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Patrick -
I'm sure since you are "sciencing rockets" you are much smarter than me for these types of things, but take a look at this
web page and let me know what you think. Seems much easier than building one from scratch and wont take away from wifey/p*ker/dog time. Then again, if you really enjoy sciencing rockets, maybe this is cheating.
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Yeah, I've seen this stuff (this exact page, even), and it's under consideration. I think I'd like to build my own, though, if it's not *too* much of a PITA. That way, I can have exactly what I want and save some cash while I'm at it, too. Plus, there's nothing wrong with a good project. If I were to go buy one, it'd end up being something more like
one of these bad boys and these run $1600-$1900. I think my wife would kick me in the nuts if I bought a $1600-$1900 video game.
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I have built 4 of these MAME machines, 2 stand-up and 2 cocktail versions. The cocktail versions are more "wife-friendly", but the ones referred to in the previous post are really junk, very flimsy built like a shelf unit you buy at Target with a flimsy, smoke-tinted plastic top-glass. If you have the skills, cutting your own is the way to go. The 2 cocktails I did used the original dimensions from the Ms. Pacman cocktails, very nice. Stand-up, though, is the only way to go for range of controls. In both of mine I bought an existing game off Ebay locally and converted it by building my own control panel (both times I modeled them after the SlikStik CO2 layout), using the Ultimarc electronics to make the PC play throught the arcade monitor. Definitely THE BEST way to go, short of buying everything new for almost $3000... I spent about $1200 on these, buying the working games (one was a Virtua Fighter, the other was TMNT) and making my own control panel.
And to answer the original question: Robotron is my hands-down favorite game, I play it regularly even today. Donkey Kong and Pac Man deserve honorable mentions, though, since my school pictures from 1981 and 1982 show me wearing shirts featuring the characters from both these games.