Thinking of building your own Arcade Machine?

If you’re looking for arcade parts for your DIY arcade machine you have come to the right place. Austin Amusements is based in Peakhurst Sydney N.S.W and deliver arcade parts Australia wide. Whether your building a MAME, JAMMA or Raspberry PI based arcade gaming machine or updating your Arcade1Up machine to have more games, we will have the parts you need.

Austin Amusements stocks a large range of arcade machine parts to suit industry and home users. With over 20 years of industry experience we are here to help. We also offer a repair service from our Peakhurst warehouse or on location. Contact Austin Amusements for prices and free quote. If you’re not located in Sydney we can point you in the right direction to technicians in your state

If you have found yourself on our website interested in buying a new or second hand arcade machines we can also help. We might have that old machine your looking for in stock or can source it for you, plus many of our wholesale customers build new arcade machines and sell them Australia wide.

Austin Amusements is also an admin member of the Facebook group “Arcade and Pinball Machines for Sale Australia”. Everyone living in Australia is welcome to join! The group is for buying and selling amusement machine related items such as pinball machines, arcade machines, parts and advertising related services.  It’s also a great group for help, if you need assistance with your machine fault, finding parts or anything related to Pinball and Arcade Machines ask the group. The great is full of arcade and pinball machine enthusiasts who are available to help. They may also be able to help you find that elusive arcade or pinball machine you have been searching for. Members are happy to help!

Building your own Arcade Machine.

There are many different styles of arcade machines and everyone has their favourite machine they remember playing when they were a child. My favourite game was Wonder Boy and I remember playing this a lot at my local milk bar when I was in primary school. I’m also a fan of the Turtles, Street Fighter and Simpsons machines, and the Hankin table tops. I have one of these at home!

If you have decided to build a DIY arcade machine the first step is to decide what style of machine you would like to build. Is it going to be an original design or your own custom version?

For cabinet plans and graphics google the name of the cabinet you're looking for and ‘plans’ or try ‘CNC arcade machine plans’. You can also try websites such as ClassicArcadeCabinets.Com they have a great selection of arcade cabinet plans for free. They ask you to make a donation to help with running costs of the website if you choose to pay. It’s a great website and it would be great to donate once you have used and build your cabinet. Any amount small or large helps websites link these continue.

Decals, we use a local printer in Peakhurst but once you have selected your design you can get them printed by most sign writers or printers in your local area. Again, ask the FaceBook group “Arcade and Pinball Machines for Sale Australia” with recommendations of where to buy them in your State or Territory. Someone is sure to help!

The next step is to decide what type of machine you’re going to build. Will it be JAMMA, MAME with a computer setup or built using a Raspberry PI. This decision may need to be based on what games you wanted to play and the usability.

 JAMMA, there is a range of Multi Game JAMMA boards available, you just need to check the games lists to see if the game boards have the games you are after. JAMMA is universal wiring, (slight modification for multi boards, but you can buy a multi board JAMMA harness and it is done for you, so no soldering modifications required) so you can change the game board with ease in the future if you find something different or better. JAMMA is relatively easy to wire, the game board manuals have the pin outs or you can google JAMMA harness wiring. You can also find many instructional videos on Youtube. JAMMA arcade machines are recommended for people with young children as they are simple to use and play, less complex for young children to use.

MAME systems, there are so many games available. Most of the arcade games you can think of will be available, including console games, playstation, Sega Master System, Nintendo etc etc. DIY arcade builders will just need to have reasonable computer and software knowhow to set them up and get some games running correctly. Same with Raspberry PI, you just need to be good with computers to get them running in your arcade machine. For PI enthusiasts, we now have a 11500 in 1 JAMMA game board which is a PI with JAMMA connector. It has a range of arcade and console games. We are now recommending this as our best multi game JAMMA board and supplying it to our wholesale cabinet builders as their base game board in JAMMA arcade machines.

Once you have decided on your cabinet type and system you want inside, the next step is parts!

Austin Amusements has a range or arcade parts to suit MAME, PI and JAMMA systems. MAME, you will need an encoder (we would recommend the I-pac2 for a 2 player or I-pac4 for a 4 player), joysticks and buttons, wiring (depending on the encoder selected) and other parts such as t-moulding, cam locks, coin mech, latches and more. Everything depends on what and how your building the cabinet. PI systems are the same as a MAME computer set up so most of the parts required are similar (you also need a LED screen and speakers that you will need to source yourself, this is something we don’t sell unfortunately, you can get these from your local Good Guys or similar store).

JAMMA systems, you will need to buy your arcade joysticks and buttons, JAMMA board (original one game board or multi game board), JAMMA harness, power supply, speakers (we have speakers to suit JAMMA arcade machines) and other parts such as t-moulding, cam locks, coin mech, latches and more. Again, depending on what and how your building your video game machine.

Once you have all of these parts and cabinet design, your one step closer to building your own arcade machine. Next step is buying the wood (Bunnings has 16mm MDF sheets suitable) and finding the time to start your arcade machine project.

Enjoy!