Midway Space Encounters

[chopperthedog]

Got this game back in Nov of 2015 nonworking and dirty. I stored some games for an out of state collector and he was swinging by to grab them and pulled up with the SE on his trailer. Had never played or heard of the game before, he said it popped up in ohio on his way to me and figured he'd grab it. Asked if I was interested, said "hell yeah", he probably covered his gas just on this little deal. Win win for all.




Next day I was able to get cab in daylight for a good look and pull the doors off. The night before I noticed the odd green and blue overlay and was kinda sad that the original one wasn't there.




Big ole 23" B&W beauty.




After pulling off the bottom back door (woot!!) the overlay was in a sad state at the bottom of the cab.




The control yoke is one impressive piece of hardware.




This is the overlay that it came with, I suspect it's from some old B&W poker machine.






Was able to lightly clean the ink side of the overlay and polish some scratches out of the non ink side, cleaned up great.






Whoever installed that poker overlay was an idiot, they used duct tape and did it on the ink side of the bezel. Was some nasty duct tape glue that took a delicate approach to not ruin the art. Super happy with the results.




After rebuilding the monitor, I finally had raster glow, installed new power supply and this is as far as the game got. Tried reseating stuff, but no changes. Sent board off to someone smarter than I.






Aladdin's castle ruined every damn coin door on purpose. I had another midway door, but I was able to flatten hinge, clean up the 25 cent thingys, pulled tumbler from back door and pinned it for midway key I had and installed on coin door. So, least I was able to save the original.




Got the board back and the thing fired up. Was doing goob for a couple hours and then things went south. Had another friend burn me a full set roms and I was back in business. After some more time being powered on another issue popped up. The red light, strobe, bonus, enemy shot, skreech and saucer sounds all locked on to a wall of noise. After checking schematic I pulled/socketed the TTL chips at D2 & D5 on the logic board that are in control of those things and was back working again.




Game came with the original 200w red bulb that was in sad shape with 40% of the red ink cracked off. I figured it would be better to use a clear 150w bulb and add red gel to the under side of light unit. Clear bulbs run significantly cooler, plus I like the contrast of red cockpit area and white marquee.




Some game play of my cabinet. Amazing sounds and control.




New plates and legs on bottom, all cleaned up and ready for prime time. I've fallen in love with this cab, it's one of the last games where creativity was allowed to shine, it's not just a game, it's an experience. A perfect example of a game where mame can never do it any justice, it needs to be played on original hardware.



good day.

[Mike A]

I remember playing that game at the Wisconsin Dells. That is awesome.

[alfonzotan]

Very, very cool.  Haven't seen one of those in a good 35 years (shout out to the awesome arcade at Miracle Strip Amusement Park [RIP] in Panama City Beach).

[nexusmtz]

Thanks for bringing this one back. I missed it when it left my local arcade.

[Vigo]

Damn!! You did good with that cab! Such a great looking machine.

[wp34]

Nice work Chopper.  I remember being awed the first time I saw this game as a kid.  Nice to see you bring it back to life.

[Pete Rittwage]

Very nice! I haven't seen one since about 1979.

It sounds like it hasn't been fired up in 40 years, so things keep failing the longer you leave it on.