# Arcade1up Xbox One Mortal Kombat 11 is HERE - Nextgen Modding!

**Source:** RetroRalph  
**Type:** video  
**Published:** 2019-05-24  
**Duration:** 18m 56s  
**Beat:** Pinball

**URL:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ye9IPYkxUT8

---

## Analysis

RetroRalph showcases a custom Arcade1up Mortal Kombat 11 cabinet mod powered by Xbox One, featuring custom artwork by Joe Sabo, Sanwa joysticks with bat top extensions, and an encoder board system that converts PlayStation 2 controller signals to Xbox One via USB. The build demonstrates versatility by running multiple games beyond Mortal Kombat, including Capcom beat-em-up titles, Streets of Rage, and even analog stick-compatible titles like Forza, with full Xbox functionality.

### Key Claims

- [HIGH] Joe Sabo created custom artwork for the control panel with pre-drilled acrylic top — _RetroRalph describing the mod in detail at the beginning of the video_
- [HIGH] The control panel uses a DIY Retro Arcades blank birch wood board as the base — _RetroRalph explicitly identifying the wood board source while discussing control panel construction_
- [HIGH] The system uses an encoder board connected to an Xbox One via a serial adapter and PlayStation 2 to Xbox One converter with zero input lag — _RetroRalph demonstrating and explaining the technical setup at the back of the cabinet_
- [HIGH] Sanwa joystick extenders are necessary due to the thicker mounting depth caused by the acrylic top overlay — _RetroRalph explaining joystick height adjustment and demonstrating the extender piece_
- [HIGH] Loctite thread locker prevents Sanwa extension pieces from coming loose during gameplay — _RetroRalph providing a maintenance tip for the joystick extensions_
- [HIGH] The cabinet can play multiple game titles beyond Mortal Kombat through Xbox Game Pass/digital downloads including Street Fighter IV, Streets of Rage, Killer Instinct, Capcom beat-em-up bundle, and Forza — _RetroRalph demonstrating gameplay and menu access for multiple titles throughout the video_
- [HIGH] The joystick can be reconfigured to act as an analog stick for games like Forza through hot button combinations — _RetroRalph demonstrating analog stick functionality for Forza Horizon_

### Notable Quotes

> "I have not seen artwork this good as far as from the Arcade1Up community, and Joe is awesome."
> — **RetroRalph**, Early in video during control panel review
> _High praise for Joe Sabo's custom artwork quality_

> "So there is no input lag that I can see here, and I want to show that to you guys in a second."
> — **RetroRalph**, During technical explanation section
> _Confirms performance quality of the Xbox One encoder system_

> "This is one of those things where my buddy George kind of tried to talk me into doing this mod, and now I can't thank him enough. It's awesome."
> — **RetroRalph**, Final thoughts section
> _Acknowledgment of influencer/collaborator in the mod project_

> "The sky's the limit. You have access to all of these games. It's just freaking cool."
> — **RetroRalph**, During multi-game demonstration
> _Captures enthusiasm for the flexibility of Xbox-based arcade cabinet_

> "This system will get the most use probably out of all of them that I have. So kind of crazy because this is one of those things where my buddy George kind of tried to talk me into doing this mod."
> — **RetroRalph**, Final thoughts
> _Predicts high usage and validates the mod's practical appeal_

