Aladdin's Castle - 6 Month Report

[Skadar]

I would like to see pics.  At the beginning of this thread someone mentioned the existence of "Aladdin's Castle cabinets".  I wasn't aware of this.  Googling for an Aladdin's Castle cabinet only pulls up the pinball machine.

What is an Aladdin's Castle arcade cabinet?

[Veinman]

Really nice, clean work! Congratulations!

[Mark70]

I would like to see pics.  At the beginning of this thread someone mentioned the existence of "Aladdin's Castle cabinets".  I wasn't aware of this.  Googling for an Aladdin's Castle cabinet only pulls up the pinball machine.

What is an Aladdin's Castle arcade cabinet?

An ebay-er from toronto has auctioned a couple of cabs with alladin's castle on the side but converted inside.  I assumed it was a crappy game.

Link

You'll see a few if you search arcade machine in the completed auctions at ebay

[Mr. Dude]

Aladdin's Castle was a very popular Arcade chain back in the 80s.

[Mr. Dude]

BTW your cabinet looks awesome!

[Skadar]

Aladdin's Castle was a very popular Arcade chain back in the 80s.

er... that's sorta why I gave my cabinet that name.     And why I used their logo.   

I was asking about the references to "Aladdin's Castle cabinets".  What are they?  Why do they exist?  Was there an Aladdin's Castle proprietary game inside?  Basically... what's the story with those cabinets.

Mark70 cleared these questions up a bit with his link to that eBay auction.  As far as I can tell right now, the Aladdin's Castle arcade chain had some house-labeled cabinets produced for them for the purpose of (I imagine) replacing factory game cabinets that had become too beat up to present on the arcade floor.  Or maybe they somehow found it cheaper to supply their own cabinets for new games.  Hmmm...

Well regardless, I like my cabinet better than the one on eBay.  Aside from the AC logo, the side-art is pretty nasty.

[Skadar]

Got my marquee from mamemarquees.com (thanks Scott) and it was quite beautiful.  Extremely deep, vibrant colors on what appeared to be something like photographic paper.

So I visited my cabinet and installed that baby between the plexiglass.  Immediately I noticed that the colors get a bit washed out.  But not too badly.  And I can also see that my wimpy fluorescent light will be just fine.  Here are a couple of pics...






With marquee and HAPP bezel installed.  This is essentially the finished product.  The only other possible things I would add is some side art (not sure what, though) and a glass monitor faceplate.

[TOK]

Arabian sideart would fit your them pretty well. Not sure about availability though.

[Mark70]

I do like the white sides look with sideart and black in the middle.  Classic.  I'm looking at doing my cab that way.  Working on the art now for a mock up in 3d.

I wouldn't change your cab or colour.  Find some sideart with a border or something.

Looks great.

[vader]

Skadar,

Cab looks great......really like that blue color, looks sharp.  The only thing that looks out of place to me is the black control panel.  I know you probably have it that way to match the bezel, but maybe you get put on a overlay to break up the black...maybe something that will match the sides.. Just a thought and maybe you said this elsewhere in your thread,  I just skimmed over, but regardless, very nice worksmanship

Tim

[Ldsfunaz]

hey skadar, have you switched back to s-video , I know you were having trouble with flickering with your component hookups, I was hoping to go that route so I'm looking for some feedback.

You cab looks great,

mike

[Skadar]

hey skadar, have you switched back to s-video , I know you were having trouble with flickering with your component hookups, I was hoping to go that route so I'm looking for some feedback.

Nope!  I am still using component video.  The superior image clarity outweighs any flickering issues.  And people aren't kidding when they say that the flickering goes away when you are playing a game.  I'm sure that technically it's still there, but you just don't notice it.

[c64rulez]

Great clean professional work! That blue is looking great
I think that the cp base should have been the same colorm so it looked more like part of the whole cab
But, still, graet work

[rlemmon]

you might

[Skadar]

Thought this might be useful, so I'm posting it here.

