Moon Invaders (now Lunarcade) - New Control Panel Theme/Design Feedback

[solowCX]

Hi everyone,

This is kind of a combo post concerning both artwork and control panel design, but figured this was as good a section as any. I am still in the planning phase for my MAME cabinet, but a possible theme I have been toying with is Moon Invaders, which would be a combination of the Aqua Teen Hunger Force mooninites, Space Invaders and general space imagery. I decided to only use the mooninites in the marquee of the design, in case I ever got sick of the design and want to change later. I see the control panel as more permanent and therefore wanted to go with more realistic artwork that would not go out of style anytime soon.

My main constraint is that (due to total lack of woodworking skills, time and space) I have decided to order a customized cab and panel from Mameroom, so I would like to follow the typical roughly 30 x 16 CP size. In that sense I am slightly limited  in space on my panel for all the controls that I want (2 spinners, 2 8-ways, future UltiMarc trackball and a UltraStik), but would appreciate any sort of feedback on control placement and design.

Some details about this, the 2 black buttons above the left and right joysticks will be TurboTwist2s with Electric ICE pushbuttons being where the white buttons are. The top row of Start and Coin buttons at the top will be the Ultralux Chrome Illuminated Pushbuttons. The center will feature the UltraStik and all the other buttons will be standard Happ blue, green and red buttons.

In a nutshell though, what could be improved about this design and theme? Buttons too close? Idea how to spiff up the saucer design? Lame idea? Feel free to let me have it.

Thanks in advance guys!

[waveryder]

Can't really comment on your CP layout as they always come down to "what your comfortable with".  I personally have never built one of these monster panels. I never bother with more than 2x8 ways and 6 buttons per player. As long as you can beat away at your buttons with out accidentaly hitting another player or exiting the game and your comfortable playing at it,  its fine. Id knock it up out of cardboard to test it first.

Your artwork theme is pretty good. The idea works well. I think you need to look at the types of imagery you are using as I think it contrasts to sharpely. Your using photo elements combined with drawn shapes and cartoon characters. I dont think that works well. There's always a danger of "Monty Python" syndrome! I would use a simple line drawing of the moon/earth. Populate the sky with some tilted "moon invaders" Use a line drawing for the UFO to maintain the style. Have a look at the original space invader artwork. Its ridiculously simple yet very effective. The whole thing is blocked line-art. My £0.02

[rotheblog]

I couldn't agree more, look into keeping your imagry consistent, using either illustrations and cartoons, or photo realistic imagry.

You might be able to use some of the saucers here, pretty cheap to download.  Or look at some of the old Atari games, which have some great space imagry, and maybe you can re-vector something there and adapt it to your needs. But your saucer is your weakest point on the cpanel for sure.

World's biggest link shortened by saint (istockphoto.com)

You might try a search there as well for moon images, either line drawings or more illustrations.  My feeling is that for the moons, they may be too toony.

I would look at using that original moon image, and playing with the Photoshop contrast to make it more of a one dimensional, flat piece of imagry using whites and blacks and less of the middle tone greys that make it photorealistic.

Jeff
http://www.rotheblog.com - Classic arcade news and information

[stephenp1983]

As for layout, there is no way that 3rd player setup in the middle is going to be comfortable.  Were you planning on having three people play at one time?  I'd ditch the middle player.

[Ginsu Victim]

Since there is a coin and start for player 3, yes, that's the plan it looks like.

There's no way to play comfortably like that. It also looks like the sticks get in the way of some of the controls above them.

I'd rethink this whole layout.

[solowCX]

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

I knew when I posted that the saucer was the weakest point and I had actually looked into using some nice vector saucer art, but none of them were of a design that were long and featured a center line large enough to fit the Start and Coin buttons. I basically put the saucer in there to tie together the top row of lighted buttons, which would theoretically look like the lights on a UFO. The GGG lighted buttons below it would then appear as some sort of death-ray or tractor beam which could eventually lead down to the lighted trackball.

I would like it to look as photo-realistic as possible, but my Photoshop skills peaked about 5 years ago, thus the reliance on bevels, etc. As I mentioned before, the use of the mooninites in the marquee is sort of just a casual part of the theme, but it seems like they might be detracting from it more than I originally thought. I would like to keep the photo-realistic elements, so maybe I should just get rid of them and try to fix up the saucer (or even remove it).

In regards to player 3, I don't believe it would be used that often, but I still wanted the option of having a 3rd player if one was needed. The main purpose of that stick (which will be an UltraStik) would be to allow playing of 4-way, 49-way and analog games. Adding in an additional 8-way player when needed is just kind of a bonus. If people think that it would be so squished as to become unusable even in some situations I will look into re-thinking it.

[solowCX]

Based on your feedback I decided to go for a more realistic look, in the process also changing the theme of the design as well. Instead of focusing on the idea of "Moon Invaders" I have instead decided to focus simply on the moon itself. This should hopefully clarify the design and make it feel less scattered.





In regards to spacing, I would still be interested in what people think about the usability of the 3rd player controls and my button spacing and placement. Currently I have around .7 inches between the holes of the buttons, .5 inches between them once the buttons are actually installed. Am also not sure if the 7th button for Players 1 and 2 being slightly below joystick might hamper playability. I have included my cutsheet below if anyone would like to see.



Thanks for the feedback all, really appreciate it.

[Ginsu Victim]

Look at the third player, and think about where their left and right elbows will be.
It just won't work for a third player, but is fine for having a dedicated 4-way or whatnot.

[BASS!]

Hello there, I only have two issues. Im all about the multiplayer nature of your pannel, but why the 3rd player with 6 buttons. I don't know of any games that really even use a 3rd with 6. I can think of some that use 4 players with 3 and 4 buttons though. My oppinion is either make it a 4player pannel and build it out from your box, or take the 3rd and make it a 4 way or get rid of it all together. If you get it out of there then you will have quite a bit more room.
    My other is with the button spacing. The thing about the spacing is, just as you like the seat in your car a certain way, you will like your buttons a certain way. I have built one panel that had a 8 button layout for console/ mame use. When I built my first panel, I used the same spacing, as set in the mameroom layout program. After playing for about an hour, my hands would ultimately get sore/tired. I have large hands but I ended up getting some cardboard and some extra buttons and built a mockup, to really test the way my fingers laid. After trying a couple, I ended up setting the spacing so that the buttons nearly overlapped each other, that seemed to be the most comfortable way I played. I then measured that, re set it in mameroom prog, then exported the file to a dxf for autocad, and had that plotted out. There is no magic layout or shape, just what works for you.
     As far as the design goes, I think its coming along. Its so hard to come up with a good design for a project. Good luck and good work!