### Entities

| Name | Type | Context |
|------|------|---------|
| RetroRalph | person | YouTube content creator showcasing arcade cabinet mods and builds |
| Joe Sabo | person | Custom artwork artist who created marquee, bezel, and control panel artwork for this Mortal Kombat 11 arcade cabinet mod |
| DIY Retro Arcades | company | Supplier of blank birch wood boards and arcade cabinet components used in this build |
| Arcade1up | company | Manufacturer of the base arcade cabinet being modified with Xbox One technology |
| Mortal Kombat 11 | game | Primary game theme for the custom arcade cabinet build |
| Xbox One | product | Gaming console powering the entire arcade cabinet system |
| Sanwa | company | Manufacturer of joysticks and arcade controls used in the build (genuine Sanwa sticks with bat tops) |
| Street Fighter IV | game | Game title installed on Xbox One system; RetroRalph indicates high interest in playing this title on the cabinet |
| Final Fight | game | Capcom beat-em-up title available through Xbox Game Pass/digital download, playable on the cabinet |
| Streets of Rage | game | Sega Genesis beat-em-up series (1, 2, 3) available on Xbox as digital download |
| Killer Instinct | game | Fighting game available on Xbox; noted as difficult to emulate on RetroPie/Raspberry Pi systems |
| Forza | game | Analog stick-compatible racing game demonstrated as playable on the arcade cabinet |
| George | person | RetroRalph's friend who convinced him to undertake this Xbox One arcade cabinet mod project |

### Topics

- **Primary:** Arcade cabinet modding and customization, Arcade1up platform modifications, Xbox One gaming on arcade hardware, Custom arcade artwork and aesthetics, Arcade control panel design and assembly
- **Secondary:** Retro gaming collection building, Fighting game preservation and accessibility

### Sentiment

**Positive** (0.92) — RetroRalph expresses high enthusiasm throughout the video about the mod's execution, artwork quality, functionality, and versatility. Uses superlatives like 'awesome,' 'freaking sick,' 'killer,' and 'speechless.' No critical concerns raised about the build or system. Minor technical issues mentioned (light bleed in marquee, incomplete button placement) are framed as ongoing refinements rather than failures.

### Signals

- **[community_signal]** Custom arcade cabinet modding community actively creating and sharing artwork and technical solutions (Joe Sabo artwork, DIY Retro Arcades components, encoder solutions) (confidence: high) — RetroRalph credits Joe Sabo for artwork, DIY Retro Arcades for wood boards, and describes the ecosystem of available modification options
- **[market_signal]** Arcade1up modding community expanding from artwork/aesthetic customization to significant hardware replacement (console integration), indicating higher-tier DIY enthusiast segment (confidence: medium) — RetroRalph describes this as 'nextgen modding' in title and notes: 'It was a lot more simple than I thought. So anyways, guys, I'm actually speechless.'
- **[product_strategy]** Xbox One encoder system using PlayStation 2 to Xbox One converter enables full Xbox game library access on arcade cabinet hardware with zero input lag (confidence: high) — RetroRalph demonstrates the technical setup: 'This breakout box then goes to these little devices here that go from a PlayStation 2 connection and it converts that into an Xbox One connection and then it plugs in via USB on the back.'
- **[technology_signal]** Arcade1up cabinets being repurposed with modern gaming hardware (Xbox One) rather than emulation-based solutions, enabling access to contemporary game libraries (confidence: high) — Entire video demonstrates Xbox One integration replacing traditional emulation approach; RetroRalph notes: 'The sky's the limit. You have access to all of these games.'

