Dragon's lair CPO... Repro or Original? And a Version of Factory side art placement.

Nondrowsy

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Dragon's lair CPO... Repro or Original? And a Version of Factory side art placement.

Restoring a Dragon's Lair and I took all the black paint off of my CP. Looks pretty good actually except for the drill holes. So I get the Repro CPO from QuarterArcade.. Should I replace or not.. What's the verdict??

The repro def. lacks depth and has printing errors on it, on the snake and the P1 P2 dirks head for example.. Lack of detail and sharpness. On the other hand My original has 5 freaking small holes drilled through it and the repro is bright and new... and not too bad. So, Which would you choose?!???

Original on Top, Repro on bottom
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More orange on original, yellow on repro
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The sky bothers me the most.. original.
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repro is all blue, no detail at all
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Original on bottom, repro on top for this pic
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Full Original
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Full Repro
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I believe this is the factory correct placement for Dragons Lair side art.
I couldn't find the correct placement for the side art anywhere, but when I removed the monitor bracket bolts.. I found it. With the right light you can almost see the outline of where it was, and that with the colors around the bolt holes, here are pics of the factory correct Dragon's Lair side art placement. at least on mine.

The right side art actually goes over one of the bolts holding the ps metal board on the bottom. here is the placement of the holes.
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And the middle of the circles is where the holes line up on the side art.
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Left side holes.
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left side hole placement on the art
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Factory placement for side art
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Man it's a shame, and I usually save every possible thing I can, but since that's such a high end game and those holes are so off center and just in weird places, you probably ought to replace it.

If it wasn't for that one just below the joystick that's off center, I'd just put bolts in the other ones and leave them. That one is UGLY though.
 
Man it's a shame, and I usually save every possible thing I can, but since that's such a high end game and those holes are so off center and just in weird places, you probably ought to replace it.

If it wasn't for that one just below the joystick that's off center, I'd just put bolts in the other ones and leave them. That one is UGLY though.

I'm really with you, those holes bug the hell out of me. But man the original is so much prettier than repro! Still leaning toward repro though.
 
I think it's just different tastes, the differences in the repro don't bother me at all, but the holes do.

If it were a cheaper game, I'd leave it how it is. I just did a 1943 for instance, if it had those same holes I'd just put carriage bolts in it and make it look as nice as possible. For Dragons Lair though it's gonna hurt the value.

Now if it's just for your house and you don't think you'll ever sell it, it really doesn't matter, and if you'd rather have the perfect correct art I'd just leave it.
 
That's the best documentation of the errors in the repo CPO I've seen. The detail in the original is so much better, but unfortunately, you really have no choice, the holes are unacceptable.

As for the side art...
I worked next to the guys who installed it on new machines. There never was any exact placement. It was always at the whim of the guy working that station on any given day, and I've seen it high and low.
In my opinion, it's too low in your photo. It should be about 6" higher. But again, since there is no definite placement, it's totally up to you to set it as you like it best.
 
That's the best documentation of the errors in the repo CPO I've seen. The detail in the original is so much better, but unfortunately, you really have no choice, the holes are unacceptable.

As for the side art...
I worked next to the guys who installed it on new machines. There never was any exact placement. It was always at the whim of the guy working that station on any given day, and I've seen it high and low.
In my opinion, it's too low in your photo. It should be about 6" higher. But again, since there is no definite placement, it's totally up to you to set it as you like it best.

Always take your word as gospel when it comes to DL. I'll tape it up 6" higher and see how it looks!
 
It looks low to me too... just because your eyes when you look at the game naturally go up a little higher than that since all the artwork on the front is the top half of the cabinet.. the way you have it, the words "Dragons Lair" would be way down at the control panel area, if it was a little higher it'd be a little more balanced.

Like you said though that's where they had it originally on that one, so there's no wrong answer really...
 
The poor quality of the repros (CPO and marquee) has been known for a long time now. But there are no better alternatives. Maybe one day ...
 
I'll bet it's a nightmare trying to recreate that, look at all the rgby or whatever they call it. You'd have to do it pixel by pixel to get it perfect.
 
The snake and the Dirk Heads ... just bad ... How did the creator miss the segment of the snake? Crazy.
 
yep.. but not gonna dog on the source. The scoreboard plexi is straight up the most beautiful repro'd piece I've ever seen. It is absolutely perfect in every way. VERY VERY HAPPY With that piece! 10/10 would order again.

but yeah, someone needs to redo the cp art...
 
Quarterarcade are good folks... just wondering about how that snake got by. Plus, I am not sure if Anthony actually had them done, or just acquired some stock.
 
Quarterarcade are good folks... just wondering about how that snake got by. Plus, I am not sure if Anthony actually had them done, or just acquired some stock.

Anthony acquired the stock and screens when he purchased Arcade Renovations from Phillipe. Not sure if he's still on that stock or if he's had more run, but either way, I don't believe it was a quality issue on his end, but the original artist that did it for Phillipe.
 
I have a Quarterarcade CPO also. When I got it, I returned it because the quality of the art wasn't as good as the original. Then I ended up ordering another one because at I decided that a new one at least looks cleaner. Now that the new CPO has been on for a while, the lesser quality of the art doesn't bother me anymore.
 
DL repro artwork were some of the FIRST repro art that was produced. Back then, the means to reproduce accurately might have been limited.

As FIZGIG (LOL) once remarked, it's about time we do a better scan of the CPO (and marquee).
 
Hey Nondrowsy...

The DL control panel overlay has a particular texture to it.
One thing I can't tell from pictures is the graininess of the material.

How does the repo "feel" compared to the original?
 
Had orginal cpo and side art from the auction so many years ago..
The orginal ones were given to John bush before he got banned from here.
I don't speak with him any more so they are considered lost..

The orginal side are never have bolt hold to my knowledge..
I might have a few pieces kicking around here but I wouldn't hold my breath..

Sorry. I tend to believe the crap people tell me. I know a lot better now..
 
I have to agree as I was also disappointed with both the CPO and Marquee art.

The texture seemed to be more pronounced on the repro vs an original OEM.

I did install the CPO on my game as as mentioned above eventually you begin to overlook the flaws. That being said I did have the opportunity to scan an OEM CPO a couple years back. Not sure it would be fair to Quarter Arcade to release it since they are still selling it (even if lower quality).

I did contact them back then as well and they didn't seem to be interested in the scan as they had a bunch just sitting on the shelf.
 
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