Neo-Geo Bartop: 2 player [COMPLETE][3/22/14]

[Slippyblade]

My brother makes a pretty respectable amount of money due to having a good job and being single.  He spent a hefty amount on my kids for Christmas this year and I really wanted to do something for him.  Buying him something seems kinda silly since he's financially in a position that if he wants something he goes and buys it, so there's not really anything I could get him that he doesn't already have.  What I DO have though, is skills, tools, and time.

Through round about interrogation it turns out he was a Neo-Geo fan back in the day.  He even mentioned he intends to buy a Neo-Geo cab and a couple cartridges, "...when I have the room..."  Well, we all know that the phrase "when I have the room" translates into "probably never gonna happen".  So, since he doesn't have the room for a full size cab but wants one and since I want to make him something kinda unique I decided to build him a Neo-Geo bartop. 

There are a few awesome Neo-Geo bartops in the project threads already so I've got plenty of inspiration.  My brother has a teenage son that lives with him part-time so I am going to build the bartop with a full sized two player CP.  Ordered most of the hardware from Groovy Game Gear last night and am doing up the plans in Sketch-up currently.  Will post pics when I have a decent render to show.

[Malenko]

Haruman has a neogeo style one already designed. Even if you dont buy from him he might can help with the plans?

[Slippyblade]

Haruman has a neogeo style one already designed. Even if you dont buy from him he might can help with the plans?

Hmm, he's local to me too.  That might be an option.  Thanks for the tip!

(update) Haruman's version is a single player.  I plan on doing a full size CP.

[yotsuya]

Haruman has a neogeo style one already designed. Even if you dont buy from him he might can help with the plans?

Hmm, he's local to me too.  That might be an option.  Thanks for the tip!

(update) Haruman's version is a single player.  I plan on doing a full size CP.

99.9% sure he can revise it for you to make it a two player. 

[Slippyblade]

Yay!  Parts shipped out this morning.  Gonna pick up pseudo-wood (MDF) this evening after work.  Might be able to start some cutting tomorrow.  I'm a very happy person.

[Malenko]

Haruman has a neogeo style one already designed. Even if you dont buy from him he might can help with the plans?

Hmm, he's local to me too.  That might be an option.  Thanks for the tip!

(update) Haruman's version is a single player.  I plan on doing a full size CP.

99.9% sure he can revise it for you to make it a two player. 

agreed! its pretty simple to just make the cab wider to compensate for 2players 

[yotsuya]

Yay!  Parts shipped out this morning.  Gonna pick up pseudo-wood (MDF) this evening after work.  Might be able to start some cutting tomorrow.  I'm a very happy person.

That's great! Although a kit would make it easier, there's something to be said about doing it all yourself. Good luck with it, provide photos! 

[Slippyblade]

Yeah, gonna do it from "scratch".  Considering the last two builds I've done haven't been actual builds.  First was a Virtua Strikers cab that I just shoved a PC and controls into.  It works, it's ugly as sin, and is missing a lot of stuff I want.  The second was a Vigolix that I half-assed and miss-measured.  That's in the younger kids bedroom.  She likes it, but I hate it.

This will be my first truly scratch build that I (hopefully) will like.  Pics when I can.

[Louis Tully]

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[Slippyblade]

So, Sketchup design done.  Still waiting on my hardware - GGG got it out the day after I ordered it, Post Office is taking foreverr.    So much for 2-day Priority, oh well.  These are renders of the sketchup design.  Still working on the marquee art and going to mount coin buttons on the front of the CP.  Exit button will be mounted on top, button in middle between P1 and P2 start is a Pause.

[Slippyblade]

Parts came today, literally as I was walking out the door to work.  I was late getting to work due to the unboxing.  I have to say, I like the Zippyy sticks WAY more than the Happs I have in my other machine.  The restrictor is very nice, my daughter is excited to be able to properly play Rally-X, her favorite game.

Can't get any work done till Friday though - waiting till payday sucks a lot.

[Endprodukt]

You may, or may not get some inspiration from my 2 player neo geo bartop dynamic marquee support (now works in hyperspin as well, not just ingame)!

[Slippyblade]

I think I read your thread on that one, totally amazing if it's the one I'm thinking of, can't watch the video atm since YouTube is firewalled at work.  If I was building this for myself I'd be all over that idea, but since It's a gift for my brother, not so much.

