or Mortal Kombat?  Only if you tell them, and then there's a bit of an indirection process happening getting from the controls list to the button letter to the actual physical location of the button.  ("shoot" is "B", "B" is right here...)

And then there's the question of whether you want to have games like PlayChoice/NES or other console emulations.  If so then having instructions that tell the player "B is A, A is B" or something can be really confusing.  (Though if you get down to individual games you can say things like "A is attack, B is jump")  But if your cabinet will play a lot of different games there's going to be a compromise somewhere.

I think that, in lieu of a better solution, giving the buttons some kind of basic label is helpful.  That way you can refer to buttons (in on-screen control guides) not only by position, but by their label.


Really, there's several problems with people unfamiliar with the machine stepping up and playing a game.  If your machine has significantly more buttons than the game does, then there's the problem of the player recognizing which buttons are "active".  They may get confused by the fact that there are extra buttons there, even if they know which ones are active - they may just feel the other buttons with their hands, and think they're relevant and try to push them, as their eyes will be on the screen.  Some players may simply be turned off by the machine if it looks too complex.  But if you get past all that then they've got to somehow find out what the game controls are.  Some people use dedicated LCD text displays on the control panel for that - I think it's a good idea, because it ensures that the control information is always accessible without people having to pause the game or whatever.

Personally, I'm pursuing a better solution. 

[RayB]

My control panel art has words like "jump" and "attack", etc next to buttons. But I think I might change that since not every game adheres to those buttons strictly...

It's especially confusing if a game looks like it might have jumping, but doesn't and yet the player will look down, see "jump" and mash that button expecting jumping but will get something else (or get nothing).

I too am considering going the A B C D route... I don't play Playchoice games. Any others games that might cause confusion?

OH another thing! My original layout called for colored buttons that match the Super Famicom buttons. Well I changed my mind and the colors now will match Neo Geo. Since so many Neo Geo games show instructions on-screen using colors buttons.

[SirPoonga]

I'm making an instuction card to explain the button layouts.  Also, player 1 will have red buttons.  The mouse buttons (button 1 and 2 when switched) will have a white holder.  The player 1 start will be the typical white player 1 button but with a translucent holder.

[SUB ZERO]

No labels ... I just prefer to explain it than try to label everything for every game out there ... kind of pointless if you ask me.

[grueinthebox]

Forego the button labels, wait for the new LEDWiz, and just light up the buttons needed for each game as it's selected.

[tetsujin]

Forego the button labels, wait for the new LEDWiz, and just light up the buttons needed for each game as it's selected.

That still doesn't tell people which button does what, though I do think it's a step in the right direction...

[Crazy Cooter]

Maybe an instruction card is the way to go.  I've always used button colors in pairs so I could refer to them as bottom yellow or top red and I'd like to get away from that a bit (and finally get some artwork down).  I think if I made a "House Button Label Sheet" it could work.  I could laminate a print of my CPO and write on it as needed.  If I labeled the instruction sheet with numbers, people should know what order to try them in.  Mostly it's for my sister and my niece.  They're not over often enough to remember what buttons do what, so I always get asked... even if I'm outside etc.

I'd love to get the LED thing eventually.

[jhanson]

I numbered my buttons, and then have a little LCD screen that explains what the numbers mean for each game.



You can get more details about my cabinet at my website.

[Tiger-Heli]

Short answer is no - Use Johnny5 - setup info is here - http://www.mameworld.net/tigerheli/johnny/ I should have detailed info (except maybe the non-MAME stuff) up by Monday . . .

[jopenner]

No labels on my cabinet except for the admin buttons like "pause", "start", "coinup" etc.
I agree that telling your guest what button to push would be easier, especially with the various button layouts available in different arcade games.

John