Super Paper Entertainment System Classic Mini

[Natron]

Last year I decided to make my brothers a Christmas present using the Raspberry Pi Zero, and this summer I finally got everything started. I was going to jam the pi into an SNES controller and make a self-contained SNES console within an SNES controller, and I had made some good progress when one of the batteries I bought exploded seemingly out of nowhere. I still wanted to make them a system, but a handheld bomb is a pretty terrible present, so I decided to nix that idea.

Around this same time, Nintendo announced the SNES classic mini, and I had an idea. Why don't I just put the pi in a fancy box that LOOKS like an SNES, and hook up a Super Nintendo controller to it? An idea was born, and I just finished the prototype and wanted to share it with you guys.

Introducing the Super Paper Entertainment System Classic Mini!

This is pretty close to the final version, but there are still some tweaks I'd like to make, such as making the buttons sit a little lower, as well as re-working the back so that the HDMI and USB cables fit a little better. There's also some cleanup that needs to be done on the paper skin so it looks a little cleaner, but that will come with future iterations. It uses Ruckage's NES Mini theme to complete the look software-wise as well, and although our projects are quite similar, I had actually never seen Ruckage's paper NES until I was almost done with this prototype. Great minds and all that, I guess!

Anyway, I'd also like to share a bit of the process of how I made this, and if there's interest, I can put out the actual PDF files of the cutouts and paper wrapping so that you can make one yourself. Let me know if you'd like to see a more in-depth tutorial, and I can make one as soon as possible (and with a Pi Zero W, because I can always use more Pis).

First, I had to make a 3d model, using the dimensions of the Pi and the original SNES as a base. I got some pics of a SNES from the front, sides, and back, and then made the interior of my model 84mm wide. Then, since I knew I'd be using 3mm cardboard, I made my model using that inside dimension to scale the SNES to suit.

Each layer you can see is a piece of cardboard cut to size. I made a 2d representation of each piece and arranged them on an 8.5x11 inch sheet of paper and printed it out. I then used a carbon transfer to create a template on the cardboard and cut it out.

That got me to here. This is the model cut out and glued together, except the buttons, they're just laying in their spots.

Then, I broke up the model and created a printout I could use for both the cardboard pieces and the cardstock. I cut the card stock, glued it (very, very carefully) and then... poof. The final shell was done. Then it was just a matter of adding in the pi, soldering the power and reset buttons (which are just momentary, they don't slide like a real SNES), and soldering on my USB hub to the front so I could use my SNES USB controller I made a few years ago.

The final models for my brothers will be slightly different. They'll have the first player controller wired directly to the PI using the GPIO SNES driver, and the USB hub will be in the player two spot so that they can add their own ROMs as they see fit. Theirs will also be a bit cleaner, as I learned a lot from doing this first prototype, and I believe I can make the next ones much cleaner looking in the end. I'm hopefully going to be doing them this weekend.

If people are interested, I'll post the final versions, including a few shots of the inside and the back.

Edit: Took out [WIP]. I'll consider it done for now, but who knows...

[herb_fargus]

That's some next level origami.

[Natron]

It's finally done! I was going to finish this the weekend before last, but I ended up being sick, so I had to put this off until this weekend. However, the final version for my brothers is done, and I'm quite pleased with it!

This one has the hard-wired controller using the Gamecon driver included with Retropie, so it has that nice authentic feel. It also has an expansion USB port in case you want to use a different controller or hook it up to the internet or anything like that.

One thing I would recommend is to use shorter wires than I did. I made the mistake of hooking everything up for testing with nice long leads, and then when I went to put it all together I had to cram it all in there like a can of worms. This is prior to covering the two push-buttons with another piece of cardboard and then adding in some two-part epoxy to really set everything in place.

Overall, I'm mostly satisfied with these. I could honestly do another revision and clean things up further, but I think I'm happy for now. The best part is that I can now I have nothing to build so I can replay Chrono Trigger!

[herb_fargus]

You could probably get away with wiring 4 usbs in place of the original controller spots but it one of the cleaner builds I've seen. Well done.

[Natron]

@herb_fargus Thanks! I had considered doing just that when I was making the first one, but I decided that I should use up the couple of knock-off SNES controllers I had kicking around. When I made my final template, I actually put the holes for the USB port on both sides so that if I revisit this, I could just make a double USB version. I hadn't thought of a quadruple USB version, but that would certainly work as well.