Hello! I am making a
Arcade Cabinet for my game,
Paddle Wars: Hit The Wall.
The game is mostly about using the powers available to the player in the right time and occasion, or go creative (some testers proved to go overly creative, scoring bizarre scores in ways that I never imagined, including never using a ball for example).
For those that want to see the game, here is a trailer (it is not the same one somewhere else on the forums):
I will update as I progress on development, and this first post will have all progress already done more or less in chronological order (with pics!)
First thing, I needed to design the controls, the PC version use mouse and 8 keys organized in 2 rows, I decided to make a custom arcade cabinet with the same controls (reason why I am building one, instead of buying a MAME one and just cram the game there), of course arcade machines have no mouse, so I went with a trackball.
So, here are the design:
So, I went to a nice site named Ultimarc, that manufactures a electronics board I needed (I don't have time to make my own, although I have all needed tools and parts, the whole thing is to be working mid January).
So, here are the parts, the electronic board, 4 red buttons, 4 blue buttons, a red trackball (although I swear it looks orange, but I ordered red), leds (all parts, trackball too, glow :D), spares, and lots of wires. The color scheme is based on the new design of the game menus (you can see the new design near the start of the video I linked earlier).
Ok, panel designed, the cabinet itself also got designed, this is a side-view of it:
If you notice it on purpose use lots of 45 degrees angles, again, it is to reflect the art style of the game itself (if I am making the cabinet, why make a generic one?)
Ok, now actual building...
First thing I noticed, is that I placed the parts over the wooden board with the designed size, and noticed that the trackball-hand of the player would easily bump into the monitor, since I don't want people hurt (neither dirty monitor... or broken monitor, considering how eventually some ogre people show up), I needed to change the design, I actually nearly doubled the length of the thing, from 150mm to 270mm (bigger than that printing of the artwork become ludicrously expensive as bigger printed is needed).
Then I found some REALLY NICE wooden planks and a cardboard plank (it looks like wood, but is cardboard) in the trash (wonder why someone threw it away), I took them, cut in the designed size, made the needed holes, and made this test:
As you noticed, the cardboard thing is a bit flimsy, the good part is that I won't need to do any scary stuff to fit the trackball like people usually do (because the trackball only has some millimeters free on the top), the bad thing is that I need a internal structure that don't get in the way of the electronics (even after done, in case I need to fix something).
Here is the planning (nothing there is glued in place, they are just positioned):
This was yesterday, today I tried to complete it, but then I figured that the wood was uneven (the part that I did not cut, the edges from "factory"), thus I wasted a lot of time sanding... Then I figured that I forgot a way to pass the wires around, thus I needed to make holes:
Then I actually attached the trackball to the board, from below (people usually attach from the top, because it is easier, but it is ugly, and the trackball was not made for that, in the top part there are even a slot to insert a nut).
The dude in the photo is my dad helping me align the thing (reason why he is in that level), and indeed it was badly misaligned, I needed to remove, find thicker washers (even using all small washers was not enough), and try again. After trying again it DID worked.
Then I figured the internal wood structure DID prevented me from doing maintenance, but also installation of the electronics of the buttons (the switches, to be more specific, they were bigger than I imagined, even worse when taking account the wires jutting out from them), so I decided that tomorrow I will try using a bar of aluminium in the internal structure instead of a piece of wood, so I have the same structural effect, but has space to work with my hands.
And that is it :D Tomorrow if everything happens right, I will work more and update here and on the blog.
Also, if you want to talk about the game itself (and not the cabinet), post in the feedback forum post:
http://forums.tigsource.com/index.php?topic=13843 notice I don't updated that post, it has the old GUI in case you want to compare with the new one (the new one as seen on the trailer). It also has the old trailer (so you can see the gameplay evolution too).
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