Dagobot asked me to write about an arcade cabinet I made. It’s a one of a kind thing, for many reasons, and it’s over at Nobrow Coffee and Tea in SLC, UT.

I first saw the cabinet at Deseret Industries, the mormon thrift store. I have a friend Ned Clayton who frequents the place because he makes a living selling things on ebay (and thrift shops).

It was a dedicated Space Harrier cabinet in working condition (the PCB worked- that’s the computer board inside), minus the joystick, with a broken monitor, and with spider and mouse homes inside. It was obviously kept outside in a shed of something.
Here’s what I did to it before I took it to the coffee shop, or, SEVEN STEPS TO HAVING AN AMAZING ONE OF A KIND CAB:

1. Reinforced the bottom of the cab and other little spots with fresh boards- there was lots of rotten particle board and water damage

2. Throw all the guts, including a perfectly working Space Harrier PCB in the garbage. Don’t be mad, you couldn’t have used it for anything.

3. Put a flat screen computer monitor in, connected to a….  computer (that sits in the bottom).

4. Took apart some cheap desktop computer speakers (amp inside the speakers) and mounted them inside the cab where the speakers should go- plugged into the computer (so I have a volume control inside the cab now).

5. I had an old joystick from a Thunder Blade kit I had once (the PCB for a certain game, plus whatever special controls it needs and the art and stickers for the game would be called a kit). Ironically, I could have used that joystick to restore the Space Harrier, but I think that I had the Thunder Blade set up proper back then and then forgot about it.

Now, this joystick was special. It was an ANALOG joystick. That means that it was a complex mechanism with gears that turn wheels that show electrically how much you’ve turned the wheel, so you can hover in one spot halfway across the screen, for example. I needed a DIGITAL joystick which shows only whether you’re pressing a direction or not (but not how far you’re pressing it). So I had to do build a box to house the joystick and attach it to the cab, plus I had to modify it so the movements of the joystick would hit on/off switches instead of turning wheels.

6. Then I had to translate the on/off’s of the buttons (joystick up, down, left, right, plus trigger buttons, start, and coin buttons) into something the computer would understand. I used a device called an ipac from a company called ultimarc. (see ultimarc.com). It takes the wires from the switches, runs them through a chip, and sends it to the computer with a USB cable that makes the computer think it’s a normal keyboard (so up on the joystick = up arrow on the keyboard etc.)

7. Next, I loaded up the arcade emulator program, MAME (in this case, shmupmame, which had a little faster input response than others at the time). Then, I got the games working, and did two things: I set the computer (in the boot menu) to “automatically boot after power loss”, which means that if I unplug the cab and then plug it back in, the computer will turn itself on (so now I don’t have to reach in the cab and press the power button on the computer). Then, I put the MAME folder, plus a shortcut for the MAME program inside said folder, into a place in windows called “startup”, so after the computer boots, it automatically loads up the MAME program!

Now, that’s the least of it! I’ve got just a few games in there right now:

Dodonpachi- Blast tanks to heavy metal music.

Dodonpachi DAI OU JOU- (my favorite). Does someone need a handkerchief? That sounds like a sneeze!

Ketsui- ever have someone dump a bucket of foam peanuts on you? that’s what this game’s like.

ESP Galuda- Gender Bender game with fairy wings and steampunk monstrosities.
Viper Phase 1- straight forward space shmup for the plebes who need a break from the fancy shmups.

But you could put anything in there, or make one with different buttons or whatever.

What’s special about this Cabiner, or, SEVEN STEPS OF SPECIAL:

1. Any hardcore shmups aficionado will recognize the wonder of the games I’ve picked. Nobrow is probably the only place you’ll see some of these games in a cab your entire life.

2. I’m in a high score battle over there with Scott, and I challenge anyone else to step up.

3. This is the only shmup cab with a flight stick I’ve ever seen.

4. The flight stick, while awkward at first, is actually a very appropriate and fun control for these games. Experience the thrill of piloting a real spaceship!!

5. I put the quarters on my tab and that’s how I afford the coffee. I am the programmer and owner of all these games (for legal reasons).

6. The coffee there is great.

7. Shmups rule!

I encourage all of you to have an arcade cabinet near you at all times, like Ricky Schroeder.

-VOURtron