School Arcade Machine Project

[AHsta]

Hi, thanks for reading this

I'm making a video game arcade machine as part of my A-level product design at school. I've already designed most of it but I've got to the final part of designing and realised there's a few details I've left out but I'm struggling with it and thought I could use a few outside opinions.

There's some things I'm not sure how to approach. For example, I know nothing at all wiring electronics and programming, but I have a list of electronic features and components I want to include in the machine. My machine is going to be a small one, desktop size, with two sets of controls so that two players can use it at the same time (or one player as well). I am most likely to take an old desktop monitor and use it as the screen. I want to have 4 speakers in the machine that will be able to play game audio but also the user's own music if they plug their phone in with an AUX cord, LED lights, joysticks and buttons, and USB ports. I'm not sure how to do the wiring, or deal with the electric side of things at all. I assume I will use raspberry pi just because that's what I've been led to believe I should use, but I was wondering if any people more experienced and knowledgeable than me had any other suggestions?

Thanks everyone again for reading

[fallacy]

Your asking pretty basic questions you should not ask until you do some research yourself. People have been doing this hobby for almost 15 years I am sure you can find one or two things out there; going to school 

[PL1]

The FAQ is a great place to start.

Since the wiki is still down, you can find a backup copy here.

https://web.archive.org/web/20160809113045/http://newwiki.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?title=FAQ


Scott

[AHsta]

Thanks PL1, do you know where I would be able to find out which games require which controls/emulators?

[PL1]

Thanks PL1, do you know where I would be able to find out which games require which controls/emulators?

Since you're leaning toward a Raspberry Pi, there are "preloaded" RetroPie images out there that have the emulators and ROMs installed and configured.

Unfortunately, we can't tell you how or where to find them (or even hint) because of Rule 5, but most of them are really easy to use.

If you want to know what controls a particular game uses, check out sites like gamesdatabase.org or arcade-history.com.


Scott