Prepare to Qualify - Driving Cabinet - Complete!

[leapinlew]

I've been working on this project for about a week. I won the cabinet in an ebay auction. It's a 1976 Atari Lemans thats solid, but needed to be reworked. I skipped side art for this and did some stripes on the side. Where I'm at now:

Create a marquee - Done! (Kinkos Backlit Vinyl)
Installing a mouse hack on the steering wheel - Done!
Mount all the controls - Done!
Setup computer - Done!
Test controls - Mixed results. Using a x-arcade solo PCB.
Play!

I'll post shots when she's done. The cabinets name is Prepare To Qualify.

Shot of the side: the red on the side looks brighter, but it's all the same color. Combination bad camera/lighting (mostly bad camera)


This is a shot of the side and front. It is on a furniture dolly -




And here is a shot of the uncomplete fron - I never noticed how uneven the coin door is from the pedals!



 

[JonnyBoy]

Looks cool, I like the matte finish on the paint. Be sure to keep the pics coming.

[deadkenndys1105]

I love the stripes.  This is going to be a nice looking cabinet.

[leapinlew]

What's anyone think about this for the marquee? The only difference between this one and another one I made is I put a couple checkered flags above the word "To"

I realize it's a bit plain, but it's in keeping with the minimalist cabinet theme... Thoughts?

[theCoder]

Nice work on the marquee.  The text looks a little too small primarily in the width.  Depending on the tool you're using you can increase the spacing between characters (I forget what it is called).  I like the checker pattern.  Look'n good.

[deadkenndys1105]

Great marquee but the text need to be sized up a bit.

[leapinlew]

Bigger text eh?

How do these look?





What about the font?

[Crafty]

Bigger sized font looks better..

Have you tried other fonts though.

Not sure if there is a better font out there for this Marquee..

Capital Letters Might Help

[theCoder]

Much better.  I prefer the first one.

[gamecreature]

I would suggest a different font as well - something with bolder letters and sharp corners. This is just an example (I used Franklin Gothic Heavy, but you get the idea):

[captainpotato]

Change the font. Please. That font is simply wrong, IMO. Also, I'd suggest dropping the edging on it and the fading out background.

I'd suggest caps only as well.

I've just had a quick play with your image. You'd want to improve the font (especially on the change I made to the IMS logo), but it's an idea. I had to change the name because I wasn't happy with how to word 'to' fitted (or didn't).

[rockworm]

leapinlew:
I like the second one better were the text covers the whole length of the marquee. If you want to keep the font, I would make it slightly bolder and increase the intercharacter spacing. Otherwise I like the red-black theme, details with white and chrome will fit in excellent.

[leapinlew]

Here is another marquee design - this time using the larger font and blockier font suggestion from Gamecreature:



Are the checkered flags good or bad?

[leapinlew]

Also, does anyone notice the text is off center? It seemed more important to make the "To" to appear in the center of the black V than to center the whole thing left and right....

[bleemus]

I think it means more to get the whole thing centered rather than worrying about the "To" being in the middle of the V pattern.

You might also think about using a fixed width font if you want the first and last words to be the same width to be able to have the "To" in the middle.  Most of those don't look that great though.

[leapinlew]

Here is one with the text centered -

[leapinlew]

Change the font. Please. That font is simply wrong, IMO. Also, I'd suggest dropping the edging on it and the fading out background.

I'd suggest caps only as well.

I've just had a quick play with your image. You'd want to improve the font (especially on the change I made to the IMS logo), but it's an idea. I had to change the name because I wasn't happy with how to word 'to' fitted (or didn't).

I understood most of that... I love the name, even though it's giving me fits right now.

As for the checkerboard fade... I like it. I tried it without the fade and to me it looked flat. I appreciate the suggestion!

[gamecreature]

You could make the "to" smaller to give more emphasis to the other words. Regarding the flags, the only thing that bothers me about them is the way they are separate from everything else - it really adds to their foreigness. Try to find a way to integrate them into the rest of the design.

[Ninten-doh]

I like the checkerboard fade, and I really like Gamecreature's outlined white lettering.  IMHO, the name gets lost with the red lettering, so how about this combo...

BTW, I like the bigger checkerboard you have on the later versions.  I meant to do my mockup on that version, but I f**ked up.

[Ninten-doh]

Cabinet mocked with red lettered marquee and white lettered marquee.  Toned down the red brightness on the marquees to match the cab.

Can you tell I'm avoiding doing work on this lazy Friday afternoon and I'm wishing I was making a cool driving cab like this?   

[leapinlew]

Man!

Your right! But, I already sent it off to be printed. Hopefully it turns out ok. Working on the marquee from 12" away on a large screen monitor gives a skewed perception on it's actual turn out. I hope I don't have to spend another $30 to get another marquee!

Thanks for the mockup though - that was cool.

[gamecreature]

Ninten-doh, that's an excellent illustration of an important design rule - make sure it's legible from a reasonable distance. Always a good practice to take a few steps back and see what it looks like. If you can't make it out, time to make some changes.

