How-to Hack Galaga into Pac-Man and more! | 6 Game Mini Arcade Machine Mod

I modify a Galaga mini arcade machine to play Pac-Man, Dig-Dug, Galaxian, Mappy, and Rolling Thunder!
Please click SHOW MORE!

My wife game me a mini arcade machine for Christmas! I only made it about a day before I wanted to take it apart, see what's inside, and hack it! I found that with a simple bit of soldering and a switch that I could make it play 5 more games that were already hiding in there!

Tools and Materials:

If you like what I do you can support me at:

For more Information, visit:

Most Popular Playlists:

Contact Ben Nelson:
and I'll get right back to you.

Music by:
Blippy Trance by Kevin MacLeod

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Amazon links help support this these videos.

[TheRetroShed]

Fabulous thanks for sharing! We have a Dig Dug cabinet and someone in our group said today that they thought it could be modded to play other games. We’ll certainly be trying this!

[JaggedNZ]

Thanks, modded my sons my arcade this evening and it works great. Knowing how to tackle the epoxy really helped a lot!

Used a hair dryer to warm the stickers before peeling them off and put them on baking paper. They stuck straight back on with no problems.

[MrBluesMessiah]

Did a very similar thing with a 1st Gen Super Impulse Tiny Arcade Space Invaders. ran tiny wires from the pads to the 4 points on the joystick so when I turned it on I could hold the joystick in any direction to load Space Invaders, Galaga, Ms. Pac Man, and I think Pac Man.

[romaneberle]

good job, thanks for sharing 🙂
10:26 i've done this 100s of times in the past. nowadays I use a little bit of shrinking tube wrap, and a piece of drilled circuit board. much better! cut the circuit board as required for components and holes for wires, or even better: pin headers, plus some extra space for mounting. put small piece of shrink tube over soldered wires. much better results! more steps involved, but easier building, stronger connections, safer connections, easy maintenance (pin headers!), cleaner looks! :)

[perkins]

I use the Fender guitar switch on mine there's a slit right below where you put your switch I shorten the switch and it just takes out enough to switch it . yours is cool I got Pac-Man Mappy Galaga and Dig Dug out of it

[storesellify]

All the video I wait maybe you show us a little tesla Motor in the end of the video lol hahaha ur awesome.

[Cargo_Bay]

Yeah, apparently most of these cabs have multiple games flashed onto the boards, so they don’t have to make a different board for each game.

[Phaota]

So, in short, this is a Namco Museum 20-Game Mini unit that has been dedicated to only Galaga unless hacked. I have feeling it also has the other games too, though a bigger combo switch would need to be used. This hack is great since these stand-alone units have the proper battery back-up to the lack of it in the Namco Museum cabinet. Still don't understand why that one is missing the battery compartment.

[SchardtCinematic]

I wonder if you can mod these to hook up to a regular size 19" CRT or Flat Screen TV. Then wire in larger controls and put it in a bigger cabinet

[arnolduk]

Meanwhile the husband has a full size star wars arcade cabinet setup in the spare room..LOL

[wmh]

I have an older Dig Dug unit that appears easily moded. I have wires and the DIP switch ordered. Regarding the wiring, did you only run the black to one of the jumpers and one of the dip switches or did it have to connect to all three jumpers and all 3 dip switches? I see where you soldered the colored wires to the dip switch but didn't see how the black was soldered. I'm not very electrically inclined. Thx for any help.

[ItsMeeeesh]

I was just wondering. Got my dad this for Christmas the Galaga one. Is there a way to save ur highscore ?

[apollolux]

FWIW, it looks like they've long since wised up and in 2023 at least these don't look to be hackable. I had gotten a Galaga one in July 2023 from a local Walgreen's in NYC hoping to do this very mod and give to my mom for Christmas and when I finally opened it up recently the board (with a completely different revision starting with DR- something) doesn't expose IOB jumpers nor epoxy-blobbed jumpers anywhere near the foam risers.

[riversarcadereview]

just curious. in theory, a three switch 'dip switch' there should be 8 games. are two of the possible positions just dead games or repeats? other than that, great video

[JustCrew]

Nice job - you must have been hard on your toys as a kid

[FrankTaank]

Can this be done in a Karate Champ machine? I have a non working one coming in the mail, and I intend to try to fix it. If I fix it, I'd like to hack it. Otherwise I may just gut it for a future project.

[dadbelo]

I hacked pac-man the same way with temporary contact switches (3) and one of the combinations gives me Galaxian also. Maybe you should look into it. Good video.

[dabtod]

Thanks for the video! Now I know I'm definitely NOT going to be modding my mini arcade

[aagg]

How do you take off the controls, as I can't take them off?

[therealspaceninja]

Hello, do you recommend someone to mail my mini cabinet to to modify it for me?