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Newbie Questions, help needed

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ooby:
Hi All,
I'm new to arcade cabinets and decided that I'd have to build one.  I want to build a 4 player control panel and this is giving me the most grief and confusion so if someone can answer my questions I'd be grateful.

1) What are the mandatory buttons that I need?  I know I'll need 4 x player buttons and 4 x coin buttons but what about action buttons?  I was thinking of 6 for player 1 and 2 and 4 buttons for players 3 and 4.   Is that enough?

2) Also do I need any extra control buttons?  Like an escape or pause button?

3) I was thinking about getting the joysticks from Happ controls.  Should I get 8 way or 4 way, or what about the ones that you can change?

I know these are probably pretty basic questions but thats the level I'm at.

starnix17:
1. It depends.... a lot of older games use few buttons (I believe most use 2, but I'm not 100% sure). Newer games (fighting, etc.) usually use at least 4 buttons.

2. I'd put on a button to enter and escape a game, but you can use a combination of buttons like Player 1 quarter button + player 1 button to exit a game etc.

3. Once again it depends, if you like older games then go with a 4 way, if you play newer games then go with an 8 way. I've never played around with the ones that change so I can't tell you about them.

-Tony

daveg2000:
Extra buttons I have besides the normal ones for each player are:
3 mouse buttons, pause button, volume up, volume down button.

The rest of the commands (ESC, TAB, etc....) I have programmed
as multiple button presses throughout the control panel.
(which you can do with a keyboard encoder.. I use an IPAC4)

ooby:
Thanks guys.  I was planning on using the IPAC4.  Is it easy to wire up to do multiple button presses?

RTSDaddy2:
Not to oversimplify, but you will be amazed - AMAZED - at how easy it is to hook up the IPAC.  Man, I know zilch about electronics, but I got mine right on the first try.

Regarding switchable joysticks,  I suppose it's a matter of preference...I have Ultimarc's T-stick plus sticks in mine, which are switchable from the top and I love them!  So nice to not have to lift the panel top everytime!

At one point early on, however, I didn't have them put back together correctly (it was my fault, and it wasn't that hard a fix) and they would not switch from the top.  At the time I wasn't sure what was wrong with them, so I just switched them from underneath...and I found that NOT to be that big a deal either.

 

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