Project 1 Astron Belt
My First Ever Project: How I Built My Own Arcade Game
The Story....
I decided I wanted a MAME cabinet so I could play a couple of thousand(at the time) arcade games on somethign other than my computer. I started calling arcades and
the third place had a Choplifter cabinet, no insides for $20, it was
a one hour drive but I said great
I am on the way, somehow we were able to put a full size arcade cabinet
in my trunk and I made it home without killing anyone important.
The cabinet was missing the glass and the sides had some of the
stickers ripped away from the edges, not perfect but for $20 it is
hard to complain. It was apparently not originally a Choplifter
because of the spaceships on the side and the original control panel
had been recovered and a hole plugged where different controls were placed.
I have been told it is a rare Astron Belt by Sega that used Startrek footage.(I didnt realize what this meant at the time but now that I know how rare this Laser Disk game is, I plan to convert it back to an Astron Belt original cabinet and use a Daphne Emulator in it...when I get around to it anyway).
 
The Before Pictures.
I needed a computer to put in this machine, fortunately I have a room
full of computer junk and I was able to put together a
system with a 14" svga monitor. I need a bigger monitor
or 19" tv but right now I just want to get it working, upgrades will
be easy once the major part of the work is done.
Controls
I figured out every key I thought I would realistically
need and put them along the top so I can even control windows
by CTRL,ESC,TAB,ENTER,Arrow Keys to shutdown or run other programs
placed in the start menu. Since I am using A,S,Z,X for player 2 buttons
I can also jump to the beginning A, or end Z or middle S of the game list,
which saves a lot of waiting to arrow scroll through the games list.
At the last minute I had to add a B coin button, it
seems Gauntlet requires a quarter in slot 2 for player 2 otherwise
you just add to player 1's health. Since I needed a button I had
not anticipated I was 1 button short, fortunately I was able to take
one of the old buttons out of the old control panel and paint it
black to match the Instert Coin A that I already had.
My plan for the buttons.
I decided on a 2 player layout for the controls(2 players
is always more fun), 1 joystick and 4 buttons
per player, that should work for 99% of the games and for one player
games that need more buttons
I can always use the player2 buttons. I didnt want to put big
labels for SPACE, ALT next to the buttons, that didnt look very good but
I need to know which button is which. I bought some dry transfers from
Radio Shack(Radio Scrap) and used them on the buttons, then painted over
with clear nail polish to keep the transfers from rubbing off, now I know
what all the buttons 'really' are but I dont have over obvious graphics
that scream it is a computer keyboard.
My original control design.
This really looks crappy today but it was my first ever attempt
The Work in progress.
I didnt want a black control panel, I wanted to do something
more asthetically pleasing, and I was not satisfied with
basic lines to break up the open space so I did some surfing
and found screen shots for flight simulators, I put them together
and printed out a nice color picture, I was going to put a piece
of plexiglass over it but it turns out drilling a lot of big holes
in plexiglass is not that simple and I broke my plexiglass on
the first try. I used some full page lamination
sheets instead, I put the graphics on while the paint was a little
tacky and then put the lamination sheets over it. This would never
last in a real arcade but for me it should be fine.
I printed out some screen shots from Starwars Episode I games and
flight simulators and used those under plexiglass for the control panel
and to border the screen.
I went a little crazy with the border graphics but since
I was using a small screen I didnt like all the black space so
I had to fill it up with something. I bought a 'display' board, which
is like a thick foam peice of posterboard at walmart and cut out a hole
for the monitor then painted it black, this worked very very well
for the boarder.
Finished Arcade Side.
I painted the torn places black which made it
look much better. I took some red vinyl tape and taped the boarders then some
black vinyl to keep the 3/4" wide stripe from looking like a peice of tape around
the edge. I thought about covering all the bad places with a larger boarder
maybe something silver that had rivets drawn on it to look
like a battleship. I also could have matched the paint and re-drawn the
missing graphics but this was supposed to be a weekend project not
a Smithsonian restoration.
Finished Front.