[Ninten-doh]

Did you send it to mamemarquees or some local print place?  You could always call them and tell them you'll be resending if you feel strongly enough about the alternate version.  Worth a shot.   

[MYX]

Check out acidfonts.com and go font shopping. Link
Becareful of using a bevel. If you are trying to get it to stand off of the background, then try a white glow. If you are using the outline on the font then a white glow will not interfere with the design and it will make your text seem sharper.

[leapinlew]

Here is a picture of the mouse hack for the steering wheel. You can follow my trials and tribulations here:

300 teeth, printed the encoder wheel:

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=54685.0




Not bad! I'm happy with it.

[gamecreature]

You should be. You'll be racing in no time.

[Ninten-doh]

Very cool leapinlew.  Keep the project updates coming!

Did you get the marquee from the printer yet?

[leapinlew]

No... not yet. I'm going to get it today and mount it tonight - I'll send some pictures tomorrow.

I am going to use a pcb out of an x-arcade solo. It's giving me some problems though. Actually, it's being a little ---smurfette---. If it doesn't straighten up soon - I'm giving it the boot. It could be the switches for the pedals and shifter giving it a hard time, or it could be the x-arcade wants the ground on a specific post. I'm not sure. I'm hoping to have it playable in a few days.

[leapinlew]

Marquee looks good. $16 at Kinkos for a 24 x 7.5.

[Buddabing]

Nice job so far, I like the stripes!

Are you planning on adding a light gun for Night Stocker and other driving/gun games?

[leapinlew]

Nice job so far, I like the stripes!

Are you planning on adding a light gun for Night Stocker and other driving/gun games?

Good question. Like, so good I never thought about it.

The monitor sort of lays in the cabinet, I don't think I can put a gun in at this point. But now I'm curious - how many other driving/gun games are their? I have about 20 games that will play on it well, so any other games I can play would be a bonus.

[Havok]

Haha - I like the Slikstik dig.

Also - looks awesome so far...

[DigDreams]

If you ever wan to update your marquee, may I throw my suggestion in to the hat...



Just a thought...  The skew gives it more of a racing feel.

- DigDreams

[Buddabing]

I don't know how many other games combine driving and shooting a gun. Lucky & Wild is the only one I can think of. Yoke games such as Stun Runner and Roadblasters would be playable with just a wheel and a gun, but I don't know if MAME supports that control arrangement.

I guess the main benefit you'd get from adding a light gun would be the 80+ games you could play on it without the wheel, such as Area 51, etc.

[leapinlew]

I don't know how many other games combine driving and shooting a gun. Lucky & Wild is the only one I can think of. Yoke games such as Stun Runner and Roadblasters would be playable with just a wheel and a gun, but I don't know if MAME supports that control arrangement.

I guess the main benefit you'd get from adding a light gun would be the 80+ games you could play on it without the wheel, such as Area 51, etc.

well damn....

I haven't really kept up with light guns... do they work well? If yes, could you point me in a direction as to what kind of gun? Do they work behind smoked plexi? Do they require a special version of mame? Is a 21" monitor big enough?

[leapinlew]

If you ever wan to update your marquee, may I throw my suggestion in to the hat...



Just a thought...  The skew gives it more of a racing feel.

- DigDreams

Good call Dig. The marquee is cheap enough that I just might. Thanks for the suggestion

[Buddabing]

Light Guns Wiki Link

[DigDreams]

Good call Dig. The marquee is cheap enough that I just might. Thanks for the suggestion

Those fonts are Speedway and Serpentine-Bold-Bold.  If you want a high-res image I'll be glad to send you a PSD at whatever size/dpi/style you want.

- DigDreams

[leapinlew]

Made some progress - had some setbacks working on the cab this evening.

First the progress:

  Moved the cabinet from the garage to the game room.
  Greased and polished the steering wheel
  Installed the monitor (what a job, had to recruit my girlfriend)
  Mounted the control panel

Now for the bad news:

  The x-arcade pcb I was going to use is definetly no good
  I need to realign the encoder wheel after removing the steering wheel
  Broke the plexiglass trying to cut it for the marquee

So... I can't mount the marquee or get the controls wired up. But! I have a plan for tomorrow...

1. Get more plexiglass and this time cut it with the router
2. Hack a keyboard.

Hack a keyboard?! I have an old compaq keyboard that looks like this:


I can cross 2 points on the back behind each letter to get that letter. I want to just solder on about 20 wires to give me 10 connections. What do you think?

Anyhow, here are some pics of the cab with the monitor and cp in place. I'll be taking the cp off so I can fix the encoder wheel. The monitor is held in with a brace and it's bolted directly to the shelf it's on - it's not moving anywhere.

[theCoder]

I've got a gutted Taiko driving cab in my garage, awaiting my attention (one project at a time).  It does not have a steering wheel.  Did your unit include a wheel?  Any recommendations on buying/building one?