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Origin of lit buttons

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Turnarcades:
Well I suppose even if it's not a deep-set practice of old, the old 'moth to a flame' theory still holds true. Fruit machines use light sequences to draw people in (I myself am instantly drawn to the 'flashy-flashy' when I go into a pub!) so I guess it stems from that.

It's just eye-candy. Same as many people upgrade the sound system to some kind of modern multi-channel system for better sound - I guess everyone who spends time building a cabinet stands back and thinks of things to add for wow factor.

solid12345:
Personally I hate the lit buttons, my buddy was pushing me to get those on my cab but he also creates and listens to techno music, I don't want my arcade to be a prop for a rave party.

chiLLbiLLy:
I've only played the Colecovision version and don't really remember ever seeing the arcade version in any arcade, but didn't Exidy's Victory from 1982 have several lit buttons, of one type or another, that actually lit and/or had some function during gameplay?  Surely, there are a few more isolated machines, not counting those with volcano buttons, that utilized lit buttons back in the golden era.

And, although it's not exactly from the "golden era", depending on the years you define the golden era as, but I think I've seen a picture of Top Secret, also from Exidy, that has something like 8 lit buttons of several different sizes/colors on it's control panel.

Of course, this makes me ask the question, if these buttons did serve some function, other than just staying lit all the time, does Mame currently emulate their output?   

Siris:
I know for a fact some cabs had lit buttons, back when the NES came out I had a buddy who worked for a distributor and he gave me a cab to put my NES and Sega in and it had these type buttons for player one and two:

http://www.happcontrols.com/pushbuttons/5400042x.htm

There are lenses you can put in the button the ones I had had either one or two stick figures accordingly.
To this day I cannot figure out what game that cab was from it was a dark blue cab with a rounded top the side art was stenciled black and white with some space theme I distinctly remember a picture of a bald female/alien looking profile with white eyes.

Anyone have any clue?

Bender:
I have to admit I wasn't crazy about the lit buttons at first.....

but it really is awesome to have just the right buttons you need for a specific game light up and in the right color too!
Makes the cab really user friendly

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