KwadKade

Robocop is still causing me some issues. The parts are in & game is hooked up, but, the Robocop & enemy sprites are not showing up. It could be because of a bad capacitor. The cap needs to be replaced as one of the legs are broken. Hopefully I can find a replacement part and it will fix it.

I’m working on an application for the Mark IV. It’s written in Python and Bash. Basically, it will wait for a coin to be inserted and it will start up the game. After a set amount of time it will notify the player that they will need to insert another coin. After the time runs out the program is killed, unless another coin is inserted. I am going to make it where a good player can complete it on one coin, others will have to insert addition coins.

I’m considering changing the Coin Mechs to accept tokens instead of quarters. First I need to get some tokens, around 800 to 1000 or so of them at first. I may get more later. We’re going to set it up where you can earn tokens instead of buying them, so the games will basically be free play. More details as I figure them out.

The coin mechs are now in the Mark I. Street Fighter II now costs $0.25 to play. Need to cut the plexi and put vinyl down on the control panel. Finish it off with a Marquee, add the volume control and it will be good.

The Neo-Geo is staying in the Mark III. The coin doors are nearly complete. Just need to get 2 coin acceptors to finish. I’m hoping to get a new monitor for it in the upcoming months.

Robocop will be in the Mark II as soon as I get a new JAMMA harness & Joystick. Will need to drill 1 hole in the control panel & plexi for a jump/shoot button. I will be getting in the bezels for the coin doors to finish it out when I get the harness & joystick. I already have the coin acceptors and brackets. A trip to Lowe’s to get locks will finish it out.

I’ve got some parts on order, hopefully they’ll be in before I get back from Oklahoma this weekend.

After some thought, the Kwadkade’s will stay at Conway Gaming Center.

I received my first new coin door & mechs and have them mounted in the Mark I. They should be hooked up soon. I will be putting the Neo-Geo into Mark IV and Robocop into Mark II in the upcoming week or so. I’m sure Vanguard Princess & Stepmania will be back in some new/different cabinets in the future.

After several requests from people wanting to talk to me about making their own arcade machines, I will be posting a series of How-to’s here in the upcoming months of what I’ve learned so far.

I am in the process reworking a lot of things in my life. This includes the Kwadkades. I will be moving the machines from Conway Gaming Center to my Apartment.

Mark III is too big to take home, so, I will be getting rid of it. If anyone is interested in it, please let me know.

This last weekend was ARK II by ARFGN at Conway Gaming Center. The Mark II & IV was constantly going down. So, I will be removing the PCs from those cabinets. Mark II will be getting Robocop. Mark IV will have the Neo-Geo installed.

I ordered some more parts today. I’m getting some Coin Mech parts and a Coin Door with a few pieces of mounting hardware and an arcade power supply. Hopefully they’ll be in Wednesday or Thursday. This time I ordered from TwistedQuarter.com in Florida. I heard about them through The BYOAC Forums.

When the coin doors & mechs get in, I’ll be putting them on the Mark I & III. So SFII and the NeoGeo will probably soon be pay-to-play. These arcade machines can get expensive, so, the money made by these machines will go right back into getting more parts and more machines. So, think of the quarters you put in as a donation to the Kwadkade fund. I’ll be doing some Free Play days as I’m not trying to get rich off this.

I maybe pulling Stepmania out of the Mark II. I want to get Robocop up and running. Besides, Stepmania has been causing me grief lately. Sometimes the pad stops responding until Stepmania is closed out and reopened. Not quite sure why.

ARK II is this Saturday (July 31) at Conway Gaming Center. One of the guys that runs ARFGN saw my cabinets yesterday and apparently left an impression. I just wish the machines were in perfect condition for this weekend. Maybe I can get a few of the marquees printed today.

Looks like I may need to start getting Japanese joysticks and pushbuttons. Apparently Fighting Game aficionados like Japanese parts over Happ. I really haven’t played with many, so, if I get to build some cabinets in the future, I may go with a Japanese theme. I’ve got some rough plans sketched out in Inkscape for my own cabinet. Maybe sometime in the winter I can start working on it.

After last night’s post, I decided to go ahead and put the Neo-Geo in the Mark III.  Unfortunately, it needs another power supply. I picked up used AT power supply the other day. I hooked it up, but, its +12V is too weak. Its only putting out +10V. The board doesn’t like that. Hopefully one of the ATX power supplies at home will work. If not, I may order an arcade power supply. I’ve found them for $20 + shipping. Also, the bezel for the monitor will need to be cut, but first, I may readjust the monitor’s position in the cab.

Once the Neo-Geo is up and working, all of my cabinets will have games in them. They all need some minor work and parts, but they all function. I want to get some coin doors with coin mechs after the 1st. The arcade boards will probably be pay-to-play, the rest free-play. All money collected will go into getting more machines. No games will be over a quarter. I want to get the marquees and control panels complete before charging for games.

I still have the Robocop board to do something with. Looks like I’m on the search again for more cabinets.

Here’s a picture of the SFII board running in Mark I.

I really need to stop staying up until 3AM working on these things on a weeknight. Getting up at 7AM after a late night usually makes the next day a fight to stay awake. There’s just not enough hours in a day to do what I want to do.

Street Fighter II: The World Warrior is now in Mark I. The Neo Geo board is now in Limbo. Either I’m putting it in Mark IV or the Mark III. Haven’t decided yet. Mark IV has the Acer Aspire Revo, and the Mark III doesn’t have a game in it yet. More-than-likely the Mark III will be the Neo-Geo’s new home. The Mark I needs a volume control. It’s rigged to go directly to the speakers at the moment.

The CGA-to-VGA converter boards came in today. I used one to test the 2 Street Fighter II boards and Robocop. Only one of the SFII boards worked the first time. Robocop gave me some issues, but it appears to be at least partially working.  SNK had bad graphics glitches. This could be due to bad connections or bad ROMs. Will need to do some more testing.

I’ve done some basic design on building my own cabinet. It’s based off a Japanese sit down Viewlix. I’m not sure if I’ll make it sit down or not. It will be a thinner cabinet than the 3 I already have.  Hopefully I’ll get some time in the upcoming months to work on it. Will need to get some more tools to make it.

Ordered more parts last week. So far I have two CGA to VGA boards coming in. Should be in Tuesday July 20, according to UPS. These will help get the other boards tested and installed. I’m looking for some coin doors as the Mark IV is missing one and I want to get some coin mechs for the Mark I.
I’m considering moving the Neo Geo into the Mark IV. This will free up the Mark I for Street Fighter II. I really “need” to get some more empty cabinets. This would make things easier, and maybe give the Acer Aspire Revo a permanent home. So far it’s been in 3 out of the 4 cabs. There’s nothing wrong with the PC, it just gets replaced with something more “useful”.

This is why I build the KwadKades:

After some issues with the joystick mappings last night, I got Vanguard Princess working. I’ve got some tweaking to do, like increasing the VS Mode time length. It’s currently set to 60 seconds. Going to change that to 90. I had to modify my .xsession file to include Openbox, due to the mouse having to be over the game in-order for the joysticks to function properly. Adding Openbox fixed that. I may need to hide the mouse pointer when the game starts.

I’m having some issues with the screen blanking after the game is idle for a while. I’ve disabled the screen savers & most (if not all) power management settings. Still not sure why it’s doing it. I may just uninstall the gscreensaver & xscreensaver.