Ok, guys. I have a lot of projects started. 2 Touchscreen jukes in the works, 4 sub mini replica cabinets, and among other things work on the restoration of our house. On top of all that, I have two wonderful boys 10 and 6 who take up a lot of my time, not to mention being a Jr. High School teacher here in Japan. As you might well be able to imagine, my time is very very limited. About a month ago a friend of mine, who is a local artist of some fame here in Japan, approached me with a strange request. He became interested in my hobby of making arcade cabinets. He wanted to build 6 cabinets, two of which he would design all the artwork himself and the other 4 he wanted to be replica cabinets. I searched the forum here and came across my muse. "Donkey Kong's" DK Jr. Bartop was very well made and since space is kinda limited here in Japan, I thought that bartops would be the best choice. As you may or may not know here in Japan, most of all the arcade cabinets you see in the game centers are what we call "Candy Cabs", while these are nice, they just don't capture the 80's feel that my friend wanted to use. I did some research and found out that, indeed, at one time the game centers here in Japan were full of upright fullsize cabinets, most of these in about 1985 were either shipped to the Philippines, Brazil, some other country or out right destroyed. I was shocked.
Since Mario and Donkey Kong are some of the biggest icons here in Japan, we decided to build Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., and a Mario Bros. Bartops in tribute to the games that launched Miyamoto into Nintendo history. The three remaining cabinets are two 1/2 scale replicas of full size cabinets (Ms. Pacman and Tempest) both of which will have all original art and be running original games which I have been feverishly working on in my freetime. One of the games is very similar to an old Apple II/Commadore 64 game called Hard Hat Mack. The final bartop is going to be a hybrid Pacman style cabinet. As you all know, just building one cabinet at a time is a daunting task, well try building a mini game center. It makes me
just thinking about the work ahead of us as well as the work that we have already done. Sorry guys, my digital camera was broken in the early stages of construction and all I have are a few shots taken with my cell phone camera, but I will try my level best to document the project from here on out.
The Bartops will hold a P4 1.2Ghz Slimtype PC and a 15 inch TFT monitor. The Pac Hybrid Bartop will hold a 24 inch CRT monitor with a 1.4 Ghz Athalon. The two 1/2 scale "original" cabinets will hold a 9.4 inch TFT monitor and a Via Pico board. Now that all the announcement crap is outta the way, ON TO THE PICS!
Well, here is the first pic. A Mario Bros. replica bartop. The cell phone doesn't do the colors justice. The colors are sharp and beautiful. Oh well. I will try to take better pictures from here on out. Sorry guys. The buttons are from GroovyGameGear.com The CPO was modified to add an additional button for games that will require two buttons. The joysticks are from Seimitsu direct. (ANY OF YOU OUT THERE WHO MAY BE INTERESTED IN SEMITSU JOYSTICKS, DROP ME A LINE. IF I AM GOING TO PLACE AN ORDER IN THE FUTURE I WILL MAKE IT A BIG ONE. The Sanwa Joystick manufacturing plant was moved to Korea, so the Seimitsu Joysticks have a much higher Quality Control and are far more superior (just an opinion)