[ron310]

You may, or may not get some inspiration from my 2 player neo geo bartop dynamic marquee support (now works in hyperspin as well, not just ingame)!

I must have missed this one. Did you post how you did the marquee?
So awesome👍

[Unstupid]

So, Sketchup design done.  Still waiting on my hardware - GGG got it out the day after I ordered it, Post Office is taking foreverr.    So much for 2-day Priority, oh well.  These are renders of the sketchup design.  Still working on the marquee art and going to mount coin buttons on the front of the CP.  Exit button will be mounted on top, button in middle between P1 and P2 start is a Pause.

What kind/size of monitor did you spec for that?

[Slippyblade]

I used a 19" widescreen LCD in the model.  Most likely that will be what goes into the actual build.  We have a bunch of them at work and I'm trying to get the boss to sell me one.

Out of curiosity, why do you ask?

[Unstupid]

It just looked like a widescreen in your sketchup.  I'd suggest A 4x3 monitor if it's not too late.

[Slippyblade]

All depends on what I have in my hands when I get to that point, to be honest.

[Slippyblade]

Wood has been cut!  Got the side panels cut and edge sanded today literally just before I went in to work.

[Slippyblade]

Battens installed and most of the carcass is rough assembled.  Experimented with joystick mountings today...

WHY haven't I tried T-Nuts before?  My god, that is so smooth, simple, and clean.  I swear, I'm never using carriage bolts again! 

Anyway, will post pics in the morning.

[Slippyblade]

Yay for perfect working weather!

Got the CP cut, drilled, and routed today. 

Here's the backside with the joystick routings.


Here's the front side with the T-Nuts in their little cubbies.  Man, I'm in love with T-Nuts.


Controls installed, but no artwork yet.  Gotta get it printed still.


And here's the carcass.  Needs a bunch of sanding and some paint still.  Also need to route the T-Mold slot.

[Drnick]

The angles on the buttons look a bit severe to me. It's going to put Player 1's elbow right in Player 2's space. You may want to add an inch or 2.  What width do you have on the control panel at the moment?  Doh, scrap that last bit unless you want to cut all new everything    Been a long day, maybe to much smokey.

[Slippyblade]

The angles on the buttons look a bit severe to me. It's going to put Player 1's elbow right in Player 2's space. You may want to add an inch or 2.  What width do you have on the control panel at the moment?  Doh, scrap that last bit unless you want to cut all new everything    Been a long day, maybe to much smokey.

The CP is exact to the MVS-2-13, the cabaret sized machine that Neo-Geo built.  I found one down at a local game store and measured the crap out of it.  Can't find any decent pics at the moment of the real thing except for this auction.

http://collectedit.com/shops/toomucharcadestuff/snk-neo-geo-mini-cabaret-dedicated-arcade-game-great-condition-working-48

Oh, here's a resto of one of the machines in question with some decent pics.

http://driph.com/words/2008/10/neo-geo-mvs-2-13-restoration/

I do wanna smack the resto guy though.  He does a pretty good job of the restoration and then puts CUP HOLDERS on the sides of the cabinet.  Ugh.

[Louis Tully]

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[Malenko]

the angle is a little extreme, but it is also accurate.  You could have rotated the buttons and spacing a little, but I dont think its gonna be a big deal. Fantastic work, and I'll be following along for the entire build.

[Slippyblade]

Got a lot of work done this weekend.  Man, paint and T-molding make all the difference in the world!

Time to start building the monitor brackets.


Home Depot under cabinet florescent light fixture.  Took it all apart, ran the casing through the band saw, reassembled the important bits.  Just barely fits in there with the speakers.  Routed a small recess so the speakers sit a little better.


And here's the drilled out grill.


The CP isn't hinged.  I used dowels and made a pivot swing.  It works really well!


The closure for the CP is actually a magnet from a dismantled hard-drive that snaps onto a wide-head bolt.

[Slippyblade]

Oops, sorry about that one pic.  For some reason it didn't resize properly.  It's fixed now.

[clok]

planning on doing a NeoGeo (button layout) 2 player bartop. Nice to see your work, will be some inspiration fro mine. Nice job so far.

[Slippyblade]

Final stretch.  I've learned so much in the process of doing this, good lord.  I'll be doing a write up when the project is complete.

