Easy way to tell Galaga from Ms. Pac?

Ghostnuke

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Is there an easy way to distinguish Galaga cabinets from Ms. Pac cabinets?

Say you were looking at a cabinet that had been completely converted to something else, no distinguishing art or anything for either Galaga or Ms. Pac, but you know it's one or the other. How do you tell them apart? I know one has a higher location for the coin door, but I don't think I'd be able to spot that in the wild.
 
galaga will be MDF most likely , pac will be plywood. Not to mention the color of paint overspray on the inside.
 
Ok so we've got overspray color for sure, maybe wood type. Anything else? Anything that might be useful if I can't open it up?
 
don't know it's an easy way as you have to have an eye for what the profile of these cabs look like but they have a different slope from the point at the control panel area up.
 
The easiest way to tell, below the coin door, if there are 4 carriage bolt heads below it, it was a mspac. Mspac used a wire basket coin bucket holder that bolted on throught the Coin panel face, galaga used a shelf for the coin bucket.
 
The easiest way to tell, below the coin door, if there are 4 carriage bolt heads below it, it was a mspac. Mspac used a wire basket coin bucket holder that bolted on throught the Coin panel face, galaga used a shelf for the coin bucket.

Aha! I've been flipping tabs back and forth on your website trying to see differences in your repros. :p
 
Another way to tell: The Galaga PCB mounts in a holder on the bottom of the cab, while the Ms. Pac PCB mounts to the left wall where the original Galaga PS board mounts. So, if you have screw holes in the bottom with nothing there, it was probably a Galaga.

Also, I think they had different size back doors, didn't they?
 
I don't know if they're all this way, but the plastic handle inserts on the upper back side of my Ms. Pac have venting slots in them, whereas my Galaga's are solid, no holes or slots.
 
Pac

The coin door on a Galaga is a little higher than on Ms. Pac. About an inch. Also, The monitors are at a liittle different angle.
 
Galaga wasn't laminated, it was painted black. Every Galaga I've seen was MDF and the vast majority of MsPacs were plywood. Their profiles are the same but the Ms Pac coin door sits just a little lower on the front of the cabinet.

Wade
 
Are you sure thats paint? I thought it was the same laminate like they used on baby pac. This is why the top of the machines usually still have the plastic protective convering on them. It was there to protect the laminate during cutting and assembly.
 
Look at the marquee....:001_stongue:

But really, there should be some kind of overspray in the cab or sometimes the serial# tag is left stapled to the side.
 
Galaga was melamine laminate, you can also tell by the cab shape they are different. The upper front corners on Galaga will be a very tight radius almost a 90 degree bend, where as Ms Pac will be a larger radius curve.

Both will have black paint on the monitor surround area, as the laminate was only on the outside of Galaga, and the kick panel.

Ms Pac

IMAG0171.jpg


Galaga

IMAG0172.jpg
 
Ms Pacs are painted with off color blue paint w/full ms Pac side art. There is also a big Ms Pac on front under the coin door. The galaga is painted all black and has 2 galaga stickers on each side that say GALAGA. There is also a funny bug on the front under coin door,. I hope that helps.
 
Ms Pacs are painted with off color blue paint w/full ms Pac side art. There is also a big Ms Pac on front under the coin door. The galaga is painted all black and has 2 galaga stickers on each side that say GALAGA. There is also a funny bug on the front under coin door,. I hope that helps.

I am intrigued by your ideas, and wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
 
Is there an easy way to distinguish Galaga cabinets from Ms. Pac cabinets?

Say you were looking at a cabinet that had been completely converted to something else, no distinguishing art or anything for either Galaga or Ms. Pac, but you know it's one or the other. How do you tell them apart? I know one has a higher location for the coin door, but I don't think I'd be able to spot that in the wild.

PacMan is made out of plywood, Galaga is made out of cardboard.
 
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