Puckman Custom Made CPO for my Bootleg Puckman

[Superully]

good luck, andré! good to know that you have two tries this time hopefully disaster girl won't have to show up ...

[level42]

Hey-guys-it's only sticking a freaking CPO to a CP.......I've done it a number of times before.

The hole is of course already in there now, so no more hole-punching required.....

[level42]

OK.....


It's time for a small tear.....

+TURN ON OBAMA SPEECH SOUND+
Because, my friends.....this is a story of true greatness. Man has gone to the moon. But here, we witness another great strengh in what humanity can achieve with willpower, endurance and faith. Faith in brothers who help eachother in times of need.
+TURN OFF OBAMA SPEECH SOUND+

I almost forgot how long this has taken.

Let's rewind to 15 april 2009 (!!)

Everything about this CPO started right here on this forum:
https://www.dragonslairfans.com/smfor/index.php?topic=710.msg6087#msg6087

I had scanned the CP and a friendly guy from Australia (well, so it seemed) called Dexter offered to vectorize the Euro Joust Marquee. He actually did some great work on it. In the middle of that story, I asked if it would be possible if he could also do the Puckman CPO (as it was much simpler to vectorize).

In return to his work and efforts, I sent him some very nice Atari Jaguar DL/SA games I had found for his collection (yes I paid them AND shipped them at my cost) in good faith. His "famous last words" in that thread are actually pretty funny now: I will be in touch.

HAH ! He disappeared but not before f-ing some other people in the community.

Somehow, I hope he lives in Queensland....

But, let's do away with all the negativity....because after this failure I turned to the BYOAC forum. There was a guy named Guydanger there who offered to do some free artwork to get a start in freelance artwork...so I gave it another shot:

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=96410.msg1015608#msg1015608

This time I hit the jackpot, and he did some really, really great work.
It was almost perfect.

But almost was not quite good enough. I still noticed some errors here and there.

Then the third guy came into the picture (because I really didn't want to bug Guydanger anymore). His name is the well known Zorg from France.

Zorg was kind enough to fix all the errors I noticed. He was really patient and we went through a lot of comms to get everything straight.

But it really payed off in the end. Zorg still hosts the finished files, both with the original all yellow circle between the ghosts AND the one mad for those who want to install a button right there (like me )

Then.....someone had to print it of course. Now, in this moments, the first man I think of is Rich from ThisOldGame.com
The first contacts I had with Rich were about the Galaxian CPO has was making at the time. I asked what file he was working on, and I found some errors and we had some great comms about it. (Even after that there were still some errors in the first print, but those have been fixed now too).
Anyway, if someone would be up for it, it would be Rich....

However, as he indicated, he had nothing to match the colors to. I didn't have any scrap parts anymore, so I suggested that we would use my pictures as reference and "gamble" on that. It worked out great. The red(ish) color and the blue were spot on. Only the yellow was a tiny bit off, but nothing terrible.

The rest you know and I won't repeat.

Here is the final result (drumroll please:)








Now.....who would have gone through such lengths for a freaking BOOTLEG CPO ?
Well, I don't regret at all, the result is fabulous IMHO !

Look at how that original Midway Pac Man joystick is mounted !!! "Look Ma, no carriage bolts !"  HAH, not even the original Puckman or Pac Man or Ms.Pac Man had that.... (mmmm, yes that's the other guy who I have to thank, the friend who welded those wire-ends to the CP...love it (AND IT'S METRIC WOO-HOO !).

O.....and I almost forgot that I got that EXCELLENT original Pac joystick from Spyridon, completely for FREE !!!! He didn't even want me to pay the shipping costs !!!!


So, a BIG thank you to all you excellent people for getting this done.....I'm touched ! 
 

[level42]

Oops almost forgot: Ully arranged the powdercoating of the joystick !

