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Arcade1Up is a computer hardware production company that specializes in the production of working 3/4 scale arcade video games using modern components and emulation.

Arcade1Up was established as a subsidiary of Tastemakers, Inc. in 2018 by its CEO Scott Bachrach. In June 2017, Bachrach had been involved in a meeting discussing the growing interest in retrogaming. The topic of retro arcade gaming had come up, and while the members had identified efforts to recreate arcade cabinets, these typically cost thousands of U.S. dollars and were heavy, a form that would not be suitable for smaller consumers at home or offices, or use in locations like arcade bars.

Arcade1Up opted for crafting 3/4-scale versions of arcade cabinets as to make them more amendable to fit into homes and businesses.fiberboard frame components for the cabinet"s sides including stickers for the game marquees, a 17" LCD screen, controller panel, and emulation hardware and power componentry to run the game.MSRP of about $250 through major retailers and Arcade1Up"s own website.

In June 2020, Arcade1Up in partnership with Zen Studios announced the first in its line of 3/4th-scale replica pinball machines, using Zen Studios" pinball video game software played out on a monitor. Zen Studios, which had already acquired licenses to develop pinball tables based on Marvel and light gun games, starting with

In October 2020, Arcade1Up successfully completed a Kickstarter for its Infinity Table, a table with a built-in touchscreen programmed for numerous board and card games, including several licensed from Hasbro, based on the same design principles behind their arcade cabinet reconstructions.

The continued rising interest in retrogaming helped Arcade1Up to strong sales, and by May 2020 they had sold their one millionth unit. They also saw a large surge in sales at the COVID-19 pandemic started in March 2020, forcing many people to be quarantined at home and turning to video games as a pastime. From March to May 2020, sales had grown on average of 96% week-over-week.

At CES 2022, Arcade1up announced a new line of full-sized cabinets, matching the size of classic arcade game chassis. These replicas include 19" screens and new SuzoHapp controls which were common for original arcade games.

I’ve long wanted an arcade machine in my home. And for the first time ever, that dream feels attainable. That’s due to the relatively affordable Arcade1Up machines that repackage classic games into slightly smaller cabinets.

These are three-fourths scale replicas with a 17-inch LCD monitor. Arcade1Up officially licenses classics like Rampage and Super Street Fighter II: Turbo, and each of its different arcade cabinets come with a collection of games and the appropriate controls for its bundle. For example, you can get a machine that includes Asteroids, Tempest, Major Havoc, and Lunar Lander that has a spinner control.

The Arcade1Up machines do not cost thousands of dollars. They are inexpensive imitations of the real thing. That means they don’t weigh a lot, they don’t use CRT monitors, and they’re not going to use name-brand buttons and joysticks.

The Arcade1Up cabinets have the striking look you want from arcade hardware. They have the flashing attract-mode screens that draw your eye from across a room. And the chassis itself uses wood and not plastic, so it doesn’t look like a toy.

If you want the full, stand-up arcade experience, Arcade1Up does sell a separate riser that brings the cabinet up to full height. But I haven’t felt the need for that.

Arcade1Up is using some cheap components. Specifically, the joysticks feel like they’re going to give out and stop springing back into place after a few weeks. Even when they’re operating as they should, they just don’t have the bounce back that I would like to feel. They get the job done, but that’s about the best I can say. And if they do stop working, you can get higher-quality replacements from Chinese manufacturers on Amazon at a fair price.

The biggest issue with the Arcade1Up is that, eventually, it’s probably just going to sit untouched in the corner. I would make sure that you get a unit that has games that you are interested in returning to regularly. The Street Fighter unit seems especially nice if you have friends who come over regularly.

With that said, I would make sure that you’re OK with getting an Arcade1Up as a decoration. Think of it as putting a jukebox in your home. You’ll probably still play music from your modern stereo system, but it’s cool to have the jukebox to create an atmosphere. The Arcade1UP is excellent at doing the same thing. And then, if someone new comes over, I’m always willing to hop on and play more Gauntlet.

So who is the Arcade1Up for? It’s not for enthusiasts, unless you’re big into modding. If you want to get an Arcade1Up to have a compact cabinet for your Raspberry Pi setup, then go for it. It’s great for that. But if you’re big into the history of arcades or you’ve already built your own machine, you don’t need this.

Instead, I think the Arcade1Up is for families. If you are looking for a big-ticket item for the holidays or a birthday, the Arcade1Up has the potential to fill that role. If you want to put something else in the finished basement next to the foosball table, this is it.

