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Picade

by Pimoroni

The ultimate desktop retro arcade machine! Picade is a Raspberry Pi-powered mini arcade that you build yourself, with authentic arcade controls, a high resolution 4:3 display that's ideal for retro gaming, and a punchy speaker to hear those 8-bit game soundtracks at their best.

We've been making compact Raspberry Pi based arcade cabinets since way back in 2012 when Picade became the first UK Kickstarter project. Since then we've been prodding, poking and refining our Picade kit to make it better than ever :) Here's some things we love about it!

  • Solid, desk friendly cabinet made from powder-coated MDF, with a quality look and feel similar to a full-size arcade. It has an inbuilt speaker for surprisingly loud bleeps and bloops, and a proper joystick and low profile buttons, thoroughly tested by over-enthusiastic pirates.
  • Top notch 10" screen with a Pimoroni-designed and manufactured driver board and keypad controls. The display panels are IPS, so they look great from any viewing angle!
  • Our USB-C Picade X HAT makes it easy to connect everything up and can power even a hungry Raspberry Pi 4 through its pins. You can turn on your Picade and shut it down safely with the illuminated power button.
  • Snazzy, retro styled artwork (or you can DIY your own!)
  • Comes with a PICO-8 license (worth $14.99!) and cheatsheet, to help you make your own tiny games! You can also download and play games written by others, with 1000s of community made projects and resources to play with.
  • Extra goodies! A bunch of stickers, an enamel Picade pin and a big, luscious Picade poster.

Picade comes in kit form, and it'll take around two to three hours to build. All you'll need to add is a Raspberry Pi, USB-C power supply, and micro-SD card. Or you could pick up our convenient starter kit, which contains everything you need to get started!

Starter Kit Includes

  • 10" Picade
  • Raspberry Pi 4 (8GB)
  • USB-C power supply (with interchangeable heads for UK, US, EU and Australia)
  • 32GB microSD card

Cabinet features

  • Black, powder-coated panels
  • Acrylic marquee and console with authentic artwork
  • Push-fit arcade buttons
  • Joystick with black ball top
  • 3" speaker (5W, 4Ω)
  • Easy access with removable back panel
  • Dedicated illuminated power button
  • Grippy rubber feet
  • Approx dimensions: 310 x 260 x 250mm (H x W x D)

10-inch display features

  • 1024x768 (4:3 ratio) IPS (wide viewing angle) display
  • Pimoroni-designed and manufactured HDMI display driver board and keypad controls
  • Powered by micro-USB cable (included) from your Pi

Picade X HAT features

  • Easy DuPont connectors for buttons and joystick
  • Push-fit speaker terminals
  • I2S audio DAC with 3W amplifier (mono)
  • USB-C power management, power switch pins, and power button
  • 4-way joystick inputs
  • 6 player buttons
  • 4 utility buttons
  • Metal standoffs to hold your Picade X HAT securely

Extras

Building your Picade

All Picade assembly instructions are available online.

If your Picade has a square PICO-8 sticker on the box and has marquee and bezel artwork that looks like this then your Picade is 2020 edition (or later) and you'll need to follow these instructions:

If there's no PICO-8 sticker you'll need to follow this tutorial and video.

Software setup

We recommend the RetroPie operating system for your Picade. You can download it  and burn it to a micro-SD card using Raspberry Pi Imager.

Connect a USB keyboard to your Pi, and connect to Wi-Fi in the RetroPie menu. Press F4 to exit to the terminal and then type curl https://get.pimoroni.com/picadehat | bash to run the Picade HAT installer.

Reboot your Pi, if it doesn't prompt you to. Press the "Alt" key on your keyboard and then select "Configure input" to configure your Picade's controls. You'll find that the sound and power button should both be working now too!

Notes

  • If your Picade display doesn't show anything when you first power it up, then it could be because the HDMI display is not being detected by the Raspberry Pi. This can happen because power isn't supplied to the USB ports on the Raspberry Pi for the first few seconds of booting. The solution is to edit the /boot/config.txt file on your RetroPie SD card, and add hdmi_force_hotplug=1 on a new line at the bottom of the file.
  • Want to make your own custom artwork for your Picade? Click here for a PDF template for the printed pieces.