Ultimate 4 Player Gaming Cabinet

domodan

I've decided that I want to build the ultimate 4 player gaming cabinet. When I say ultimate, I mean the ability to play all varieties of games. I want to be able to play old school joystick/button games arcade games and rollerball games, all the way up to N64 or as recent as I can get in an emulator games.

I've decided that I'm going to mount a 60" flat panel TV and good speakers. This cabinet is going to be BIG.

Here's where I'm going to need help. I will obviously have the joysticks, roller balls and buttons permanently mounted in the panel. For games that require N64 and NES style controllers I'll need some flush mount ports. Can I get these various controller types that will plugin via USB?

The other thing I'm struggling with is how it will know which controllers to accept for the game. Can I program it to look for the USB ports first and if nothing is there default to the joysticks?

With RetroPi can I group the games by control type? I've got a RPi3 and want to get the software and hardware side (controls) all ironed out before I build the cabinet (obviously).

Thanks in advance!

domodan

Well, I've taken the first step in getting some the Canakit Pi3 inbound to me along with a couple of different gaming controllers. Once I get that working as desired, I'll move on to building a couple of old controllers with the joystick, button and rollerball. Then I can play around with choosing which controllers it prefers and what not.

Again, I appreciate any advice that anyone has for me on this ambitious project.

MWGemini

@domodan You might want to consider doing something like this: http://beersmith.com/mame/ . He designed modular arcade control panels so that he could swap in whichever control type he wanted.

As for grouping games by control type in RetroPie, you can't do that right now, not very easily at least. That could change in the near future.

domodan

@MWGemini said in Ultimate 4 Player Gaming Cabinet:

@domodan You might want to consider doing something like this: http://beersmith.com/mame/ . He designed modular arcade control panels so that he could swap in whichever control type he wanted.

As for grouping games by control type in RetroPie, you can't do that right now, not very easily at least. That could change in the near future.

MWGemini - thanks so much for the reply. That is a pretty wild setup he has! LOL. I don't think I want to go that crazy. I think I just want the classic joystick with buttons which will suit most games...MAYBE a rollerball...and then the option to plugin USB controllers. I guess I just need to figure out how to tell the system to prioritize a USB controller HIGHER than the joystick and buttons.

First thing first, is to get Retropie running on a USB SNES style controller. Once I have that up and running, then I'll build my first joystick/button controller and see if I can get the priority working right. Once I can do that, then it's cabinet building time.

MWGemini

@domodan I haven't tested or used this myself, but this might be useful for what you're asking: https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/1167/here-is-a-way-to-select-joystick-for-players-1-4-global-or-emu-specific

There are also tons of blogs/articles/etc. on the internet with info about arcade builds. I've stumbled upon a few while looking for other things, but I'm sure if you search, you can find lots of great ideas out there. I also know that there are companies that sell pre-made arcade controls. https://shop.xgaming.com/collections/all is one example, but I'm fairly sure I've seen a few others as well. While browsing that site, I also found this: https://shop.xgaming.com/collections/arcade-parts/products/4-player-x-arcade-builder-s-kit-usb-ps2

If you're planning on building a full cabinet, you might also want to consider powering it with something other than a Raspberry Pi. While it's an amazing device, it does have somewhat limited power and can't play many of the more modern and graphics-intensive games. A gaming PC in your arcade cabinet would give you a lore more flexibility, but is also going to cost a lot more.

domodan

@MWGemini - Thanks so much for the detailed reply. I'm going to certainly equip the cabinet to have room for a much larger and more powerful PC, but for now I'm going to go with the Pi.

I actually decided that all I'm really after, is the retro stuff. Every SNES and older...MAYBE as new as N64. At least for this build. I want the old school stuff. Based on that, I think I can get away with not having to have the USB controllers and the additional complexity in which that brings.

I'm off to check out those links.

In the meantime, I ordered a couple of Control blocks as well! I need to figure out what buttons and joysticks I want to buy now...

MWGemini

@domodan Also some good links and ideas/discussion in this thread: https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/7393/2-player-cabinet-planning-stages

caver01

@domodan Although not as big as your 60" screen plan, my cabinet is a functioning 4-player design that plays all of the classic arcade games plus some consoles that interested me from when I was a kid (Atari 2600, NES, SNES). Check the link in my signature for details about my project.

As you are probably concluding, you can get away with playing most of the older consoles using arcade controls, provided you have enough buttons. For me, that was six action buttons for players 1 and 2, and four buttons for players 3 and 4, not counting coin and start which double as select and start for consoles.

I am looking forward to seeing more details about your project, as we seem closely aligned in terms of what you want to play--the only difference being maybe that I wanted some portability and the ability to play vertical games from the short sides of my cabinet so the image can fill the display.