The Willis Moon Patrol replacement control panel overlay does a great job relating the design to the game. The geometric shaped cockpit window looking over an arid moonscape almost gives you the feeling that your driving your lunar vehicle across hostile enemy terriotry. Another 6 color, die-cut, high quality overlay from Willis. This one has the P1 and P2 Willis men, along with the © 1983 by WILLIS ™ text logo. There is no part number, but it is identified as a “Willis replacement overlay – Moon Patrol” in the lower right corner. Rather odd as they hadn’t put labels on the previous years overlays. No part number would indicate that this particular overlay didn’t get distributed by Wico so the relationship may have already been over. As much as I like the original artwork on the Williams Moon Patrol control panel, I might just leave this one in place if I found it in the wild. My overlay is in great shape, just missing a few die-cut pieces. Not an easy overlay to find, but a great piece of arcade history.
From the original Tokens Only post dated 03-18-2013
Willis Moon Patrol cpo
So here we have the Willis Moon Patrol control panel overlay. It has all the quality features I’ve come to expect from a Willis product, with die-cut control openings, reverse screen printing and 3M paper backing; they even made a good effort on the artwork. Granted its not the Williams Moon Patrol cpo, but it has some interesting features. The Willis Moon Patrol cpo attempts to create the perspective that you’re in the seat of some lunar vehicle, driving your way across the moons craggy surface. With the sun setting in the distance, you’ve just embarked on some great adventure across this alien terrain. Not buying it?
Then lets just say that it’s much better than some of the bootleg pieces I’ve seen, especially this one – bad bootleg moon patrol cpo – and leave it at that. (old dead link)
Of course we’d prefer to restore our Williams Moon Patrol control panel with an original NOS overlay, but those are becoming harder to find and even when you do find one it’s not always in the best shape. You could look for a suitable reproduction, but heck, this Willis Moon Patrol replacement cpo just might do the trick. Plus it has the famous Willis “player” men and lots of attention to detail. Back in 1983 when this replacement overlay was released it would have worked just fine for the operator trying to make a living off quarters. It would have cost much less than an OEM replacement and done just as good a job making the machine look new again. Sort of. Maybe I won’t be able to convince you that this Willis Moon Patrol cpo is worthy of adorning your prized Williams classic, but at least we can agree that it is a cool piece of arcade history.
My example of the Willis Moon Patrol cpo is in pretty nice shape, missing most of the die-cuts, but otherwise clean and without significant damage. The colors are still bright and the text is crisp and like new, almost as if it just rolled off the press in 1983. A better decade for sure! This one gets stashed away in the vault. If you have any information about Willis Industries or would just like to comment about the artwork they produced, drop me a line I’d love to talk Willis!
Not much has changed since I first posted about this overlay over 10 years ago! It’s one of my favorite replacement overlays as it has a lot of character and relates well to the game. I’ve never seen one on a cabinet, so if you have, please share!
