About Us

Who are we?

About Us

Our Mission

Innovate the education industry by teaching children core STEM skills in a fun and rewarding way – through the line of 8BitCADE Consoles!

These are DIY kits that formulate to create fun and exciting hand-held gaming consoles – used for both entertainment and learning.

We utilize the Arduino platform to make learning programming fun, exciting and rewarding. Learn both programming and game development with 8BitCADE.

successfully funded on

thank you!

Check out the kickstarter page for an indepth look into the 8BitCADE XL!

Thanks to these people here:

We raised £12,305, which was 205% over our goal! Thanks to these amazing people below, all 154 of them!

Matt Dyson
Samuel JC
Ralf Michael Yap
paul
Earl Campbell III
Dr. Mathias Wilhelm
Jim Husak
hgeorgb42
Gwen Y.
Eric Danker
kelly carlton
Marios Louca
Jonny Doyle
Michael Legary
Neil Pierson
Eric Bachmanm
Grant Gillies
Nicholas Kager
Christopher Bolt
Jeffy
Neil Selby
Vladimir Oka
Grmahun Tsegay
Ascanio
Mohammad Hassan Hsh
Daniel Webb
Andreas Zieger
Kevin Vorwalder
Sherry Mannebach
Johan Tejle
Vikki lowry
dennis venable
Yoshihiko YAMAMOTO
Kevin
Tyrone
Elizabeth Simon
Julien Rasle
ezi
Mark Carey
Michael Hartzell
Michael Azzato
Alexander Valentin
Bob Maier
Tim Davies
W
Eddie T

Jaime
Sean Hagen
Robert
Kurtis Santillanes
Neil Powney
KillrPnda (KP)
Karen
Brian O’Rourke
marieteadubs
Nathan Johnston
Christopher Ritchie
Jonathan Fernandes
Karen Mcleavy
Andre Houtzager
Gautier Nadé
Yaniv Parobek
Simon van Tol
Peter Membrey
Marten Pohla
Morgan Tingle
Benjamin
VanIkyn
Jared
Jon Raymond
ss
Derek Pettigrew
Faisal Jafri
Tracey Bashkoff
Adam Del Conte
Adam Hepton
Albert Gajšak
S&T Geotronics
Channel Chung
Derek Berggren
Andrew Wright
Andy Keys
Ivan
永島知佳
Amber Ryan
Balint Newton
Carl-Mikael Zetterling
Colin Fowle
Hiroyuki Yamamoto
Dee
Hiroyuki Nishida
Jerry Coplan
Yukihito Funakoshi
Tsugio SUZUKI
Candra N. Murphy
Salmon Slammin
Shigeaki Sato

Tony Flores
John
Fredrik Jorevall
Marc Mackin
Elise Renouf
Doris
Yuki Kadoya
Pirakorn Suthikorncompee
Tamzen Hayes
Achim Meissner
Alexander Peitz
Philip McGregor
Jonathan Katzer
Angel
Matěj Kučera
Rafal
Whitney
Martin
R.E. Scott
Johan
scott cohen
Wally Heinrich
Ali Raza
Kartik
Fernando Nieto
Tyler Rothgeb
Rick Spears
Tinna
Chu
Hybird
jason hiscox
Hit Point Press
Robert Berrington
Victor
Joshua Murray
Tenebrous
Ane-Marte Mortensen
Chris Mason
Orn Jonasar
Kevin Giang
Gwari
Matt Elder
Ken Forward
Dominador Garcia
Sven Höhn
Justin Swan
Alexander Gonzalez
Daiki Nishihara
Christian

Who am i?

Hi! I’m Jack Daly and I am a student & founder of 8BitCADE. Ever since I was young I’ve had a keen interest in anything electronic. I have a passion for design, programming, electronics – but also for retro games and consoles.

The 8BitCADE is my retro passion packaged in a compact, fun and exciting console – providing endless hours of entertainment. I love that I can play games from all over the world, and learn from one of the greatest gaming communities – Arduboy!

Previously, my love for retro consoles took me to something with a larger form factor! I designed an arcade machine with a twist. The casing was made of recycled coffee grounds as I partnered with an international coffee brand.

During my early stages of learning Arduino, I tinkered with a range of mini-projects. From a machine which gave gifts to young children if they solved math problems, to a smart fish tank system that maintained your tank and fed your fish!

I’ve also dabbled in educational courses. I’ve helped deliver robotics and electronics courses using Arduino, a build your own Arcade Machine course (in which the arcade machine was designed by myself and a colleague beforehand) and published my own Udemy course online about the basics of Adobe Illustrator – in which I have taught over 10,000 students! Check it out, it’s free!

My latest project is 8BitCADE.

I’ve been developing 8BitCADE XL for 6 months now and am now ready to take it to the next level with the help of you! I am exceptionally pleased to be able to present my contribution to the world of makers, learners and gamers as I feel the 8BitCADE is a product of a great deal of community work.

8BitCADE's story

8BitCADE started in 2019 with the 8BitCADE. This was a small handheld gaming console that was used to run a short after school activity at my school – driven by myself and a colleague. It was used to educate students about electronics, programming and PCB design.

After gaining student feedback and using my own experience, I realized a couple of core things needed to be updated. The screen size needed to be enlarged, the casing made more comfortable and the addition of a memory chip to store more than one game. I wanted to focus on improving the gaming side of the console by adding these core aspects.

Thus the 8BitCADE XL was born – the ultimate 8Bit gaming device. More Screen, updated board, comfortable case – a retro gamer’s dream.

The 8BitCADE XL had many prototypes, however, a lot of knowledge was carried forward from the creation of the 8BitCADE. The development of the 8BitCADE helped shape the console you see today – the 8BitCADE XL.

As I had experience creating a curriculum around a gaming console the 8BitCADE predecessor – I decided to enhance the learning potential of the 8BitCADE XL and created the website 8bitcade.com. I designed the platform in an intuitive manner to allow students to access the learning resources on their own accord.

As popularity grew, I knew I had to take the 8BitCADE XL to the next level. Which brings me to today. With the help of you and the community, we can bring the 8BitCADE XL to life.

The console created for makers, by makers

Arduboy Compatibility

The 8BitCADE XL is inspired by the brilliant people over at the Arduboy Community. Many of the games on the 8BitCADE XL were created by the community – such as your favourite retro game titles like Virus, Circuit Dude and Donkey Kong.

The Arduboy has a large community of makers, programmers and 8-bit game enthusiasts, created by the great Kevin Bates. It’s the perfect community to help new programmers prosper and I’m excited to introduce 8BitMakers to the expertise of the Arduboy Community, allowing them to learn, grow and program within an established community.

The 8BitCADE Loader is based on the work of the talented Mr Blinky. Because of his hard work, the 8BitCADE XL can also be integrated easily with any Arduboy game using the helpful HomeMade Arduboy Package.

Our Core Values

We believe that learning design and electronics shouldn’t be a boring and systematic process – learning should be adventurous and rewarding. Finding worth in learning through creating a usable product that can be enjoyed time after time.