I plan on using a 25" Magnavox and I am a little leery of purchasing the plastic bezel because of the size and fit. Plus, the shipping from Happ just kills me. I think I may just build a frame around the TV and paint the backside of the plexi with Black Satin paint instead of using a bezel. It will save money too.

How did you solve the problem of turning on the TV via remote? Did you use a remote hack? I'm kinda curious as to how people have solved this without hacking the TV. The easiest way I could see would be to hack the remote to extend the IR bulb so it sits directly in front of the TV. I would rather have it be activated by the one pushbutton approach w/ a SmartStrip, however.

Yep, I would be a happy person if I never had to order anything from HAPP ever again.  Their shipping is outrageous.  But I figured I was paying for convenience so I bit the bullet.

I use a SmartStrip in my cab and my JVC TV is EXTREMELY user friendly in this regard.  It powers on when the PC is turned on and it maintains all of its previous settings.  As a failsafe, however, I drilled a small hole in the bezel through which I can activate the TV via remote if I have to.  The remote is velcro'd underneath the control panel side if I ever need it... which so far has been never.

I also configured my PC BIOS to "Power on with Password".  And I changed the password to the equivalent of hitting Player 1 Start + Player 2 Start.  So if the machine is off (which is hardly ever), you can just walk up, hit those two buttons and everything comes to life.

[miles2912]

The only aladdins castle that I found was a pinball game.  I don't remember an arcade game.  Here is the link http://www.klov.com/game_detail.php?letter=&game_id=11228

[RayB]

As far as I can tell right now, the Aladdin's Castle arcade chain had some house-labeled cabinets produced for them for the purpose of (I imagine) replacing factory game cabinets that had become too beat up to present on the arcade floor.

[fatrabbitbrain]

Great job with the cab! I just hope mine turns out like yours did. I just started cutting the wood yesterday so we'll see how we go..

A couple of questions;

What size casters did you use? I bought 2-1/2 casters but they seem that they'll jut out.
Was it easy to get the plexi for your marquee in?
Do you have any idea if the Creative Inspire 2500's are easily mountable like your T3000's?

[dmsuchy]

Man, I dig that marquee! And is anything better than a backlit blue trackball?

[Skadar]

Six months after completing Aladdin's Castle and installing it in my office, I'm happy to report that the cabinet enjoys daily use and is running like a champ.

The only thing funny about the whole thing is that I've got something like 5000 games on there and only about 5 of them get played with any regularity.

The women in the office are addicted to Ms. Pac-Man, it's the only thing they will play.  The non-gamer guys like to play Galaga, Tempest, and recently Shuffleshot.  The small group of gamer guys (including myself) play a much wider variety.

Lately we have been experimenting with PC games on the cabinet.  Star Monkey is a huge hit amongst the gamers.

Visual Pinball gets ZERO play... even from myself (it's just much better on my laptop).  Daphne only gets play by myself via Dragon's Lair.  ZSNES gets virtually no play.

Anything else you would like to know?
Cheers,
Skadar

[ChicagoDave]

Nice job!  Looks great!

[rdowdy95]

Are you ever going to put some Lexan or Smoked Lexan in front of the monitor?

[Lutus]

I also removed all my console emulators from my machine since... and I quote "All of these games are funner with a control and on the TV".

So, what I did was hack an Xbox controller into a box and then was able to interface an original NES and SNES controller into the box to play the emulators on my modded Xbox.

Everyone seems to love this configuration.  I could show you pics if you wanted but you can prolly find examples on the web.

Peace.

[severdhed]

first of all, i have to say i love your cabinet, good job!   

this may sound stupid, and i have no idea what the surface of the slikstik is like, but if you want it to blend into your cabinet, why not paint the surface of the slikstik purple?  or install matching red t-molding on it?  just a thought...

i wish my cabinet looked as good as yours.