Yikes, I can do a much nicer conversion today, ahhh the learning curve..
The insides.
I hacked up a keyboard that would not type the letter "O" and soldered
wires to the keys I needed. I was a little worried about reflections with
the long wires I had, almost 3 feet for each key, but it worked with
no problems. I used a terminal block to make installation easier.
I also ran an extra wire from my power block to the original power switch on the case so I can turn it on and off without reaching behind to find the power strip.
I had to replace the flourescent light in the top with a 18" light stick,
which was an easy fix and much better than repairing the old original unit.
Well that is it, I can now play about 2000 games anytime. Not a bad project,
went quite smoothly and cost about $75.00 out of pocket.
Updates
You see this line
We just crossed it and there is no going back. My one weekend project
has turned into a two weekend project. I was not satisfied with
the monitor I had so I bought a refurbished 17" for 155$, then I was
not satisfied with the 133processor, it seemed a little slow for some
games so I bought a 333Mhz with motherboard for $100(of course
it did not work so I had to return it for replacement). I
also upgraded the memory to 64megs for neo-goe games. Now that I have filled
up the hard drive with
neo-geo games, which are huge, I did some drive swapping to get a 3.2Gig in it. I have now copied Dragons Lair I and II
to the hard drive so it is not so jumpy, and I may add other
emulators later.
I also bought a Microsoft Easyball for a trackball, only $25.00 from egghead.com
and it is big. A little black spray paint makes it look less like
a childs toy and it looks like it could have been mounted in a 1/4"
board if I had planned on it. I found that some games, especially shooting games just
did not work well with a joystick. Starwars is also nearly impossible
to play well with a joystick but a faster processor should
help that too. I should have planned on a trackball to start
with but I really didnt think I would need one, it is actually very useful in
many games and in place of a mouse for windows.
If I had planned on needing a trackball I could have left enough
room in the middle of the panel to mount it but too late for that, I will just use it when I need it. I was not satisfied with my collage of images so
I bought a Starwars Episode I poster and cut out the middle to make a much
better looking boarder.
If anyone knows where I can find a starwars yoke or if you know of
a regular yoke that will work let me know. I thought about buying
a yoke to see if it was as good as the original starwars yoke
but I hate to drop $50 on a decent yoke and it not work.
The re-worked system.
Update
Well I got tired of moving the trackball around. Everytime I needed
to use the 2nd joystick or a 2nd player needed it, I had to
move the trackball somewhere else, what a pain. Enough of that, I just chunked
the old control panel and built a new one but this time I integrated
the Microsoft trackball and since I never used the reset button I
made it into the left click button. I also used spray on adhesive
to hold my new graphics to the panel which is much better and no wrinkles.
I am going to install a program called Rain. It is supposed to
keep the CPU cooler by insterting a HALT instruction when the cpu is idle.
I do not have much faith in my AMD chip when it runs all the time,
maybe this will extend the life.
I suggest only using the Happ control butons 53-9200, I think
these are the Ultimate, I tried the Competition but they felt
cheap and I did not like the convex buttons.
The control panel with built in trackball.
04/00
I have made a new upgrade to my system. I changed to a 19" monitor. If
you are building a machine use a 19" monitor, it is much much better
than a 17". I also covered the torn artwork with a yellow/black
saftey looking boarder tape from Office Max. I thought it had an
Aliens movie feel since they used the saftey colors on the ship.
I added some extra boarder tape around the edges to visually
balance the repair
job. I also changed the marquee to a Galaxian. It made more sense
than the old Choplifter marquee since the side art was a space ship and the bezel was a space scene. Unfortunately the Galaxian marquee was a little too
tall so I had to trim it down by about an inch but that wasnt too bad.
My machine with new marquee and covered tears.
2006 Update
This was my first project ever. I have come a long way since this time. Looking back I am very glad I did not hack up the cabinet or do something stupid like paint over the sideart. I am looking forward to restoring the cabinet as an original Astron Belt. I have since purchased an original control panel and bezel for the machine and am working on new sideart. |