---

## Transcript

 get over here so so all right guys here it is i am so excited about this mod this is joe sabo's artwork he kicks serious, but oh my gosh, it looks so good. All the detail from the marquee to the bezel to the control panel is all really, really good. I mean, some of the best I've seen. So let's talk about the control panel for a minute while we're here. So he made a custom acrylic top that already had all the buttons pre-drilled out. So I really didn't have to do much there. However, this is just a small acrylic top. As you can see, it's thin. So it's like a thin plastic. Although this is actually thicker than the arcade one up topper. But yeah, so this lays over the actual wood board that I used for the CP. So this wood board is actually DIY retro arcades. It's a blank birch wood board. But what I did was I took the overlay and put it on top of birch wood board and then I drilled the holes so I basically drew circles or outlines of the all the button configurations and then drilled them you know into the board so that I could run the buttons through so this is a really really awesome piece and the way he designed it it actually comes over the edge I don't know if you can see that but see it actually comes over this lip comes over wider than the control panel and I think when you back up it has an overall killer look because of that. I really, really think that looks awesome. So let's take a closer look at the artwork really fast. So his artwork is very, very detailed, as you can see. I mean, I have not seen artwork this good as far as from the arcade one-up community, and Joe is awesome. So he was saying that he was thinking about extending the artwork, so he was going to have a the riser art that would extend down so I think that's really cool so obviously one of the most special things about this mod is that it is actually running off of an Xbox one so obviously that's gonna that's gonna spark a lot of questions as to how I did that and we're gonna get into that in a minute but you will notice that it has you know eight buttons on each side you've got your Sanwa sticks and you've got your start slash options button but there's a back button on the Xbox controller that you need to have so that you can access the menu systems so right now these two buttons are acting as that the reason why they're the micro switches are just are just sitting out like this is because I haven't I didn't know where I was gonna put these yet so I realize that's not complete I just got really excited and wanted to show you you guys this mod sooner than later, but I will end up putting those somewhere. You know, I was thinking they could go here on the front panel, which I've done before, or what I was really thinking might be cool is putting it somewhere on the side. Although the reason why I didn't want to put it on the side is because I really like this artwork and I didn't want to put the button there. So we'll see. For right now, that's where it's going to stay, but I might move it. All right, so let's go to the back and see what's powering this thing. Okay, so we're around the back now, And the first thing I want to tell you guys is I have not cleaned up any of the wires. It's all really just kind of more of a work in progress, although everything is fully functional right now. So that is the monitor mount that you may have seen on a prior video. I'll have a link that pops up right here if you want to see that. The wire you have hanging down here is actually the switch for the marquee. I'm going to switch it on and then I'll show you that in a minute. But yeah, that's the lit marquee. Normally I mount this on the cabinet. I just haven't gotten to that yet. So what you really want to see is what it takes to power all this stuff. So you've got your Xbox One here, and you have this little adapter kit right here that has a serial adapter. And so this serial adapter actually goes from an encoder board that's on the control panel. You can't see it because it's mounted to the control panel, but there is a controller board there. So that serial connection goes to this breakout box. This breakout box then goes to these little devices here that go from a PlayStation 2 connection and it converts that into an Xbox one connection and then it plugs in via USB on the back so I'm actually going to show you guys the diagram of how you do this now I disassemble the tank stick you can see that right here I just assembled the tank stick but that's only because I had one but I did find out that you can actually buy the encoder board and the wiring kit separate. So you may be able to do this same thing without actually owning a tank stick. So kind of cool. So there are probably several other ways you could do this. One of the ways I thought was maybe using a arcade, you know, an Xbox One arcade stick. Problem with this one is that in order for the buttons to work the way this encoder works is you have to actually have an Xbox one joystick plugged or controller sorry plugged into this at every at any time I didn't really want that now I'm not saying that this is the only alternative option there's probably many of them it's just this one works out really well with zero input lag so there is no input lag that I can see here and I want to show that that to you guys in a second so I'm gonna flip the cabinet around I'm going to talk about a couple more things real quick and then I'll jump into we'll jump into gameplay