Have you purchased an Arcade1Up and wished you could play more games than the 2-4 games that came on it? You can, by replacing most of the electronics with a Raspberry Pi! You could also use an old PC that you might already have sitting around gathering dust which actually performs better and can emulate more systems, but a Raspberry Pi running RetroPie is a simple low power solution, and you can rely on the experiences of others that have already figured out how to set this up to be extremely user friendly. If you do go the PC route, I recommend taking a look at the Hyperspin or LaunchBox/BigBox front end for MAME. However for this article, I will cover using Raspberry Pi and RetroPie.

Not all Arcade1Up machines are ideal for all mods. There are two different screen orientations, portrait and landscape. In most cases you would want to use a landscape cabinet so that you can maximize the screen space. In addition, if you don"t want to buy or build a completely custom control deck and drill your own holes, potentially messing up the original artwork and plexiglass, you will want either the Street Fighter 2, Mortal Kombat II, or Marvel cabinet which all contain a joystick and 6 buttons each for 2 players. Vertical cabinets would look nice for vertical games such as Pac Man, Centipede, Donkey Kong, Frogger, and Q-Bert, but any landscape games would be fairly small, and of course the lack of buttons on the vertical cabs can be limiting.

In order to convert your Arcade1up to a Raspberry Pi machine you will need:Raspberry Pi 3 B+ (This includes WiFi, Bluetooth, and is the fastest Pi that currently supports RetroPie. No case is necessary since it will be mounted in your cabinet anyway). They are made by many vendors so shop around for the best price because they can fluctuate. You can also buy a kit with a case and power adapter included. You can use a Raspberry Pi 3, but the processor is slower and it will struggle with newer games. The 3b+ can play most games made to the mid 90s comfortably, but not games with 3D polygons. For those more modern games you need the power of a PC. The Raspberry Pi 4 is available now, but the community has not yet optimized the RetroPie software to run on it, so I would avoid it for now.

LCD HDMI controller logic board such as this one. Make sure the one you order supports the model number on the back of your LCD screen. Some are different (such as Marvel) and require different boards.

Unscrew the metal box on the back of the LCD and disconnect the cables and unscrew the ground wire. Screw the ground into the corner of the HDMI board and reconnect the cables to it. Find a good spot to secure the board to avoid stress on the wires. On my machine, the cables were very short, so I ended up adding a shelf in the inside to mount this to. Avoid having this board making direct contact to the metal housing of monitor. The original 12v power adapter will connect to this new board to power the screen. You can connect any HDMI device that is handy at this point to test that the screen shows a picture.

If you have a button kit with LED buttons, you will either have a daily chain wire (old style) to supply power to all the buttons or each button will have a 3 wire connector (new style). If you have the daisy chain type, tape the extra connectors with electrical tape to keep them from touching each other. If they touch, they can cause the LEDs to not light up. This will connect to one of the red ports on the USB board for power. I prefer the daisy chain style because it gives you more flexibility on button placement with longer wires. You can use some of the original Arcade1Up wiring for the input wires this way and many of those have longer wires. If needed, you can splice the input wires to combine them and add length. These LED buttons can supply power even if your computer is off. If you want them to turn off completely when not in use, you will need to turn off the power strip altogether or wire up your own switch for them. On the Pi, they do turn off when the Pi is shutdown.

There are some pre-built images out there that you can download and install that may have many of the following procedures done for you. The drawback to using a prebuilt image is you may not like they way they set things up, since many were configured for widescreen monitors and added digital bezels, and some added fancy menus that make it difficult to find the games you want. The rest of these steps are assuming you starting from a stock RetroPie image.

Download the Retropie image and one of the recommended tools such as Etcher to flash your micro SD card. It will take a few minutes of time to flash the image with Etcher. Once complete you will not be able to view the filesystem on your computer, this is normal. Remove the card and insert it into your Pi and connect the power. If your screen is connected correctly, you will see the Pi boot sequence and it will launch Emulation Station.

If you are modding a cabinet with a vertical screen, such as Space Invaders, Pac Man, or Galaga, your screen is mounted vertically and RetroPie will be showing sideways. You will have to deal with this for a bit to map your buttons, then we can exit Emulation Station and fix this with a keyboard.

The possibilities are almost endless when modding your Arcade1Up. Besides modding the hardware and software, you can also make cosmetic mods, to replace the stock marquee with a lit marquee, add artwork to the otherwise plain front plates and riser, replace all the artwork to a different game not made by Arcade1Up, add new controls like trackballs, spinners, steering wheels, and USB ports for additional joysticks for 4 player action. Since I started this article, I started a new project to build a driving cab with a steering wheel and a PC. I may cover this in a future article.

