Arcade Cabinet

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Pac-Man is pure nostalgia. With it comes memories of arcades:

– Putting quarters on the marquees of machines waiting a turn to play.

– Trying to stay on a game as long as possible to make that quarter last.

– Excitement when the newest technology was made available to the public.

For years, I wanted to own my own arcade machine. As a child, it was not possible because those machines were too expensive. As an adult, the space for a bunch of full-sized arcade machines is not easily available in my home. So, the logical conclusion – create a custom machine that can play multiple games.

MAME stands for Multi-Arcade Machine Emulator. With today’s technology, emulators are commonplace and is what powers the games in this cabinet project. For arcade parts, there are plenty of stores online, so obtaining the joystick and buttons was a breeze. The rest of the hardware came from old parts I had laying around. And to deal with the space concern, my wife and I reused a bunch of the woodworking tools we have purchased for the home and created a bartop arcade cabinet frame.

This project involved a great mix of software, hardware, and woodworking. Overall, it was awesome to complete.