When I printed the artwork, I just used Office Max.  Printed on normal paper.  I realize that is not the optimal way of doing it, but I needed to cut costs where I could.  The pics show some banding in the art that's not actually there.  Yes, some of the art is off-center - this was my first go at using Inkscape.  Can't say I'm a big fan.  Measuring anything is difficult and the "snap" feature is a joke.  It's close enough though, so I'm happy with it.  When I get around to building my own, I'll be more careful and get it right.

Marquee area is finished.  It was a very cool feeling when I first plugged it in after it was all mounted up.  The first signs of life!


Control panel looks way cooler with the artwork behind it.  Didn't think about the T-Nuts when I printed the artwork, so you can see the bottom half of them sticking out.  Gonna putty fill and paint/sand over them so it's not so obvious.  Also, the plexi is not on in this pic.


Overall shot of progress so far.  Gonna mount the electronics tonight.  Started working on the romset and frontend last night.

[BAMBOO]

Awesome!   

[Louis Tully]

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[Slippyblade]

Wow.  Never expected compliments on this considering all the flaws.   

If I might pass on a suggestion that was thrown my way on more than one occasion... Maybe pop those bolts/screws out of the marquee retainer and the front plexi and tag 'em with some spray paint so they blend in with everything else? You went through the effort to not have joystick bolts showing, might as well blend the other stuff.

I will definately be doing that to the top marquee bolts.  I did the ones on the underside and it looks great.  I had originally intended to form plexi around the curve on the CP so it was all one piece and would have no screws at all showing.  Screwed that up with a quickness.    I actually like the look of the CP screw heads though so may leave em.  We'll see.

[Malenko]

I think it looks really good mang.

[PL1]

Didn't think about the T-Nuts when I printed the artwork, so you can see the bottom half of them sticking out.  Gonna putty fill and paint/sand over them so it's not so obvious.  Also, the plexi is not on in this pic.

Guess this was the pic you had in mind instead of double-posting the other.   



Scott

[Slippyblade]

Guess this was the pic you had in mind instead of double-posting the other.   

D'oh!  Edited to fix obvious screw up.  See what happens when you try to update your build thread while at work.

[BAMBOO]

Flaws or not, looks pretty tight on my screen.  Shizzle my nizzle, I want one now.

[Slippyblade]

Well, that was an experience.  While working on the software end of things, I decided that the nag screens had to go and I needed high score support.  Off to "compile mame"-land!  Oddly enough I couldn't get MameCompiler to work, so I just did it the manual way using Mr Do's instructions.  Worked like a charm and now I have it. 

Sweet.

[Unstupid]

Your marquee layout/artwork looks vaguely familiar... 

[Slippyblade]

Your marquee layout/artwork looks vaguely familiar... 

I was just about to respond to one of the other posts linking to your thread.  It's a blatant rip off of yours.  Since I didn't want to do the LCD mini marquee thing, yours was the only thing I found that looked good.

Unstupid's Neo-Geo bartop

[Malenko]

if you'd like, I can make you something more unique.

[Slippyblade]

If Unstupid is offended that I used his marquee, I guess I'll make something different.   It is very close to the factory marquee so I wouldn't be changing much in any case.  Thanks for the offer Malenko, I appreciate it, though I have to pass.  I'm already in mental debt to a couple others for some Warhammer 40k themed art they tossed my way a bit back.

[yotsuya]

If Unstupid is offended that I used his marquee, I guess I'll make something different.   It is very close to the factory marquee so I wouldn't be changing much in any case.  Thanks for the offer Malenko, I appreciate it, though I have to pass.  I'm already in mental debt to a couple others for some Warhammer 40k themed art they tossed my way a bit back.

To be fair, I don't think Unstupid was offended. He just pointed out it looked like his. 

[Unstupid]

Not offended.  Hey, what happened to the previous conversation? Anyways.... I have no problem with you using a marquee similar to mine.  Here are my suggestions though.... pick whether you want to build a Neo Geo "System" (used on 1 slot machines) or a Neo Geo MVS used on 2, 4, or 6 slot machines).  Mine had a 1 slot board (MV1C) inside which is why I didn't use the MVS logo anywhere on the box.  If you stay with the MVS theme (as on your control panel) I'd switch the marquee to say MVS instead of system.   Also If you were to redo the CP art I'd try and get the white lines around the Player 1 start and player 2 start to be even.  or maybe try and dremmel out a little of the wood cp to slide the buttons left or right to get them centered around the white arc and so that they don't cover the letters..  Remember, the devil is in the details, but its the little things like that that are gonna make your cab shine! 

