My First Cabinet - World of Warcraft Cabinet

[Kardall]

So, i have a cabinet that I'm making. We'll see if I want to stick with my current design type for the information site (it's on SquareSpace). You can visit it here: http://wiki.arcadecontrols.com/wiki/Kardalls_Arcade

I have decided to dedicate the cabinet to one of the games that has consumed most of my life. World of Warcraft. I have been playing since 2005, and decided to quit. However, I don't want to forget the friends I have made over the years, and the joy that a game of such a social impact (regardless of what others say) can bring.

So I give you, my cabinet. I haven't settled on a name yet, so right now it's Kardall's Arcade.

Here's a picture of the cabinet itself in design phase:



The squarespace page has more pictures, including the side panel. I am doing it in a blog style, so that I can catalog my progress.  I am in Canada, so if anyone is near Calgary and is interested in helping out, then please send me a PM. I'm not sure if I have the skills to do it myself lol. I'm researching constantly.

Right now in between money fixes, I'm trying to design the side art of what I want. My vision is Alliance vs. Horde, and it'll be a fighting cab mainly. So the left side of the cab (player 1 side) will be Alliance themed, and the right side (Player 2) will be, you guessed it, Horde.

I'm going through the wall papers, and I had an idea of putting some sort of collage of all the crests for each faction on the sides, and the 2 factions (currently) will be on the marquee in the middle. I also found a cool pic of horde vs. alliance for the control panel. But until i design the layout for it, I don't want to go too far on that part.

I am modifying the wallpapers that have the alliance/horde battleground caves, and getting rid of the surrounding work, leaving only the cave/banner. Having fun trying to decide where to put the other race crests. Doing Horde side at the moment (FOR THE HORDE!) lol.

If you have any tips, they're greatly appreciated. I'm trying to figure out how, when i'm done, i'm going to get them printed. Should I just use paper and glue/laquer them on? etc. etc. I was going to just have the parts printed separately if that's the best way, so that I can position them how I want, and do it in stages.

Edit: Thought I'd put the dimensions of the cabinet here. It's 73" tall.
http://kardall.squarespace.com/storage/kardcab-002.png?__SQUARESPACE_CACHEVERSION=1254185649493
It's too big and I don't feel like stretching the forums, so it's just a link to the squarespace one for now. I'll resize one later on and put it in here in it's place.

[Kardall]

I live in a rural town, and I was talking to a guy at lunch (older farmer who loves to help) and he told me that he has some 1" MDF in 4x8 sheets that is made out of straw... Now, the problem is, I don't think you can plane that stuff down so... any tips? It'd be free......

[Kardall]

*sigh*
I have been looking for like 6 hours and I can't find any decent images for world of warcraft that don't look like crap... perhaps I'll have to not do a warcraft theme...

I tried taking some images, reading up on the vectorizing of the images, and they are way too complex to do anything decent with. I'm afraid that I'm going to have to settle with something like Street Fighter or something along those lines... I have time to think about it anyway. Not like it's going on right right now, the cab isn't even built yet. But still, it's frustrating.

[emphatic]

Did you look @ DeviantArt? http://www.deviantart.com/#order=9&q=warcraft
Also should be some in this thread: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=276451 (check out their "new" thread mentioned in the first post as well).

[syph007]

If you were looking opinions, I would ditch the WoW theme.  Make yourself a poster or something if you just want to remember the game.  If you going to build an arcade machine to honor and play the classics give it an arcade theme.   

[Epyx]

@Syph

Doesn't mean you don't honour the classics if you choose to use an "unconventional theme"...plenty of cabs with "unconventional" themes that are still great cabs.  I love the classics and have been playing arcade games since I was 7 (1979), just don't want "another" pac man cabinet. Doesn't mean I don't appreciate the classics!

EDIT: Hopefully didn't sound grumpy...just saying its a BYOAC forum..."your own" is a definition that differs from person to person.

@ Kardall

If you can't find good WoW art you aren't searching hard enough...WoW art litters the Internet.  Change your approach to how you search. One of the first methods I use for searching anything picture related is to use Google's search by Images rather than web pages...type World of Warcraft or World of Warcraft Art into Google and then click on images instead of the default web. You will get 5 billion pages of WoW artwork.