and how this thing works and what options you have to you alright so getting back to the front of the cabinet you can now see the light up marquee I'll give you a closer look so hopefully it doesn't bleed too much it looks really really good my only problem I'm having right now and I'm gonna resolve it at some other point is and get some light bleed in so you can see that down below I had to fix that I've I've actually had that problem before with Scott's marquee. I think he may have resolved that by now, but you could solve it by putting some tape, you know, black tape on the bottom or something like that. All right, so I want to revisit the control panel just real quick before we get into gameplay. These are Sanwa joysticks. So these are the ones that I decided to go with. I will have links in the description to these, but these are genuine Sanwas. The only thing that I changed is I put bat tops on them. These did not come with bad tops. They came with ball tops. Now, the problem that I had, and I'll explain this to you right now, is you maybe can't see this on the camera. I'm going to try to zoom in quickly. If you look, you can see that's the end of the actual shaft of the joystick. Well, John Youssi there's a connector here. So what happened was because this is actually making the control panel a lot thicker than normal because of this acrylic top, I needed to extend the joystick. So they sell these Sanwa extenders which kind of bring the joystick up a little bit more if you have issues like this where mounting depths are deeper. So this actually brings the bat top up to a more comfortable level versus being so close to the control panel. So that's all you do and I'll show you that really quick. So if I unscrew this so if I take this off you can clearly see that and I scuffed it up a lot when I was mounting it so my bad. If you look close on there, you can see that's where that breaking point is, that extender piece right there. And then you just put the bat top on top of that. So that's how you do it. And it'll extend that out. Now there's one other bat top tip I wanted to give you guys real quick. So just bear with me a second. And I'm gonna bring something over that I think will help with those of you who are having some bat top issues. So give me one second here. Okay, so I'm back and this is a little tip here. Kind of random, but this Loctite right here, This thread locker is your friend when it comes to using these Sanwa extensions. So what you would do is, and I'm not going to do it for this because I'm going to have to take it apart a couple more times. But you put a little bit of the Loctite here. Screw this on. And then put a little bit of Loctite on the top here. And then you can put the bat top on. And you'll be good to go. It won't move around. Trust me. You'll be really good. And you'll be happy that you did that because you won't be messing with it and fiddling with it all the time, which I tend to do quite often. So it's a good little tip, and I think it'll help you out. Alright, so I'm actually a Street Fighter guy, so I'm not actually a Mortal Kombat guy really. So I'm very poor at this game, especially the modern ones. I feel like I'm decent at the old ones, but I'm not very good. So anyways, I'm not going to focus on the gameplay too much. I just want to show you the functionality of the system and what you can do with it. So I'm gonna set the camera up on the tripod for the best angle to record gameplay, and I gonna show you what you can do with this thing Okay so first things first volume So for the volume you would use the TV remote I actually did not put an amp in this so I actually exclusively using the TV volume. So that's how you adjust the volume with the remote. You could also have the speaker output be controlled by this, so you could actually use this as well with an amp. So anyways, that's not how I have it set up right now. All right, so before we get into Mortal combat, I did want to show you something. So when I hit this button and that, it brings me back to home. So I didn't really go over this much, but you will have full functionality of your Xbox. So, you know, if you wanted to play other games. So I have some games loaded here that kind of are well suited for this setup. You have things like the Capcom beat-em-up bundle. Believe it or not, I will show you this too, because like I said, I'm not going to show a Punch Mortal Kombat gameplay because I suck at it, but there is an option to turn one of the sticks into an analog stick, which allows you to play games like Forza, which is really cool. So you can play Forza Horizon 3, whatever it is. The Killer Instinct games, they're all on the Xbox for download. Streets of Rage, the Mega Drive Classics collection. I've got Street Fighter 4 on here. I've got the Street Fighter 30th anniversary. So the cool thing about this is the sky is a little bit the limit because there's so many cool games that you can download and play that it's well beyond a Mortal Kombat cabinet. It just happens to be themed that way. So because it is, we'll start with Mortal Kombat, but I do want to show you some other games after that. So let's get started on Mortal Kombat. Okay, so I'm going to press start. I'm going to get this thing going. Don't make fun of me. I am not good at this game, as I said. All right spear is back forward X. Oh I got this He's getting lucky so far I never can get this LTRT fatal blow thing to work right for some reason. So I don't know what I'm doing wrong. So if anybody knows, let me know. I mean, obviously I'm terrible at this, but it'd be nice to know what the heck to do. Because I'm doing what it says, and it doesn't seem to work. Alright, clearly very easy is very easy. