Getting Started

Welcome to my first classic arcade building attempt. Below are the steps I took to build it and the software used to get it running the what I visioned it to be. I did not want it to work like most MAME arcades, meaning that you need to start the games by a mouse or a keyboard. It needed to function by just the joystick and the buttons. I came across a front end to the MAME that did just that. As for the control panel I purchased an X-Arcade Tankstick. I did this for two reasons. First I signed up for X-Arcade news letter and in the first letter they had the Tankstick for $149.00 shipped to the house. That is a savings of $80.00. I priced out the parts, Happ equipment, and it way cheaper to buy the pre made control panel. The second reason was due to this was my first try at building an arcade and it was a big part of it would be done for me. The graphic I laid out in Photoshop and had it printed a Kinkos for $128.00. The total cost of this arcade was $368.00.

The MAME version that I decided to use was mame32u901. This version had a good balance for running the most game that I wanted to have on the arcade. The newer versions will not run the older roms, which include Pacman, Centipede, Defender, Ms. Pacman just to name a few. The real early versions will not run the newer fighting games that good graphics. After I got the MAME working properly I decided to put video gaming systems on the I have owned. These include Atari 2600, Nintendo NES, and Nintendo 64. The Nintendo 64 uses Nintendo 64 controllers via a USB to controller adapter. This makes the 64 games play as they were meant to be played. The kiosk unit the I used for the arcade came from my work. It did not work and it was being pitched in the trash. It doesn't look like a classic arcade but I still think it looks good. The guts of the unit is commercial products and are the best. It has a 17" monitor with a touch screen and the computer is a MSI P4 2.8 with 1gb of ram. The classic looking one will be my next project. I will be doing complete custom graphics for it including the control panel. I have some it done. Enough about that. Below are pictures of the steps I did. Click on any one of them to get a super size picture for more detail.

Building The Arcade

The Frontend to the Programs

The frontend is a software from Maximus Arcade and costs at this time $25.00. It work good but I would have done some changes so you could run more then one MAME at a time. This would allow you to run all the MAME games, new and old. It is easy to work with and adds a nice clean touch. It also allows to have ambience sound in the background. I chose to put arcade sounds. I got the files form the Arcade Ambience Project. There is about four hours of continuous sounds.

Games List

Here is a complete list of games that I have on the machine now. I tested all of them out.
MAME Arcade - 88 Games', 1941, 1942, 1943, 1944, 1945, Arlington Horse Racing, Asteroids, Tetris, Berlin Wall, Break Though, Buck Rogers,Battle Zone, Centipede, Crusin' USA, Crusin' World, Defender, Digdug, Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong 3, Donkey Kong Jr., Driving Force, Dragon Saber, Empire Strikes Back, Excitebike, Frogger, Football Champs, Galaga, Galaga 88, Galaxian, Ghouls and Ghosts, Got-cha, Golden Tee, High Impact Football, Space Invaders, Space Invaders II, Space Invaders 95, Joust, Joust 2, Lucky and Wild, Marble Madness, Mario, Millipede, Mini-golf, Missile Command, Sonic The Hedgehog, Mad Planets, Metal Slug 2, Metal Slug 3, Ms.Pacman, Multi-Five, Please Goal, Pole Position, Power Drive, Paperboy, Punch-out, Racing Hero, Raiden, RallyX, RBI Baseball, Super Breakout, Street Football, Simpson's, Saturday Night Slam, Snow Bros, Strata-Bowling, Street Hoops, Super Mario Brothers, Tapper, Tempest, Target Ball, TMNT, TMNT- Turtles in Time, Trivia Pursuit, Pinball, World Class Bowling, Xevious, X-Men VS Street Fighter, X-Men VS Capcom, Zaxxon.

Atari 2600 - Digital Clock, Tank Battle, Tank Plus (Sears), Basketball, Baseball, Football, Towering Inferno, Air and Sea Battle, HERO, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Space Invaders, Pacman, Frogger, Pitfall!, Euchre.

Nintendo NES - 10 Yard Fight, Adventures of the Magic Kingdom, Adventures of Lolo 1-2-3, After Burner, Air Fortress, Al Unser Jr Turbo Racing, Alien 3, All-pro Basketball, American Gladiator, Back to the Future 1-2-3, Bad Dudes vs Dragon Ninja, Banana Prince, Bases Loaded 1-4, Battle Tank, Battleship, Beetle Juice, Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, Blades of Steel, Bo Jackson Baseball, Boulder Dash, Bubble Bobble, Burgertime, Donkey Kong Classic, Double Dragon II, Duck, Excitebike, Galaga, Goal, Goonies II, Gremlins 2, Home Alone 1-2, Hoops, Hudson's Island, Hunt for Red October, Jaws, Lifeforce, Mario Classic, Mario, Mario 3, Mario Time Machine, Mario is Missing, Mike Tyson - Pouchout!, NES Open, Operation Wolf, Othello, Pacman, Peek-A Boo Poker, Pinball Quest, Platoon, Pokeman Green, Pokeman Blue, Power Blade, Pro Wrestling, Rad Gravity, RC ProAM, River City Ransom, Rocketman, Simpsons-Bart VS, Snow Bros, Space Invaders, Spy Hunter, Star Wars, Super Dodge Ball, Tecmo Bowl, Tecmo Cup, Temco Baseball, Temco Basketball, TMNT 1-2-3-4, Legends of Zelda 1-2, Top Gun 1-2, Track & Field 1-2, Volleyball, Wheel of Futune, Winter Games.

Nintendo 64 - 1080 Snowboarding, Airboard 64, Bomberman 64, California Speed, Castlevania, Centre Court Tennis, Conker's Bad Fur Day, Crusin' USA, Crusin' World, Destruction Derby 64, Disney's Donald Duck, Donkey Kong 64, Doom 64, Dr. Mario 64, Duke Nukem 64, Duke Nukem - Zero Hour, F-1 Pole Position 64, F-1 World Grand Prix, FIFA Soccer 64, F-Zero X, Goldeneye 007, GT 64, Hercules, NBA Courtside, Mahjong 64, Mario Golf 64, Mario Party, Mario Party 2, Mario Party 3, Mickey's Speedway, Midways Greatest Hits, Monopoly, Winter Olympics 98, Namco Museum, NBA Live 2000, NFL Blitz, NHL 99, NHL Blades of Steel 99, Rayman 2, Ready 2 Rumble, Road Rash 64, Rugrats, Snowboard Kids, Spiderman, Star Fox 64, Star Wars-Racers, Star Wars-Battle of Naboo, Super Mario 64, Super Smash Bros, Taz Express, The Legend of Zelda - Majora's Mask, The Legend of Zelda - Ocarina of Time, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 2, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3, Toy Story 2, Triple Play 2000, Turok-Dinosaur Hunter, Wave Racer 64, W. Gretzky's 3D Hockey, WCW Mayhem, Wheel of Fortune, Winback - Covert Operations, World Cup 98, WWF-War Zone.

Links

ROMs and Emulators - Doperoms - Romnation - Romhustler
Frontend - Maximus Arcade
Controls - X-Arcade - Ultimarc