[syph007]

@Syph

Doesn't mean you don't honour the classics if you choose to use an "unconventional theme"...plenty of cabs with "unconventional" themes that are still great cabs.  I love the classics and have been playing arcade games since I was 7 (1979), just don't want "another" pac man cabinet. Doesn't mean I don't appreciate the classics!

EDIT: Hopefully didn't sound grumpy...just saying its a BYOAC forum..."your own" is a definition that differs from person to person.

lol no worries, thats why I said it was just my opinion.. we all have different ones.  I personally can't stand WoW.  I'm sick to death of hearing people at my work talk about it for hours on end... why wont they build arcade cabinets and talk about that instead!!

But ya I forget we have different goals.  My goal is to have something that looks like it 'could' have been a real arcade machine.  It was a huge status symbol of the 80's.  The silver spoons kid etc.  I want someone to come over and say cool arcade machine and think its a real one.. not oh, you build your own game thing thats arcade shaped with modern non appropriate graphics.  But see not everyone is going to share that goal, so it's cool.

[Sir Headless VII]

If you can't find good WoW art you aren't searching hard enough...WoW art litters the Internet.  Change your approach to how you search. One of the first methods I use for searching anything picture related is to use Google's search by Images rather than web pages...type World of Warcraft or World of Warcraft Art into Google and then click on images instead of the default web. You will get 5 billion pages of WoW artwork.

You can also set the search to find "Extra Large" images only. This will yield only large images suitable for putting on the side of a cab. An image search for world of warcraft yields 22,400 extra large images (with safesearch on).

[Epyx]

@Sir Headless VII

Yes, a great tip

@Kardall

I would love to see you do a WoW themed cab. It has some great potential. 

[LeedsFan]

I kinda like the idea of a WoW themed cab. Even though WoW is for n00bs and you shoulda gone with Final Fantasy XI... a much tougher and deeper game not aimed at the kiddywinkies.    (Flamebait planted)


LOL but seriously.... yeah it should be fine if you find decent art. I'd be really wanting to see how it turns out.

[clok]

I kinda like the idea of a WoW themed cab. Even though WoW is for n00bs and you shoulda gone with Final Fantasy XI... a much tougher and deeper game not aimed at the kiddywinkies.    (Flamebait planted)


LOL but seriously.... yeah it should be fine if you find decent art. I'd be really wanting to see how it turns out.

I had to (thread derailment, sorry).. so spending lots of time doing the exact same thing over makes a game good?.. err not that you dont do alot fo that in WoW too (or any other MMORPG).. FF is kids stuff compared to most of the hardcore korean RPG's..  Is 75 still max level? been awhile.. 4 jobs was enough for me, havent played in a bit. So many people use the "if its not hard its not fun" card. Grandpa walked 10 miles to school.. I drove.. does that make one or the other better or worse. Should I walk, waste an extra hour of my day. Some people like to play, some like to grind, some dont like either... WoW simpley has the best mix of level time, items, etc... for the "majority" of players.. doesnt make it bad.

My personal prefrence is EQ (original)... and I do think WoW is to easy.. And i think FF is way to ... grindy boring.. but its an opinion only...


THread correction-  So is it going to be all of WOW or a side .. Horde, ally?

[LeedsFan]

I had to (thread derailment, sorry).. so spending lots of time doing the exact same thing over makes a game good?.. err not that you dont do alot fo that in WoW too (or any other MMORPG).. FF is kids stuff compared to most of the hardcore korean RPG's..  Is 75 still max level? been awhile.. 4 jobs was enough for me, havent played in a bit. So many people use the "if its not hard its not fun" card. Grandpa walked 10 miles to school.. I drove.. does that make one or the other better or worse. Should I walk, waste an extra hour of my day. Some people like to play, some like to grind, some dont like either... WoW simpley has the best mix of level time, items, etc... for the "majority" of players.. doesnt make it bad.

My personal prefrence is EQ (original)... and I do think WoW is to easy.. And i think FF is way to ... grindy boring.. but its an opinion only...

I actually tried WoW for the 10 day trial. I did enjoy it quite a bit even though I knew it wasn't very deep... enough to buy the original game with first expansions. But I lasted about another 3 or 4 days and I just got bored. It was the same thing "go kill these mobs and bring back X number of items" every time. I reached level 20 and hadn't had one single party. It was an MMORPG and I hadn't made a single friend or even needed to speak to anyone. Other players were just extras running around that sometimes challenged me to PvP. And that was it.

