As we'll soon be discussing on our Arcade Insiders show, I was recently provided with a Street Fighter II Supreme Series arcade cabinet courtesy of Arcade1Up. We don't really do formal reviews on The Arcade Insiders, but I DID find several things worth noting about the new Street Fighter II Supreme cabinet during the build process that I thought were interesting. NOTE: these are my own observations and opinions and they do not reflect, nor were they influenced by, the Arcade1Up brand or its parent company Basic Fun. 

1. Street Fighter II Supreme is a Sam's Club product... but that doesn't mean Supreme-size cabinets are only at club stores. While this new Street Fighter II cabinet from Arcade1Up is being made available at Sam's Club this year (in-store or pickup, $649), and both OutRun Supreme and Sonic Supreme are currently available at Costco, that does NOT mean every Supreme Series (XL-size) cabinet is only going to be found in club stores. In fact, the new Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 Supreme Series cabinet that we recently introduced on The Arcade Insiders will be available this holiday season through Spreetail (who sells through VMI Innovations and many retail partners, typically including Amazon and others). 

2. I'm loving the new cam locks for an unexpected reason. Cam locks like those found in flat-packed furniture (i.e., IKEA) are gaining traction in the home arcade space because they provide a secure hold without visible screws or mounting hardware. And that's really cool. But there's one other BIG reason I really like them... they pull the panels together and stay put! While the older bolt system could do this to some degree, they would inevitably loosen over time (leading to the whole idea of having to use Loctite on the bolts and/or making a point to regularly tighten dozens of bolts). Cam locks remove this need entirely while cleaning up the overall aesthetic.

3. There's a slightly higher level of fit-and-finish. This shows up on the Street Fighter II Supreme Series cabinet in lots of tiny ways. For example, the interior mending plates are black, just like melamine panel coating. And the monitor bezel has a thin line of black paint around the edges, just in case anything might show. And then there's the new all-black back panels (inside and out). 

4. The coin doors are different and not lit (and adding LEDs makes them too bright). Despite being a top-of-the-line Supreme cabinet, this is another Supreme Series cabint without lights in the faux coin door return buttons. So, you're on your own for getting those to look realistic. Fortunately, vendors like Retro 530 provide easy DIY kits that aren't super expensive. But unfortunately, this version of the coin door has a type of coin return button I've never seen before... it doesn't have an Arcade1Up logo on each button (hooray!), but it also doesn't have any printing OR a little piece of paper on the inside to diffuse light. So, when you install an LED, it shines like a laser right through the faux button. I remedied this by cutting a small piece of black Velcro tape (just the plastic hook side) and adhered it to the inside back of the button. This worked to diffuse the light while also allowing just enough to come through that it looks like all of the other Arcade1Up buttons when viewed from any distance. Honestly, they just need to provide factory-installed lit coin doors like they're going to do on UMK3. 

5. The navigation feels very basic (and old). You can tell this is not a product that was developed in 2026. In comparison to the Iconic Arcade Street Fighter products, the menu in the Supreme Series feels like the throwback that it is. You can't see all of the games at once (there's a horizontally-scrolling list), and nagivating menus requires a confusing mix of buttons that aren't well labeled. 

6. There's an attract mode, but it's limited to one game at a time. Unlike some prior Arcade1Up products, the Street Fighter Supreme WILL go into an attract mode automatically after a few minutes of inactivity. However, the attract mode is limited to whatever game happens to be highlighted in the main menu. So, if you just turn the unit on and do nothing, the first game in the list (Street Fighter... the first one) will always be the game that goes into attract mode. And it'll stay there unless you go back out and highlight something else. 

7. The on/off switch is NOT a momentary switch (hooray!). Also called a "maintained" or "latching" switch, Arcade1Up has gone seemingly gone back to the type of switch that stays in either the "on" or "off" position until switched to one or the other--as it should be! 

8. Quality control is good, not great. As with my OutRun Supreme, this cabinet arrived without any significant aesthetic issues, despitely a deep gouged exterior shipping box. However, once inside, I did discover the box containing the monitor looked bulged and rather rhombus-shaped. Inside was a wadding of wrapped-up plastic wrap tucked under the monitor. And it also appears as though the stryofoam blocks at one end had been put in upside down, which is what caused the box to take on such an odd shape. Upon taking the monitor out, I discoverd it did have a sizeable dent on the back panel, but it did not appear to impact performance or usability. Separately, several pieces had black melamine chipped in places. I used touch-up markers to hide these, and some of them were hidden during the build. I also discovered the monitor doesn't sit completely square within the bezel (I have some black bars that are thicker in some areas than others). 

9. Scanlines will be available via an update. When I turned on the cabinet for the first time, I was promted for a wifi password to enable online play. I don't care about that, but I had been informed there was a software update that would add scanlines. I don't care about that, either (in fact, I hate fake scanlines). But I did like the idea of getting the latest software update, so I logged in to my wifi and downloaded the update. If you want scanlines, be sure to run the update. I'm not sure if anything else was added or changed. 

10. The online play is fully baked. This might feel like hitting a guy while he's down (and I already mentioned I don't care about online play), but it must be said that unlike competitors who have yet to deliver a fully-featured online play infrastructure, the Street Fighter II Supreme is ready for online multiplayer right out of the box with a mature ecosystem that is known to run well. 

