Vectrex Overlays as EPS
Due to an article in one of the last retro gamer issues, I got hooked to old Vectrex. I remembered that I got one down in my basement – a guy at my university once gave it to me along with a couple of other computer stuff. This is the big adavantage, when many people know that you collect old hardware: Some times you hit the big bargain.
After digging it out of my basement and undsuting it, I noticed that the joystickport hat been strippen in favour of some loose wires rising out of the ugly hole. I soldered in a new port but still two buttons are not working. The PCB looked as if someone who has never ever used a soldering iron tried to fix it. As far as I could track down the lines, everything should work, but I am not very skilled when it comes to electronics. So I decided to go for a functional vectrex from ebay. As I already got two controllers and did not care much about the mint/boxed versions I got one for 30 Euros (and it was a good one too – no buzzing noise when turned on). Games! Where can I get games? I had Scramble, but with no Overlay. Once more ebay had salvation to my needs.
Figuring that those games are pretty expensive I was thinking about getting a multicart, but what about those cool overlays. Without em, it is only half the experience. I checked the web hoping to find some decent scans of those overlays, but the only thing I got where some ugly gif images, in low-res available for some emulators. So I sat down and reworked those I bought at ebay, so far. Herer they are; all shiny vector drawings, scaleable without any loss. I haven’t tried to build one for myself, as I got the originals and printing them on transparencyfilm, cutting out the back and laminate it all is quite a lot of work, as you can see on Marks page. If you feel like doing it, drop me a note and tell me how long it took you.
At the moment I am rather back on other things but if you like to see more reworked vector overlays you can drop me note, try to cheer me up on it or just send me original overalys to work with.
I just scanned in Star Castle (front and back) at 300 doing with the intent of vectorizing it. Any tips you can offer?
Not really. You just have to know your tools. I for one use Illustrator. Usually I start with putting the image on layer and lock it. On the next layer, I start tracing the outlines by hand, with the pen tool and then I just pick the color with the idropper tool. that’s about it. It is wise to use multiple layers and kind of put things on different layers in complicated areas. Make up your mind first, what part is above the other and start with the one in back and work to the front.