[Unstupid]

Edited My earlier post!

[Slippyblade]

Ahhh, now I understand the confusion of the MVS vs SYSTEM.  The actual arcade machine I was modelling this off of was an MVS-2-13.  As far as I know they were single game machines, but the one I took measurements and pics from had MVS on the control panel. 

There's a lot of little quirks that I discovered as I built.  The Left Player/Right Player arrows still confuses the hell out of me.  No idea how it happened.  I think I measured wrong when I drilled.   But, considering it's a first machine and I'm giving it away as a gift to my brother...  He can deal with it.   

[Unstupid]

The actual arcade machine I was modelling this off of was an MVS-2-13.  As far as I know they were single game machines, but the one I took measurements and pics from had MVS on the control panel.

Actually MVS-2-13 are 2 slot cabs.  The second number in the model number says how many game cartridges it can hold and the last number shows the size of the screen.  Cool site with too much info here: http://www.hardmvs.com/xml/usa/usCabs.htm

[Slippyblade]

The actual arcade machine I was modelling this off of was an MVS-2-13.  As far as I know they were single game machines, but the one I took measurements and pics from had MVS on the control panel.

Actually MVS-2-13 are 2 slot cabs.  The second number in the model number says how many game cartridges it can hold and the last number shows the size of the screen.  Cool site with too much info here: http://www.hardmvs.com/xml/usa/usCabs.htm

Ya know, now that I read your post...  I knew that and had forgotten.   

The machine I took my measurements off of must have undergone a renovation at some point, it only had a single game and a 1 slot marquee.  Then again, I'd never seen one in the wild before so was rather blown away at how adorable it was.

[Slippyblade]

So, working on the software/computer end of things and hating life.  I've got four PCs sitting around and apparently, they are each broken in their own, unique way.  And of course, the parts are only marginally interchangable.  At this point I'm half tempted to just go buy a low end motherboard/CPU brand new...

[Slippyblade]

Finally pieced a computer together from my bit-boxes and loaded XP on it.  Seemed to be working.  Copied over Mala with layout and gamelists.  Everything seemed to be working...  then MAME refused to cooperate.  Seemed to be crashing back to Mala.  Tried launching MAME directly from the command line and got what looked like random stretched triangles on the screen.  Argh!   

Forum searches to the rescue!

I was using the onboard video on the mobo.  No 3D hardware apparently and MAME 149 defaults to rendering via Direct3D.  There's a command line switch to force rendering via DirectDraw that fixed the problem.  Amazingly enough there is at least one forum post on these boards that talks about this and how to fix it.  Yay!

So, now that the computer end of things is worked out, I started mounting everything inside the cabinet.  Considering that I'm using older desktop PC parts I'm having to get creative in my getting it all mounted.  Whipping out those mad Tetris skills.

My brother is in town this weekend and came by to visit.  He loves the cabinet and can't wait to take it home.  Overall, I'm chalking this up as a success.

[TheDude]

Good-looking bartop 

[Slippyblade]

Completed and delivered.  Bro and his kid absolutely love it.  I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out overall.  Next one will be better though.

Thinks I learned:

• Make sure the square you are using is actually square.  Apparently mine is about a degree off which wasn't a real problem until cutting the plexi for the screen bezel.
• Use the table saw for cutting angles, not the jig saw.  None of the back panel edges line up correctly due to the angle cuts all being off.  Next time I'm using the table saw!
• The 3/4" MDF sold in Handi-panel form at Home Depot is NOT 3/4".  Because of that, my T-mold ended up being a hair wider than the MDF on both sides.  This only presented a problem where the CP swivels open and where the rear access panel is removed.
• Use real plexi.  In an effort to save some cash I used the clear acrylic from Hobby Lobby that is used for framing projects.  That stuff warps and deforms at the drop of a hat.  Any hat.  dropped anywhere.
• Figure out what computer parts you will use BEFORE building.  I had a heck of a time figuring out how/where to mount the various components inside the cab.
• Triple check your artwork.  Some of my artwork is off center, some not quite deep enough, etc.  Since I'm perpetually broke, I took what I got and went with it but I'd have LOVED to reprint after making some changes.

Crappy cell phone pics, sorry.

[Malenko]

The end result is pretty great! 

[yotsuya]

Looks great, Slippy! 

[ChanceKJ]

  I like it. Good job.