My arcade system started as an idea about 2 years ago. Back then I knew about this program called Mame that could emulate (play) older arcade games on the pc, but I had no clue how truly indepth it actually was. After about 3 1/2 months of playing around with MAME on my main pc, with a keyboard and mouse I realized that this just wasn't cutting it. After this realization and doing some snooping around the MAME control settings I realized that there had to be a better way.

Now this is where all the fun really began. I started doing countless hours of searching through google and other sites looking at different examples of how other people had taken a traditional pc and turned it into something completely different. They were using real arcade controls, creating real arcade style enclosures and running not just MAME but up to 10 different emulators on the same system. So I thought hey, how hard can this really be.

Well another 3 moths of research later I had a good idea of the hardware and software I would need to get together to get this project up and running, then all it took was a trip to http://www.ultimarc.com/ to purchase the needed hardware. A few days later I had everything i needed to get started, oh yeah and multiple trips to home depot.

In this picture we have the basic frame of the system built you can also get a good idea of where the name massive MAME came from the system is nearly 6 1/2 feet tall.

Here is the side view of the basic frame as we were mocking up the mount for the control panel.

Here we have the control panel mounts mocked up and the tv mounted in place also.

Here is a view of the wiring of the control panel. all buttons and joysticks are wired into an i-pac board then the i-pac connects to the pc via a keyboard connector.

In this picture we have the control panel, computer, and television mounted and everything is up and running.

First run and ofcoarse what better game to start out with then the one and only pac-man.

This is how the system sits now. There are a few small things that need to be finished, the marque, an upgraded paint job, at some point I would love to add a track ball and light guns too.

This project so far has been alot of fun and now that it's up and running it's finally time to enjoy all the games. If you are thinking of building an arcade system for yourself and have any questions regarding hardware or software feel free to contact me via e-mail at the link below or just hit the contact button. I also have to praise the work of my friend jack who actually built the wooden structure. Without his help I would probably have ended up with a computer, tv and some joysticks and buttons sitting on a desk.
Josh