My kids love the game and it looks great next to Mad Planets, so I’m going to have to get a jump on my project this Spring. If you spent any time at an arcade growing up, the Q*bert sounds are very unique and instantly recognizable. How could you forget?

Thanks to Jeff of rotheblog I was able to connect with the man responsible for the Q*bert sounds, Mr. David Thiel. He participated in a great little chat session which is archived over at coinopspace, a classic arcade game forum, check it out! Sound is David’s business and he’s still very active in gaming sound, recently doing work for Stern Pinball. To hear some of his work you can visit his site at daudioguy. Let’s get back to the game.

Keeping Jason’s game for awhile allowed me to send out his marquee for a nice little thank you surprise. David Thiel was kind enough to autograph it for Jason, making this Q*bert just a little more special. I know Jason is a big fan of the game and I hope he continues to enjoy this classic for many years to come. Hop on!

I had never heard of Enviro-graphics, or known about artwork packages that operators could use to decorate their arcade. I was too busy finding my next quarter for that new game, or waiting for the 6 tokens for $1 special at Aladdin’s Castle, who paid attention to the décor? I suppose I do recall the way many of the arcades looked back in the day and the atmosphere did contribute to the overall memory. So perhaps Willis had a good idea. Token signs, out of order signs, score boards, event schedules, specials, rules…all things the operator needed to communicate with his customers. The random space scene posters remind me more of the stuff some stoner would put on his walls to light with black lights and listen to purple haze. Probably not the best idea for a family oriented venue. The brochure states that the posters were directly screened onto 1/8″ thick foam board, which is probably why so few (if any) survive today.

One thing I noticed is the apparent change in relationship between Willis and Wico around the time this stuff was being produced. If you recall my post about the partnership they shared, apparently it didn’t last or just wasn’t working out. Whatever the reasons, the brochure above is a lot different from the unopened one you see below. Dated September 10, 1982 it has the Wico name and distributor information prominently displayed. A few additional pieces of artwork can also be seen on the back. The almost identical brochure above has all traces of the Wico name removed and “Now operators can buy direct from Willis”. Interesting move and even before the industry crash really took hold. If you can shed any light on this relationship or if you have a Willis Enviro-Graphics poster you’d like to sell, let me know.

I neglected to take a couple of before pictures to show the nasty grime covering these three G07 chassis, but we’ve all seen similar parts. Any arcade pcb’s that have been sitting around in a warehouse for 20 plus years are bound to be covered with crud. Makes it hard to see what you’re working on when trying to do repairs and sometimes a standard cleaning just doesn’t do the trick. So into the dishwasher they go!

I put three chassis’ into the dishwasher on normal heat settings with no detergent of any kind. I did give them a quick spray of simple green to loosen things up a bit. As you can see the parts came out very clean. Not 100% showroom floor clean, but so much better now that I can actually read the print on the pcb.

After the dishwasher process I used some compressed air to blow out the obvious pockets of water and then I let the three chassis sit on a wire shelf in the laundry room to dry. The heat from the dryer got them nice and dry in no time, but I still let them sit for several days. Next step is to do some rebuilding and see if I can get them working. Only issue I had was the “warm electronics” smell left in the dishwasher after the pcbs had been in there. Not a huge deal, but I had to run it again to get the smell out.

This marquee is reverse screened on glass and in great shape overall, with none of the typical flaking frequently seen when artwork is printed on glass. It was a little difficult to photo graph and even harder to scan. The reflective quality of the glass was creating some weird shadows during the scanning process making the scans worthless. Anyway, a nice marquee for a great game.

The artwork and color scheme on that game exude 70’s funk and I love it. The cp artwork was originally screened right onto the metal panels, just like on Asteroids and Missile Command. Unfortunately that means when it wears off, its gone forever. So besides being a replacement overlay and not a metal panel, the Willis piece just doesn’t fit well with the Atari cabinet artwork. Sure, the big “football” and a bunch of football players make it obvious what game its for, but so boring. Still has all the earmarks of a quality Willis piece and makes a nice addition.

Besides lacking all of the usual clues that identify a Willis overlay (can you name them all yet?), it is one flimsy piece of art. Cheaply made and probably one of the thinnest overlays I have in the archive. It is really just a stiff piece of paper with adhesive on the back. This overlay is also excessively large and while I’m OK with the simple geometric pattern, something more creative than a mirror image could have been done. Doing a quick test fit on the control panel of a similar Atari cabinet reveals that much of the artwork would be lost under the bottom of the panel, or trimmed away for proper fit. Perhaps it was made this large to accommodate a variety of cabinets. Regardless, it’s a bootleg whose origins will probably never be known. If you have any pictures of this installed on a cabinet or if you know any additional history, drop me a line!

Now I’m not saying that it’s super fantastic or anything, it just works well and looks better than the original in this case. Quality materials, die-cut button holes, part numbers and copyright info all in place. Another piece for the archive.

The original control panel overlay was reverse printed on a thick piece of plexi which made it quite durable but prone to scratching or graffiti. The reproduction was made in the same way Willis made all their products, reverse printed on lexan material with 3M adhesive. Quality production, with part number and copyright info, but too far removed from the feel of the original cpo. Another problem is the nose picking girl. I can’t imagine that when this piece of artwork was reviewed before production, no one caught that slight little problem? I mean it looks like she’s about to dig for gold. Add the hokey overall appearance of all the artwork combined and you get one dog of an overlay. Unfortunately this was a popular game and the reproduction overlay was likely made in mass quantity, spreading the horror over the greater collecting community. It will be added to the artwork archive, preserving the history one piece at a time.

I don’t really remember if the games were ever on during that time in the construction, but I doubt I would have had time to play them anyway. It was a short visit and I had a lot to get do.