There are many ways to play retro games on your computer or your big flat TV but nothing compares with an arcade machine.
RetroPie is an OS that turns your Raspberry Pi into a retro-gaming console and I decided to build an arcade cabinet using my spare Raspberry Pi. The designs I found were bulky and ugly and started designing my own bartop cabinet for 2 players.
There are standard buttons layouts for arcade machines but the buttons’ distance seemed too big for my fingers. I designed a layout that would fit better for my hands and drilled the MDF wood that hosts all the buttons. There is one joystick and 6 buttons for each player. Also I added START and SELECT buttons for each player and 2 extra buttons for other functions.
I ordered most of the parts from ebay. I chose illuminated arcade buttons. They require a little more pressure but they are fine if you remove the internal spring. It is possible to connect them on the GPIO pins but many testers have been reported lag issues. The best way is to use USB encoders. Each button is connected on a terminal and each encoder is connected on the Raspberry Pi with a USB cable.
There is a power inlet on one side of the cabinet with 3 switches, one main switch, one switch for the monitor and one switch for the leds. In the interior of the cabinet I mounted a project box to cover all the cables connected to mains for safety reasons. Also I added 2 USB female sockets on the front allowing me to connect external gamepads.
I used a 19″ monitor. The aspect ratio is 4:3 which is ideal for old school games. After removing the plastic frame I soldered some cables where the old monitor buttons were and used new buttons for the LCD. I attached these buttons below the marquee. I used white acrylic sheet for the illuminated marquee. The light comes from a short led strip. The sound is produced by a PAM8610 stereo amplifier module.