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh! Watch it, buddy. I will uppercut you all day. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh! I also don't believe in block, by the way. Block like that button. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh! Yeah, I can do that too. Oh, oh, oh, damn. Oh, damn. Oh, dude, dude. Oh, jeez, jeez! That's it. No one does that to Scorpion! I know what I'll do, I'll punch you in the face! Uh oh, finish him, I definitely don't know what I'm doing there. Ah, dammit, weakest finish ever. Anyways, so let's go to the other stuff. So clearly it plays this game really awesome, you play two players, it's kick-ass. The joysticks feel good because they're Sanwas. The buttons feel awesome. It's freaking sick. So, but let's go back to the regular Xbox and see what other things we can do. All right. All right so this is what cool about this So you can play offline mode or online mode over a network We going to do offline mode And as you can see this has got Final Fight on it which we know Arcade 1 has a cabinet of this So let's choose Final Fight. It presents the game in the correct aspect ratio, and it also puts little borders on the side, which is pretty neat. and I have the scan lines turned on so you'll see how awesome this actually looks. It looks killer with the scan lines on it. It actually looks like pretty much how I remember it looking. Jesus, get over here. Get over here! This guy's got the longest arms ever. Anyway, so obviously having the Capcom bundle is really cool because you can play Final Fight as well as Strider. I believe Strider's on there too. So, oh, sorry about that. Basically, this button will allow you to get to the options menu. And in the options menu, you can do a bunch of stuff. You can check out this game on your own. But if I say quit game, it brings me back to the main menu. Actually, Strider is not one of them. I stand corrected. I thought Strider was on this for some reason. But anyways, really cool. So that's just one option for you. And all these games will play amazingly well on this setup. Okay, for the sake of time, let's fast-track things a little bit here. So obviously, big fan of Streets of Rage. And you 1, 2, and 3 are on the Xbox as a digital download. And then there's also the Sega Genesis Classics. Killer Instinct is there, which is great. And a lot of people try to play Killer Instinct on RetroPie, Raspberry Pi, or whatever, and it requires a PC build, so oftentimes people don't end up getting that playing well. Street Fighter IV, huge fan of that. Obviously, I'm going to be playing a lot of Street Fighter IV on this cabinet. As you know, I'm a big fan. I actually built the whole entire cabinet based on it, just this game. So I'm having fun with this, and it's nice to be able to play this on another system in my house. So, big fan, and it's really cool to play it in this format. And then if you're super old school or you know old super old school to me you can play yourself some Galaga There's tons of other retro games that are available for digital download as well that I think you'll have fun with a cabinet like this so as far as Genesis goes there's a ton of Genesis titles available to you. You can set scan lines You can put filters you can do the side bezels camera what those are called I think they're side bezels, but you can do a whole bunch of cool stuff So really, like I said, sky's the limit. This is a really, really fun build. Alright, so I promised you'd be able to play Forza, and you absolutely can. So there's specific hot buttons that you can press to reconfigure the way the buttons and joystick react. So you can make the joystick act like an analog stick. So it's pretty cool. So I haven't tested it on other analog stick games. You know, there's going to be some that just play better with a controller than they do, you know, an arcade stick. But it's really cool that you can do this. All right guys, it's final thoughts time. So what do I think about this modification? Dude, this is freaking awesome Super fun. The sky's the limit. You've got access to all of these games. It's just freaking cool Yes, it there's a cost involved to do it. Hopefully after you watch this video You'll get a guide or some guidance as to how to do it. It's actually not that bad It was a lot more simple than I thought So anyways guys, I'm actually speechless. I'm so excited about this. This system will get the most use probably out of all of them that I have. So kind of crazy because this is one of those things where my buddy George kind of tried to talk me into doing this mod and now I can't thank him enough. It's awesome. So anyways, I would love to hear what you guys think so put your comments below. Please like the video if you thought this was neat. Please subscribe to the channel your support is definitely appreciated and it makes a big difference and also hit the notification bell so you can be formed to future videos well that's it guys until the next one we will see you next time

_(Acquisition: youtube_groq_whisper, Enrichment: v3)_

---

*Exported from Journalist Tool on 2026-04-13 | Item ID: d88b16d7-06ae-4b5a-86e3-46839aad7b86*