DIY ROM Arcade Blog

Thanks for checking out the site! I created DIY ROM Arcade to document the creation of my first “Do It Yourself” Arcade Machine running Emulators and Roms.

I have been a gamer for as long as I can remember. Some of my first memories in life are being a baby and watching my mom play PacMan, Space Invaders and Asteroids on our Atari 2600 Woody.

I started playing games also as soon as I was old enough to understand what to do and I really loved the Atari. Then when I was about six years old my parents bought one of the original Nintendo NES systems, with the light gun and R.O.B the Robot. I spent countless nights playing Gyromite, Duck Hunt, Rad Racer, and my favorite… the Legend of Zelda.

My parents bought us a SEGA Genesis for Christmas a few years later and I loved playing Sonic The Hedgehog, Altered Beast, Toe Jam and Earl, X-Men, Mortal Combat, Golden Axe and all the other classic titles.

A year or so later I had been saving up my allowance and finally had enough money to buy a Super Nintendo. It was so much fun playing Mario Kart, Super Mario World, Street Fighter, Super Mario RPG, Legend of Zelda, Earth Bound, Mario All-Stars, and so many other great titles I can’t list them all here.

As the years went on I had a Nintendo 64 (Woot Goldeneye!!! And Zelda Ocarina of Time!), a Gameboy & GBA, SEGA Game Gear, Playstation, GameCube. Playstation 2, Xbox, and I now have a Nintendo Wii, an Xbox 360, a Playstation 3, a PSP, and a Nintendo DS!

Needless to say the one hobby that I have stuck with for all these years is gaming. Even though I own a lot of newer consoles I still enjoy playing all sorts of old games, whether it is on the Atari 2600 just to bring back memories, or on the old-school NES because I still enjoy all the old titles.

I have worked with computers for the past 20 years now (almost) and in the mid-nineties came across my first Emulator (NESticle). I was so amazed with the concept of Emulation and even more amazed at the sheer number of ROMs available online.

In the past few years I have been an avid collector of all sorts of different Emulators and ROMs. I decided several years ago that I wanted to build an Arcade Machine that would run all sorts of different emulators with tons of games. I have been planning the project in my head for years but because of either money or living space I have been unable to beginthe project until now.

All the time I have spent planning the Arcade Machine has given me a great idea of exactly what I want to do with this project. My goal is to build my first Arcade Machine Emulation System and I am going to share my work with others every step of the way, so that people who have wanted to build their own Arcade System can get ideas from the site, and I bet people will have some good tips to share with me also.

So thanks for sitting through my rant. Welcome to the site. I hope you enjoy what I have to offer.