My first set of MAME vertical bezel overlays – Alien vs Predator, D&D: Shadow Over Mystara, Magic Sword, Wild West C.O.W-Boys of Moo Mesa and Xenophobe

TL;DR: You can download all of these overlays at:

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1aAVZbjjAhQh_aEsqYgEaj6IGHl8oA9RK

Now that I have my vertical MAME cabinet up and running, my latest pandemic project has been creating vertical bezel overlays – the perfect union of two of my obsessions, classic arcade games and graphic design. I've been having a lot of fun with it, so I figured I would share my first set.

There wasn't a specific rhyme or reason to my first set of game choices, but they all ended up being various flavors of run-and-gun/hack-and-slash games from the late 80s and early 90s. I also tried to choose some games and approaches to representing the cabinets that I haven't seen yet.

Huge thanks to u/IAmThat2 (ArsInvictus) for inspiration and tips, and a shout out to Orionsangel, Mr. Retrolust, VCabinet and others in the community for their great bezel work that I’m building on here. Credit also to coinopart.com, arcadeartwork.org, Mr. Do’s Arcade and other sources for artwork I’m using in some of these.

Some notes on my approach:

My goal is to create immersive overlays that celebrate these games and make them more fun to play, not specifically to authentically recreate the original cabinets, though I’m doing that as much as possible. Plenty of great games had minimal or uninspired cabinet art, so I chose in some cases to create something new that’s in the spirit of the game.

Most of these include two game screen sizes, and all include normal and darkened versions, which can be selected from the Video Options menu. The purpose of the dark version is to better simulate a dark arcade, where the printed bezel art did not glow the way the marquee and screen do (not unlike Mr. Retrolust’s Lights Out series). I’m still working on exactly how dark the dark ones should be and how to best create that effect, so let me know if you like that approach and how it feels to you.

Also worth noting – at this point, these all just include a 4:3 window for the game screen, with no monitor bezel art, as there are many bezel variants and shader options out there. I may update these with an option for monitor bezel art in the future.

As I said above, you can download all of these at https://drive.google.com/open?id=1aAVZbjjAhQh_aEsqYgEaj6IGHl8oA9RK . These are all works in progress that will likely evolve as I refine my approach.

Alien vs. Predator

I created two variants for this game, one in a generic cabinet format that I used for most of the games, and one that’s designed to simulate the look of the Capcom Dynamo Big Blue cabinet that this game sometimes appeared in.

The artwork here draws mostly from the original cabinet art, except for the bezel around the monitor, which I haven’t found a great source for, so I created a new one in the style of the original.

Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow Over Mystara

One of the deeper fantasy hack-and-slash games, I thought this would be a fun one to put into a vertical format. However, the original cabinet didn’t include much art other than the marquee, so I adapted other existing Mystara art for the regular cabinet (it's more visible in the medium version, not shown above), and I added some new textural art for the lower area.

This cabinet existed in many different form factors (generally as a conversion kit I believe), most of which would be difficult to depict on a vertical screen, but I did include a version based on the Dynamo Big Blue format. I may try to add more of the versions based on some of the other cabinets out there in the future, for kicks.

Magic Sword

An earlier side-scrolling hack-and-slash game, but a classic – this was the first overlay I made, with inspiration from the version ArsInvictus created. I brought in some of the cool control panel art at the bottom, and I included a couple of US quarters lined up on the control panel edge, the universal symbol for “I call next game” (obviously not relevant for non-US players – this is a separate layer you can remove or replace with your currency of choice).

Wild West C.O.W.-Boys of Moo Mesa

I hadn’t actually heard of this game until recently, but the art style and gameplay are excellent. The original cabinet art is nice but it has no bezel art, so I created a bezel style based on art of the characters and a couple of new elements. Not strictly authentic, but more fun than the original in my opinion!

Xenophobe

Last but not least! One of my all-time favorites, this one was more challenging because of its unique cabinet design. I created a look inspired by the original cabinet, the only overlay I’ve created that includes an arcade scene in the background. There are two variants, with and without the three joysticks. I’m still playing with the brightness/contrast and overall look of this one, so it will likely evolve.

I’m definitely interested in what people think, as I’m still developing my process around designing overlays and some things will likely need tweaking. If you download them, let me know how they’re working for you. These are all tested on my Windows 10 system, but should work on any variant of MAME that supports lay files — if you run into any issues please let me know, I'm still pretty new to making these. Hope you guys enjoy them!