Mameroom Full CP - A review

[MojoNixon]

Hello all,

Long time lurker, first time poster.

For my first offical post, thought I'd let you all know about my experience ordering a fully configured CP from Mameroom.com....

Ordered it on 2/7/08
Some back and forth via email going over details, changes from the basic layout, moving the spinner around, etc.
Received final layout for approval on 02/11, sent approval on 02/12
Some more back and forth via email about button colors
Shipped on 02/18
Received on 02/21

Upon opening the box, I was really impressed. Workmanship was excellent, the thing was HEAVY and felt very solid. Plugged it in, booted up, and XP immediately recognised everything.

Issues:
1) Spinner was incorrectly mapped to the y-axis instead of the x-axis. Spoke to Scott, who apologized for the error and was told mine was only the second board they built using the GGG interface instead of the I-Pac. Only had to move a jumper over 1 space and all was well.
2) The back edge of the bottom panel came loose during shipping. Also spoke to Scott, they will be using longer screws going forward. It was designed to swing upward and toward you.
3) Some of the buttons were not mapped to my liking. This was more my fault than his. I should have specified exactly which buttons I wanted mapped where, prior to my approving the final build/wiring. Scott sent me the specs for the GGG board and I re-did the wiring to my liking in 5 minutes. It was easy and everything worked like a charm afterwards.

Final impressions/advice.
Most importantly, I was impressed with how responsive and available Scott was throughout the process. After I received it and came up with my issues, he responded to my emails within a few hours, sometimes within minutes. Also spoke to him a number of times on the phone. It was nice to be able to contact him readily, especially after what happened to SlikStik.

He was very apologetic about the issues I had and offered to re-do the thing, but it was unnecessary and as it turned out, really easy to deal with everything myself. He is also sending me some extra buttons gratis so I can do some further modifications that I didn't initally think of.

Side Pinball buttons and a plunger button was included even though it wasn't part of the spec. Unexpected and nice.

I would wholeheartedly recommend them to anyone interested in getting a CP. My biggest piece of advice, though, would be to know exactly how you want your buttons mapped, in case you're fickle like me. On the whole, a pleasant experience.

Regards,
Steve

[johnperkins21]

Umm, this thread is useless without pics. 

[MojoNixon]

oops, yeah that might help  . Posting from work, will add pics tonight after I get home.

[johnperkins21]

oops, yeah that might help  . Posting from work, will add pics tonight after I get home.

Liar! 

[FrizzleFried]

oops, yeah that might help  . Posting from work, will add pics tonight after I get home.

Liar! 

Huh?  He added photos alright (look at first post).

[johnperkins21]

Whoops. Scrolled right past them. My bad. 

[Ummon]

He added photos, later.

[Ginsu Victim]

yeah, but look at the dates. He added the photos well before the "liar" comment.

[Ummon]

I thought jp21 was just razzing him about his excuse. Although with that layout and those colors I am surprised he missed the pics.

[MojoNixon]

I'm sure he was kidding re: the liar comment. I certainly didn't take anything it personally.

However, what's the crack about the colors and layout?

Actually, this was obviously my first intro to cp's. If I had to do it over again, I would go with a different color scheme on the buttons and the trackball. In fact, I would just get a blank and do it myself. Now that I know that wiring isn't the big scary thing I thought it was going to be, I'm going to take it apart to add an overlay and then re-assemble.

[massive88]

My guess is the red next to the blue.  Its quite a flamboyent contrast.

Im no color expert or designer, but I know that Red and Blue are not Complementary Colors.

It doesn't make your choice of colors wrong however, you should always lean toward getting exactly what you want.  However it may come across as an odd decision to other people (who may feel compelled to comment on it, as above) when you stray from the more traditional color combination choices.

Edit:  Upon renewing my knowledge of complementary colors, thats probably not what you want to go for either.  So I guess you can disregard that comment.  Point still stands though, you wont make everyone else happy with any color choice you do, so just make sure you make yourself happy.

[MojoNixon]

Yeah, it does look a little "busy". If I was doing it again, I'd go with a single color for each player. Live and learn. I should have paid more attention to the CP gallery to get color scheme ideas before going forward...At least buttons aren't that expensive.

[johnperkins21]

I was just razzing Mojo. I checked the Review forum and noticed that there were no new posts, so I had made an ass of myself by assuming that he didn't update. Went directly to posting rather than looking at the original post.

I'm not a huge fan of the color scheme, but I don't know what his final vision is. It could look pretty sweet with the right artwork on there. Personally I prefer to have each player have all one color (with maybe button 1 being a different color). And buttons are very, very easy to change. So if he decides that he doesn't dig the colors he can easily change them out.

[Ummon]

I was just razzing Mojo. I checked the Review forum and noticed that there were no new posts, so I had made an ass of myself by assuming that he didn't update. Went directly to posting rather than looking at the original post.

Something like this is what I thought.


The color scheme is your traditional sports (and Indian paint) colors. They get attention. The layout is odd due to the sticks left of center and upper left. How does it feel in various game play?

[MojoNixon]

The layout is odd due to the sticks left of center and upper left. How does it feel in various game play?

if I only knew then....

The second stick left of center is for Robotron and SmashTV (2 of my favorites). Unfortunately, the placement of the 2nd player one stick slightly interferes with the use of the dedicated 4-way (upper left). I have to cant my left arm a little out to use it comfortably. If I had to do it over again, I would have printed a full size layout and "played" on it to get a better idea of gameplay. Otherwise, I like everything else on it.

I'd also get an inertia cylinder for the TT2, as Tempest is really weak without it. One's coming soon though.

[Ummon]

I'd also get an inertia cylinder for the TT2, as Tempest is really weak without it. One's coming soon though.

Did you get a token top?

[MojoNixon]

Didn't know anything about makes/models/accessories for the spinner before I ordered it, so it's whatever the base top is, (light plastic with a white registration dot). It's not bad for driving games or arkanoid but I need the weight for tempest and major havoc.

I just looked up the token top. Sounds like the answer, do you know if I can just do a simple swap?

[Ummon]

Of course you can. Otherwise Randy would look pretty stupid. But wait for the cylinder and see how that works. If you're not concerned much with looks, you may not need the token top.