pmpddytim #1 Posted May 17, 2004 My fiance loves pinball games so I figured I would make her a custom pinball controller for Midnight Magic. MATERIALS: 1. 6x4x2 Radio Shack Project Box 2. 4 Microswitch Arcade buttons (2 black, 1 green, 1 red) 3. 1 old cord from a 2600 knock off controller 4. Very thin wood from Hobby Lobby. I used Microswitch buttons because I could not fit 4 leaf switches in that small of a case. Used a small case becasue my Fiance has small hands, however its really comfortable fo me to. CONTROLS: Right Black button - Right Flipper Left Black Button - Left Flipper Red Button - Pulls Back Plunger Green Button - Releases Plunger I just lay this on my lap and use my index finger and middle fingers of each hand to press the right and left buttons and my thumbs to press the green and red buttons. I would have put the flipper buttons on the sides but it just felt akward in my mock up. COMPATABILITY: Midnight Magic: Works perfectly. In this game if you press both flipper buttons at the same time both flippers go up thus eliminating the need for a third button to perform this function. Video Pinball: Works but if you press both flipper buttons at the same time nothing happens or only one flipper goes up. I don't see this as a problem because Video pinball kinda sucks anyways. Pheonix: This is kinda cool. Right button makes you go right and left makes you go left. Green shoot and red brings up your shield. The configuration is kinda odd but once I got used to it I played for about 25 mins woth no problem. I imagine it would work for all galaxian type games. Check out the pics and let me know what you think! -Tim Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pmpddytim #2 Posted May 17, 2004 CRAP! Sorry I forgot to reformat the pics before I posted them. -Tim Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jeepnut24 #3 Posted May 17, 2004 Looks good. Ill be adding that functionallity to my "Custom Controller" Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pmpddytim #4 Posted May 17, 2004 Once I get all my plans and schematics drawn up I'm going to start on an all in one super controller! It shall be the size of a small house! -Tim Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jeepnut24 #5 Posted May 17, 2004 Once I get all my plans and schematics drawn up I'm going to start on an all in one super controller! It shall be the size of a small house! -Tim That is what I have going right now. Well sorta. I may even put in keypads. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Brad2600 #6 Posted May 17, 2004 Nice mockup, pmp! Clever idea as well. Not as good as a REAL pinball machine but good enough still! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pmpddytim #7 Posted May 17, 2004 Nice mockup, pmp! Clever idea as well. Not as good as a REAL pinball machine but good enough still! If you mean "Mockup" as a model that dosent work then its not a mockup. I would take pics of the wiring but you would laugh at the crappy soldering job. It looks like I was drunk when i did it. Yeah it will never be a real pinball machine but it plays really well. Wish I would have made it sooner. -Tim Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Brad2600 #8 Posted May 17, 2004 My bad. I missed most of what you typed. Brain is on the fritz right now. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Tsukasa #9 Posted May 17, 2004 Did you glue a piece of wood on the side or what? Radio Shaft project boxes come in black plastic and metal.... Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pmpddytim #10 Posted May 17, 2004 Yeah its glued on the top and front for that retro feel. You can get really thin sheets of wood at hobby lobby. You can get them even more thin than what I used but the grain is not as nice. It looks a lot better in person than in the pics, looks like the wood is actually supposed to be there. I was pleased. -Tim Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Vic George 2K3 #11 Posted May 17, 2004 No side-mounted buttons? Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pmpddytim #12 Posted May 17, 2004 No side-mounted buttons? It just felt wrong with the side buttons. It was to hard to keep a hold of. If it were bigger then side buttons would work but with such a small box it was akward. When I make a big multi-controller I'll put the buttons on the sides, -Tim Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
moycon #13 Posted May 17, 2004 No side-mounted buttons? Heh, Thats what I was thinking. My favorite way to play a video version of pinball was the old Tele-Games Pinball/Breakaway combo. These units had the pinball buttens on the side. I'd imagine one of these could be modified to use with the Atari. Thats not to say the customer controller pmpddytim made ain't cool! Hell I think any Atari 2600 project rules!! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
moycon #14 Posted May 17, 2004 Well that was odd. Not quite sure how I double posted that..... And no Edit button. Something weird is afoot. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
ATARIPITBULL #15 Posted May 17, 2004 Well which ever one of you guys makes a good looking all purpose controller, post pictures of them and get ready to take some orders if the price is not too high. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
jeepnut24 #16 Posted May 18, 2004 Well once my "controller" is up to par, I will post pictures. Needless to say, my brother and I have been play testing it for a few weeks now. Now that I see this pinball controller, I will be modding mine a bit. BTW, a little extra work, and you could use it as an asteroids controller. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
128bytes #17 Posted May 20, 2004 pmpdaddytim - That controller would also work great for Activision Decathlon or Activision Skiing! Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sku_u #18 Posted May 20, 2004 Very nice! Maybe your wedding gift to her can be a Bumper Bash cart. That game uses the buttons on the two paddles to control the flippers. That gives Bumper Bash a slight edge over the other two pinball games IMO. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Stingray #19 Posted May 20, 2004 I'm also working on a "size of a small house" all-in-one 2600/7800 controller. Mine is still in the scattered collection of bits all over the floor phase. I hope to be able to cram in joystick, two paddles, two buttons, keypad and now with this post looks like pinball buttons will be a must as well. -S Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Rob Mitchell #20 Posted May 20, 2004 No side-mounted buttons? Heh, Thats what I was thinking. My favorite way to play a video version of pinball was the old Tele-Games Pinball/Breakaway combo. These units had the pinball buttens on the side. I'd imagine one of these could be modified to use with the Atari. I did this about 3 years ago. I modified a broken Atari Video Pinball console and made it into a controller! I put switches on the back to configure it to work with either the Atari pinball games or with the Vectrex Spinball game. I have a separate socket for the joystick to pull down and release the plunger. Also I replaced the paddle on the top deck with an Indy 500 driving controller spinner! And I hot glued pennies inside the knob for angular momentum. The latest mod is that I harvested a 4 way tilt mechanism out of a cheap tilt stick. I hot glued that in the console where the speaker cone once sat. I still need to wire it up so that I can have tilt function when playing AVP! It really makes pinball games a joy to play! I hope your wife enjoys your custom controller! Rob Mitchell, Atlanta, GA Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Clock #21 Posted May 20, 2004 I love looking at other peoples projects. I think your controller looks really nice, I love the choice of buttons and the wood panel gives a great hardcore retro look. Good work. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
wilpetty #22 Posted May 21, 2004 well allow me to state the obvious... That control is badass! You could probably sell those things Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
pmpddytim #23 Posted May 21, 2004 well allow me to state the obvious... That control is badass! You could probably sell those things Why thank you kind sir. -Tim Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
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