We recently printed some side art and a marquee for a game we’ve never heard of. Check out Ross’s Bank Panic arcade restoration below:
“As for this restoration, it was actually the very first restore I’ve done on a machine, and it was a full out complete restore, as I originally had zero parts on hand. I had to source out every single part individually, over a good chunk of time. I had a feeling I was going to need to get measurements and scratch build my own cabinet, since they’re so rare. Luckily, around that same time, a fellow Klov member happened to be selling the cabinet (it was converted to Arkanoid), but he was located all the way in Wisconsin (I’m in Massachusetts). But I knew I had to get it because who knows how many years I’d have to wait for a closer one. So I jumped on it and had it shipped out here. Since the game was converted to an Arkanoid, I had to completely deconvert it.
Now that I finally had the cabinet, I needed the following – Bezel, marquee, control panel, control panel overlay, correct joystick, another monitor, PCB, and side art. Unfortunately none of the artwork has ever been reproduced for this game, so it took a while to either get scans or scan things myself. Probably the biggest obstacle was getting a correct metal control panel, as I knew it would be virtually impossible to find an original Bank Panic CP. Luckily, Root Beer Tapper uses the same exact size and shape control panel (A Bank Panic cabinet is very similar to that of Tapper, but has a few differences). Since the button layout is different, I had to fill in certain holes and drill six new holes to line up perfectly to the Bank Panic overlay. This was very nerve wracking, but I’m very satisfied with the way it came out 🙂
If you’re interested in reading about more of the smaller details on this, I created a thread on klov with lots of pictures and the step by step progress that I made on the restore. http://forums.arcade-museum.com/showthread.php?t=353232
As for why the game is special to me – It’s funny, because I had never played Bank Panic when I was younger. I’m pretty local to FunSpot in NH, and as a kid we would always spend summers up in Laconia, so we visited FunSpot a lot. I still try to make it up there maybe 6 times a year or so. There’s always your “go-to” games up there, and things don’t change much as far as the game lineups. When I’m there I always try to get in a game of Amidar. I know it’s not a popular game, but I like it. Bank Panic is directly behind Amidar, and every time I would play Amidar I would always hear this catchy – almost annoying music repeatedly on the attract mode sound, coming from a different game. And I would always think to myself “what the hell is that game?!”. And I guess it never intrigued me enough to actually find out, and once my game of Amidar was over I’d move on to something else. But one of the days, a few years ago, it was time to finally find out! And there sat Bank Panic. A game I must have walked past a hundred times and never thought twice about. I always liked things with “wild-western” type themes, which this game had. I put in a quarter, tried it out, and it was one of those games where instantly I thought to myself “I need to have this!”. That doesn’t happen to me much. I know some collectors will buy literally any game that’s for sale for the right price. For me, however, I only collect the ones that I absolutely love. The game is a really addictive and fast-paced reaction type game. And the button layout is different than most games as well, which I like. I also now don’t think the music is annoying, haha (during game play at least – with the attract mode sound on it becomes a little much). And now it’s probably in my top three favorite games ever. I personally think the game is criminally underrated, however, I know it came out in a terrible time for arcade machines (late 84- beginning of 85). So I’m just happy to own one 🙂 And or course a special thanks to you for helping me with the marquee and side art!”
-Ross