With FF you are forced to team up at an early stage or you get nowhere. You *can* level solo but it's very tedious. But missions etc. cannot be soloed. I got the feeling that the average age of players in WoW was much lower than in FF, but that was gleaned from reading forums rather than any contact in game. Blizzard made a great decision to appeal to the masses. Kinda like tabloid newspapers... you target the lowest common denominator and rake in the cash. But as far as journalistic quality goes they suck. 



Anyway... apologies for the derail (it was my fault I started it).     I've yet to see any project based on an MMORPG so it would be interesting to see how it turns out. Alliance Vs Horde would look very cool. The joysticks and buttons could be differing colours with different sound effects played in the frontend (depending on which controller is used etc).

[Kardall]

@ Epyx
I have found tonnes of art, but the problem is (even with the deviant art stuff) is that they're only suitable for say 8.5x11 or maybe 11x17 size. I was trying to see if I could vector-draw/sketch the Lich King to take up the entire side of the cab, but it just makes him look really cartoon-ish. That's vector graphics for ya I guess.

I wonder, if I asked Blizzard nicely, if they would send me a disk with a really nice graphic That'd be so sweet. Put like, Lich King on one side, and then like Fordring on the other for alliance. Anyway. Lots of dreams, patience required

Also @ Sir Headless
I will definitely try that. Didn't think about that

[Aceldamor]

Did you look @ DeviantArt? http://www.deviantart.com/#order=9&q=warcraft
Also should be some in this thread: http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=276451 (check out their "new" thread mentioned in the first post as well).

just be aware, that everything on deviant art that is user posted is property of the poster, so use of it requires permission of the person who posted the work.

[Kardall]

Ya that is true. I'm pretty sure that there's someone out there who would like to be known on the internet as an awesome vector drawer and will do something for free LOL j/k

[Kardall]

Update: Rather than build a cabinet (since it's getting cold out and I'd rather not have to worry about that too much), I found someone who is going to sell me a 4-player simpsons cabinet for $75. I think it's pretty much empty, which is good, as it will allow me to do what I want with it.

Without having seen it, I think what i'll do is just make the control panel copy, so I can keep the original one (someone probably will be looking for it anyway), and that way I won't destroy it.

I'm wondering though if the original artwork is underneath the painted black sides. Apparently that's what they have done to it. I might just have to remove the paint on it to see what lies beneath. But that may wait until it gets warmer outside. Canadian winters can be a PITA.

When I get the cabinet home I'll put some pictures up.

[Trebeck]

The problem with WOW art is that 1) The art out there isn't big enough to print at large sizes.  2)  WOW art is done by some of the best artists in the biz and you would have a hard/expensive time getting that custom made.
I feel for you dude...

 

[Kardall]

Well, I got someone with a truck lined up to go pick up the cabinet next week.

I do have a question about the buttons though. I've gone through the ultimarc pages and the happs pages for buttons, but I hear that Sanwa buttons are shallower. As I don't know how deep the control panel is, if I can use either kind, or if I have to use Sanwa buttons because of the depth. I'm assuming the regular screw-in ultimarc buttons should work, and they're cheap so. However, anyone know of a US supplier for Sanwa buttons "just in case"? I can only seem to find Japanese suppliers on the web.

[Epyx]

Lizard Lick has them:

http://www.lizardlick.com/pages/pushbuttons.shtml

[opt2not]

You can also get 'em from www.modchipman.com. They used to ship to Canada, but I don't think they do anymore.
They're in the states.
Also, http://www.arcadespareparts.com/arcade_parts/push_buttons.html?page_id=2


*edit:
Looks like modchipman's site is down...

[Shortbus]

I got a good theme, WoW, Whip em out Wednesday.....a radio station in Boston did that years ago, opee and anthony i think and chicks were really into it, kept me awake on some long commutes. . . You could tweak OND's speaker enclosures and round off the ends....heee heee, you'll have to excuse me.....

curious how you kicked the Wow habit? Was it hard? tremors, sweats? My wife has a brother that is an addict to that game as well....LOL....I have no idea what that game is other than what I've heard.....but it must be pretty frickin good, that kid spends days playing, only stopping to eat and occasionally sleep....

good luck...