Starlight Scrappers Arcade Cabinet

This is the arcade cabinet that houses the game that my team made for our senior design project at the University of Texas at Austin and submission to the 2023 game developer's conference. It is an original design built from scratch specifically designed to accommodate the features of our game as well as the challenges of portability.

Plywood for laser cutting the main structure had already been acquired by the school as well as our mini pc which ran our game and wiring components such as wires, wire nuts, and jumper connections. All purchased materials can be found with links in the attached spreadsheet.

An initial cardboard mockup was developed based around our gameplay idea and was then refined in tinkercad for more precise measurements and design. This was then finalized in autocad and then a second cardboard prototype was assembled. For the overall design of the cabinet I wanted to reflect the spirit of traditional arcade cabinets and modeled the general shape and assembly after cabinets I had played in the past as well as reference blueprints for other cabinets I found online. A huge design challenge I had to work with was size. Because we were submitting to a conference I wanted to make it portable, so the cabinet was designed to take up the least amount of space necessary to comfortable house our components and wiring. Additionally the cabinet breaks apart into three parts with each of the control boxes being able to separate from the main body. this significantly lowers its overall foot print and makes it easier to move around. Another major factor in the design process was the size of our laser cutter's cutting bed. Because of this limitation all parts had to be able to fit within a 16" x 24" space in order to be cutout. I've attached my tinkercad model below.

The design was then further refined to add screen tilt and speaker slots. The design was then altered. again as the material provide for final construction was only 12" x 24" as opposed to the 16" x 24" cardboard sheets and laser bed that I had been prototyping to. Because of this the cabinet design had to be cut down the middle with the two halves being joined later in construction. Parts were then modified and organized to fit a 12" x 24" sheet and were then sent to our laser cutter and assembled with sure bonder hot glue. Components that would be locked in place once the two halves to the cabinet were permanently joined such as the screens and speakers were also installed at this step as they would become inaccessible once full construction was completed. I've shared my final cad files below.

Once the two halves were joined, all surfaces were sanded and puttied to make sure all the parts were smooth and flush with each other. paint was then applied to all surfaces that weren't going to have vinyl, and vinyl stickers designed by our team's artist were then carefully applied to the remaining surfaces making sure that the did not wrinkle or have any bubbles. Aluminum mesh also applied to the cutouts by the speakers to give the cabinet a bit of a space ship feel to fit with our game and let players get a small look at the wiring inside the cabinet. The maintenance door was also installed and wiring and setup instructions were written inside for others to reference.

Jumper connections were fitted onto all of our control components to connect the to our IPAC which would route them to the computer running the game inside our cabinet. The surge protector was then connected to our power socket following the intractable guide listed below. This assembly was carefully insulated with heat shrink, and following its installation in the cabinet, the rest of our components were ready to be mounted into the cabinet. After testing our controls and pc outside the cabinet to make sure everything worked, everything was carefully organized within the cabinet and wires and power blocks were held in place with command strips and zip ties in order to protect our components as well as to avoid tangling. After this the cabinet was complete!