So there it was, people around the world of helped in this, Australia (ahum), the US, France, Germany and all for this nut from Holland

[level42]

If anyone is tuning in (Zorg ?) there is only one suggestion to change in the files:

Make the hole area for the joystick inverted (black). This way, it isn't too noticeable when the hole is not 100% exactly centered. Also the cross-hatch in there seems to be not in the center of the circle.

[ckong]

  You did it, and it looks stunning. Congratulations.

Next step in the do-it-yourself: stenceling the ms. pac-man cab? 

[Etienne MacGyver]

.........I had scanned the CP and a friendly guy from Australia (well, so it seemed) called Dexter offered to vectorize the Euro Joust Marquee. He actually did some great work on it. In the middle of that story, I asked if it would be possible if he could also do the Puckman CPO (as it was much simpler to vectorize).

First: Looking fantastic Andre !

Second: How bout that Marquee ? is it done, or do you still need "someone" to do the vector job ? 

[level42]

@Etienne: Well, if someone is bored and has enough time....... Looks like a nightmare to vectorize though....but I'd surely accept a good raster version too.

@Ckong: Nah.....I've got another job waiting now....something with a tube and some PCB's and some SW stuff......

[Superully]

Next step in the do-it-yourself: stenceling the ms. pac-man cab? 

my next big investment is going to be a compressor and an airbrush set (or whatever this is called). i'm tired of this stupid paint rolling thing, it sucks!!! i'll hopefully be trying it out on my taito bubble bobble cab, let's see if i manage to find some good equipment until then. that area is vast and needs a lot of researching time first!

[Zorg]

If anyone is tuning in (Zorg ?) there is only one suggestion to change in the files:

Make the hole area for the joystick inverted (black). This way, it isn't too noticeable when the hole is not 100% exactly centered. Also the cross-hatch in there seems to be not in the center of the circle.

you mean this way ? (I applied the same thing to the button holes.)
you are right about the cross-hatch, it's now corrected.

[ataritoobin]

Look at how that original Midway Pac Man joystick is mounted !!! "Look Ma, no carriage bolts !"  HAH, not even the original Puckman or Pac Man or Ms.Pac Man had that....

Looks fantastic!  Nice touch with the joystick mounting. 

Actually the genuine Namco Puckman machine has no visible carriage bolts on the CP.  It's mounted to a piece of metal under the plexi bezel.  Looks sleek 



(Of course the dust washer is on the wrong side of the CP in my example picture  )

[Superully]

first of all: i liked your obama speech a lot, spoken like a true president!

the overlay looks totally kickass, those two ghost on the left intending to push the button are fabulous. unfortunately, the overlay doesn't cover the button hole entirely so that the black from underneath can be seen a little bit, but i guess this is only visible from the left and in daylight, noone will notice it in the gameroom - hopefully. i'd love to see a picture of that control panel on the cabinet "in action" - gives us a full body shot, andré. i mean from the cabinet, not from you ...

[level42]

first of all: i liked your obama speech a lot, spoken like a true president!

the overlay looks totally kickass, those two ghost on the left intending to push the button are fabulous. unfortunately, the overlay doesn't cover the button hole entirely so that the black from underneath can be seen a little bit, but i guess this is only visible from the left and in daylight, noone will notice it in the gameroom - hopefully. i'd love to see a picture of that control panel on the cabinet "in action" - gives us a full body shot, andré. i mean from the cabinet, not from you ...

Yeah you're right about the yellow button. I fact, I'd love to have a yellow button that is the same size as the res/pink/purplish (what color is that anyway) one's that were originally on there. They are just a bit larger than the usual US buttons....
It would fully cover the button hole so you wouldn't see that.

However, I have VERY little problems with how it is now. The fact is that it is already AMAZING how this turned out, but simply scanning the original, measuring everything BY HAND and hoping and praying for the best. Same as the color matching.
It turned out much much better than I had ever hoped for !


Body shots will have to wait a bit....got some other priorities right now...

[gyruss]

looks kick-ass! 

[Q*ris]

It looks so fresh, I wanna eat it.
Wondeful job!