Are you ready to hop in a time machine back to 1996? Well, unfortunately, that"s still not possible, but the Taito Egret II Mini can at least bring back some of those memories. This compact version of the original Egret II totes all its features, including that wild rotating screen. Plus, you get access to 40 games already loaded in and ready to play on a device under nine inches high and six inches wide.

It"s easy enough to see the appeal of having a throwback arcade machine in your home. But, old technology had a tendency toward being big and bulky. Cabaret models keep the design a bit more on the svelte side, and that"s the case here with the Arcade1UP Galaga Arcade Machine.

The games are displayed on a 4.25” LCD screen and controls include a miniature joystick (which you can screw off for a regular D-Pad) and arcade buttons. Plus, the authentic Data East design on the cabinet is pretty rad. Big things really do come in small packages. MyArcade also has a MiniPlayer dedicated to Namco"s classic collection if you"d rather play games like PacMan and Galaga.

The NEOGEO Mini Arcade is tiny and features a 3.5-inch LCD screen. If you want to blow up that picture on your TV, there is an emulation system that requires a mini HDMI to connect. You also have a free-moving joy stick and several buttons on the cabinet for getting into the action, though they are a bit cramped together. For less uncomfortable gameplay, there’s an optional controller that plugs into the USB-C. This extra controller is necessary if you want to play two-player games. Overall, the NEOGEO Mini Arcade is a relatively inexpensive console that offers a fun way to play some of your favorite classics.

But amazingly, this little wonder plays the full and original Space Invaders on an even tinier screen. The controls work great, too. It"s small enough to serve as a little novelty decoration on your office desk, and you don"t need to let anyone else in the office know that you can actually play on it when you need a quick mental break from work.

Priced under $600, you get 2 sets of robust controls that will get you kicking, punching, blocking, and running. The real feel, full-size joysticks labeled with moves for Mortal Kombat II have a nice response and the games play just like they used. Although this unit has an LCD screen rather than CRT, there isn"t any smearing or ugly ghost effects. Everything looks as crisp and colorful as the original games were down to the pixelated blood squirts. If you"re ready to take a leap back in time and help Raiden defend the Earthrealm, save your quarters and grab this cabinet.

The PSP gaming system features a slim, light and portable design with a huge, ultra-crisp LCD screen so you can play hundreds of games, view movies, read digital comics, browse the Internet and more. Get the stunning graphics and entertainment of a console whenever and wherever you want!

Experience incredible gameplay featuring real 3D graphics with no need for special glasses. This breakthrough in portable entertainment showcases a 3D screen, 3D Depth Slider which allows you to control the 3D graphics to meet your needs, a motion sensor and gyro sensor which bring motion to the gaming experience.

Upon announcement of the Arcade1up replica arcade cabinets earlier this year, many laid in waiting for the day they could see a teardown. A four foot tall cab with an LCD outputting the proper 4:3 aspect ratio and the simple construction of IKEA furniture certainly seemed appealing. In theory, it wouldn’t take long to customize such a piece of hardware provided the internals lent themselves to that sort of thing. Now that the cabinets are on store shelves, [ETA Prime] made a tutorial video on his method for upgrading the Arcade1up cabinet with a Raspberry Pi calling the shots.

The entirety of the mod is solder-free and uses plenty of readily available parts from your favorite online reseller. The brains of the operation is a Raspberry Pi 3 Model B+ running Emulation Station. The Arcade1up Street Fighter 2 cabinet’s less than stellar audio receives an upgrade in a 2x20W car audio amp, while the middling joysticks are swapped out for some more robust Sanwa-clone ball tops.

Since there is no “select/coin” button natively, [ETA Prime] added some and in the process replaced them all with beefier LED-lit 30mm buttons. The replacement joysticks and buttons were all part of a kit, so they plug-in conveniently to a plug and play USB encoder. To adapt the 17″ LCD’s output over LVDS, [ETA Prime] elected to go with an LCD controller board that outputs DVI, VGA, or HDMI. Luckily the Arcade1up cabinet’s 12V power supply could be reused to power the LCD controller board and in the process bring down the overall cost of the upgrade.

While this Arcade1up cabinet mod won’t solve the whole “bats versus ball tops” argument, it does provide a template to build on. The tutorial video is below and the list of parts used can be found in the YouTube description.

gameplay, artwork and joystick configuration. Custom riser boosts the height of your Arcade1Up machine to standing height. Place your cabinet on this riser with Pac-Man graphics to make the controls at the correct height for stand-