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Critique my 4 player panel
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mrjah:
An obvious homage to Supercade here...  Pardon the extra coordinate systems that I didn't clean out of the image.

Some notes:
- For reference, overall CP width is 48".  Raised section of CP matches width of cabinet.
- Vast majority of dimensions (buttons, joys, other spacing) are inspired by well-known machines.
- P3-4 joys are not angled: up is always up.
- Joys will be color coordinated with buttons for P1-P4: Red, yellow, blue, green.
- CP surface will not be gunmetal grey -- haven't gotten to that stage of design yet.
- 4-way joy in middle of panel is set up for left hand use; right hand on 2 buttons on lower right.
- White buttons in the center of the CP are pause, etc.  Three are function buttons, and the fourth (far left) must be held down simultaneously with one of the other three to get the function to fire.  Helps to prevent accidents.
- White buttons mounted on front edge of CP are coin and start for each player.  I'm not into coin boxes.
- Those are spinners on front corners of the CP.  I've tested these locations on a cardboard mockup and they work far better than they look.  I have some concern over button use with the spinner for P2, but it's not too bad to use.
- Flight stick (not shown) will be mounted between the two trackballs, and will actually retract cleanly down into the CP when not in use.  This will be a completely unnecessary and fantastic little add-on.

So...

- Should I put some buttons up by the trackballs?  Two per side, or something?  I turn to the experts here for guidance.  What do I need up there?
- What have I royally screwed up?

As always, thanks for your kind assistance...

mccoy178:
No Golden Tee I take it?  Other than that it looks okay.  I've never been a big fan of the dual level, but if you look at my four person layout, you may not be a big fan of that either.
cdbrown:
Having the trackballs close to the screen could leave your fingers sore, screen smudge marks or not getting the high score in the gold tell games or any game that requires fast rolling of the ball forwards. 

Be careful of the orientation of the 3 and 4 player joysticks. 
I prefer all the sticks to be + + + + 
and not x + + x
but this may work for your panel layout.

The buttons on the side walls - you may find people will bump them alot when playing games.  Make sure they won't do anything to the game - no shift keys assigned to these.  Nothing worse than accidentally nudging P1 start and pressing some other button causing the game to quit.
PCtech:
Neat layout, only a couple things I see:

1) Like mentioned before, trackball use will be limited because the trackballs are so close to the screen.

2) What, no spinner?...for a CP that big, might want to find room for a spinner (personal preference)

3) The 2 buttons to the lower -right of the 4 way, looks like they might work better if they moved over to the right more (almost lined up with the stick)

4) Put the "side-wall" buttons on the upper lever (under the trackballs), that will keep folks from bumping the buttons with their bodies.

5) If the grey bottons between P1 & P2, and between P3 and P4 are coin bottons, might want to wire them to the coin door, or with the other admin buttons.

Otherwise looks good!

Good luck, please post picks as you go.

TheRed:
I like it and don't know much about mame cabs etc....

With that said, I really enjoy 4 player games like the gladiator, which is a pgm game and I don't know if they are in mame.....but it does require 4 buttons for all players.


Again, I don't know much about meme, but I am guessing the new versions can pgm if it has STV games now.
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