The initial concept for Raspberry Pi may have stemmed from teaching basic computer science in schools, but nowadays, you see many professionals using it for a number of DIY projects, including retro gaming. Case in point is John Park, who has recently built a Raspberry Pi 5-powered “wall arcade” with an RGB LED matrix display that would indulge one in a nostalgic gaming experience. It can also become digital wall art with a demoscene code.
The key novelty of this project is its large, low-resolution RGB LED matrix display, which creates a unique pixelated aesthetic. Park has used four 64×64 RGB LED panels to form a 128×128 pixel display that offers a low-resolution arcade experience. It runs a PICO-8 fantasy console that supports retro-style games and animations. Priced at $18, it can be installed on Windows, Mac, and Linux apart from Raspberry Pi machines.
This DIY arcade machine works by launching PICO-8 on a virtual screen (XVFB), making it think it is on a tiny monitor. Meanwhile, a Python script captures the screen and sends it to the LED matrices using Piomatter. An Adafruit RGB matrix bonnet is included to deliver power and data to the display. As visible in the video (below), it is not just a video player instead it can be used to play a number of retro games using wired USB controllers.
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All the components are housed in an IKEA Sannahed picture frame with custom 3D-printed brackets. An external speaker can be attached to enhance sounds when gaming. If you need help trying one at home, you can check out this Raspberry Pi project on the Adafruit website.
Via: Tom’s Hardware
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