Lately I have been looking at arcade machines for home use….I had no idea of all the variations and price differences in arcade cabinets, but there are some incredible option out there.

There are 2 main kinds of arcade machines – Upright and Cocktail and each of those can have either a PC or a JAMMA board (basically a circuit board with a built in hard drive) running the games…below is an example:

(Upright on the left, Cocktail on the right)

If you can afford one of these machines it is a great way to relive your childhood gaming memories and if you go for the JAMMA board option they will sometimes come with just over 1000 games already loaded so you can plug in and get started straight away, but this makes it much harder to load new games, and buying new JAMMA boards is quite expensive.

I have decided to go with the Arcade-X machine as this will house a Playstation, Xbox and Nintendo as well as a PC and will also double as a TV. This way I can upgrade it myself and load my own games onto the PC, using front-end software called Maximus Arcadewhich costs about $20.

There are some very cool variations as well as the standard ones such as:

• The Arkeg – An arcade machine with a built in beer tap
• The Defender – A stand-up cabinet with a huge 32″ screen
• The Stealth – A designer cocktail cabinet

Of course if this is too expensive an option, you can buy a starter kit and put in your own TV and PC, these kits start at around $400 and can be purchased from places like Arcade Direct. There are also hundreds of books and designs you can download if you want to attempt to build one yourself.

I will upload pictures when I have mine up and running….it will probably be mid next year.

*Images from Ubercoolhome & Arcade Gaming Australia

Chris Thursfield