Question about a jakks multi-game thing

[DaOld Man]

I am thinking about building a bartop arcade using one of those 5 games in 1 jakks controller.
The jakks is made to plug into your tv, so i take it that it displays in horizontal only (I havent purchased it yet, just dreaming right now.)
Does anyone know of a way to make the jakks display vertical, so i can turn the TV vertical in the cabinet?

[HaRuMaN]

no.

[DaOld Man]

Anyone else?

[shardian]

The games themselves are modified to work horizontally. Take pacman for instance, all of the score stuff is off to the right of the maze to better disperse onto a horizontal layout. Same thing with galaga. There is nothing you can do to play in a vertical setup.

[Ginsu Victim]

Yeah, definitely not. Just aren't made (or modded) to do it.

[shardian]

I don't think it was ever confirmed, but many think several of the games are direct port rip-offs of the NES versions.

[TOK]

Don't do it, gut a PC and use MAME.  If you're used to playing them emulated, I think these are garbage.

[shardian]

I quite enjoy the Jakks games myself. I have several of them, and would like to make a junior scale version to donate to the Ronald McDonald house. I'm sure someday I will get around to it.

[Ummon]

I don't think it was ever confirmed, but many think several of the games are direct port rip-offs of the NES versions.

Ports of something. I didn't like them. However, they use actual arcade-display pictures on the box. Or used to anyway.

[MPS]

The games themselves are modified to work horizontally. Take pacman for instance, all of the score stuff is off to the right of the maze to better disperse onto a horizontal layout. Same thing with galaga. There is nothing you can do to play in a vertical setup.

The Jakks arcade games haven't been modified.  All of the Jakks arcade game hardware is based around an NES on a chip, and the games were programmed from the ground up to run on that hardware using a standard TV.  They are not the original NES ports from that era.  All of the coding is brand new.  There is no way to make them work the way the OP would like on a vertical monitor.

The majority of those Jakks games are horribly programmed junk.  The OP would be better off to go the MAME route.

[HaRuMaN]

Anyone else?

Was "no." not clear enough? 

I would agree with the other people in this thread.  Build a MAME PC.  Go to Goodwill, or any other local thrift store, and pick up an old PC for cheap.

[bishmasterb]

Vertical, no, as others have stated.

But I'll take the minority opinion as for the Jakks games themselves. Yes, they are not perfect arcade representations. But they are pretty damn close and certainly a lot of fun.

If you're looking for casual entertainment and want:

* Zero boot-up time
* Zero configuration effort
* Zero chance of software configuration corruption/errors
* Idiot-proof menu system

and are tolerant of good, but not perfect, ports of the games, then the Jakks units are definitely the way to go.

As others have done, you can also combine multiple units through a switchbox to get more than 5 games in one cabinet.

[DaOld Man]

Was "no." not clear enough? 

Yes.

[DaOld Man]

Vertical, no, as others have stated.

But I'll take the minority opinion as for the Jakks games themselves. Yes, they are not perfect arcade representations. But they are pretty damn close and certainly a lot of fun.

If you're looking for casual entertainment and want:

* Zero boot-up time
* Zero configuration effort
* Zero chance of software configuration corruption/errors
* Idiot-proof menu system

and are tolerant of good, but not perfect, ports of the games, then the Jakks units are definitely the way to go.

As others have done, you can also combine multiple units through a switchbox to get more than 5 games in one cabinet.

Your points are exactly the reason I wanted to try this. But Im thinking a bartop made be a little strange looking having to be so wide to accommodate a horizontal screen, unless it is an extremely small screen.

[bishmasterb]

Your points are exactly the reason I wanted to try this. But Im thinking a bartop made be a little strange looking having to be so wide to accommodate a horizontal screen, unless it is an extremely small screen.

15" CRTs (4:3) are about the biggest I think you can go while maintaining the basic look and feel of a real arcade machine, at bartop size. I know some people have put 17" CRTs in bartops (I think I've even seen a 19") but they start to lose the look and feel of a regular arcade cabinet at that point (nothing wrong with that, just depends on the look you're going for).

[TOK]

I used a 19" to make my bartop more like an actual arcade cabinet. That was the actual monitor size of the original.
The cab itself is a bit large compared to the skinny mini's guys are building now, though.