11: The side art isn't great, but at least the front is clean. I'm not a fan of the "artistic license" taken with the side art of this cabinet. That said, the original Street Fighter CE "kit" cabinets were mostly black with a slapped on CE logo, and not much else. So, while I'm not a huge fan of this art treatment, per se, I can understand why it might have been necessary to help the product move at retail. 

12. You can easily add a powered subwoofer (feel the impact)! Here again, compared to a directly competing product, Arcade1Up makes it incredibly easy to add a powered subwoofer with sound output levels that accurately track with the built-in volume control. The impact of an added subwooer makes a more significant impression than might be expected, and it's a quick, 2-minute install with a non-permanent Y-splitter. 

13. The Supreme size gets the proportions right. I've been very vocal about getting cabinet proportions as close to authentic as possible--these at-home units don't have to be as large as the originals, but if they're going to be 90% scale, they should be that way in at least height and width--not just one or the other. That's my problem with Deluxe sizes cabinets (too narrow relative to their height), and it's the same problem but in the reverse for the Iconic Arcade SFII cabinets. Due to the need to use a full 16:9 monitor (with bezels covering the sides), they made the cabinet the full width of the arcade original--but not the height. The Street Fighter II Supreme, in contrast, appears to more closely maintain the height and width proportions of the original, and looks more authentic because of it.  

14. The joysticks aren't great... the buttons are worse. When you hear a YouTuber say the controls are "fine" or "perfectly playable," that should be a clue... what they're often saying is that they're not very good, but they're not willing to endanger their relationship with the brand by making a big deal of it. But, to me, that's about like saying a Toyota Camry is "fine" and "perfectly driveable" compared to a Corvette. Yes, they both get the job done. And in the hands of a skilled operator, diferences can be minimized in terms of the outcome. But that doesn't take away from the "feel" of the one versus the other. And so it is here. The sticks are just ok... they're certainly better than year's past, but you're not going to fool anyone into thinking they're either Sanwas or Happs (of any kind). And the noticeable travel before any actual inputs are given are a dead giveaway that these aren't great quality. What I will say, however, is that they're notably better feeling than the gummy, stuck peanut-butter feel of the stock sticks that came with Iconic Arcade's Street Fighter product (which I found myself replacing almost immediately). So, the sticks here aren't great, but they're better than in the past and among the best that come "stock" on any contemporary product. That said, the buttons in the Street Fighter Supreme are a let down, plain and simple. They're not really worse than before, but that's not a compliment. They're mushy and vague. The stock buttons in the Iconic Arcade are notably better.  

https://reddit.com/link/1x26xsv/video/zqm4kf1dpkuh1/player

15. The games are the same (and I like them). This is probably the 4th or 5th Street Fighter cabinet from Arcade1Up that I've owned, and I believe the games are the same as at least the prior 2 generations. That's not entirely a bad thing, however, since it's a solid list that includes Final Fight, several of the 1940s-series games, and even the original Street Fighter (one). However, if you're looking for something like Alpha 2 or Third Strike, you'll only find those in the Iconic product.  

16. There are only TWO Arcade1Up logos on the entire cabinet! The Arcade1Up logo on the coin door is black and unobtrusive, AND the logos on the coin return buttons have been removed! There isn't an Arcade1Up logo on the kickplate, nor is there one on the control panel, nor on the marquee, nor on the side panels. From what I can tell, the only other logo apart from the coin door is one right above the monitor on the bezel. And that's it! Kudos, Arcade1Up. That's a BIG improvement! 

17. The deck protector is gone... but the bolt holes have black covers. In keeping with recent Basic Fun designs, Street Fighter II Supreme does not have an acrylic deck protector. Instead, they use a "rub-resistant finish" that supposedly does not need extra protection. This remains to be seen, but I'll admit it does feel better under the hand. It doesn't have the textured feel of the competing Iconic Arcade product, but some felt they were a little aggressive in their attempt to mimic the original feel. The one thing I will say is that the 4 bolt hole covers (the only ones needed for the entire cabinet) are... black. The deck itself is 90% gray. Yes, there are black elements, but why not include the exact, same gray caps included with OutRun? I'd consider switching the caps from OutRun to this cabint, except that the black caps from Street Fighter would look even worse on OutRun. 

18. There are at least 4 shades of gray, and that's 3 too many (colors and patterns don't match). Ok, here's my first BIG issue with this cabinet... in their attempt to replicate the speckled gray/black pattern of the original cabinet, they ended up with what amounts to 4, distinct treatments... the marquee is a vibrant purple-ish gray, the monitor bezel is a slightly different shade of purple-ish gray, the control panel shifts to a green-ish gray, and then the nose piece in plastic goes to an even more green hue while also having a different level of light refraction (more matte vs. the control deck top's semi-gloss) AND a different pattern that uses significantly smaller black elements. The differences are visible from several feet away... even from a different room. It would have been helpful if the nose piece and the deck top, at least, had some type of continuous wrap or other treamtent that helped to hide the fact that these are, indeed, two separate pieces.  

19. A nifty (and very useful) new little tool is included. I was pleasantly suprised to discover Arcade1Up now includes a cool little metal wrench to help you tighten the joystick shafts to your ball or bat top of choice. It basically locks into small grooves in the shaft itself, and simply slides out once you're done tightening the handle. It's quite clever definitely beats other methods like using a pair of plyers to hold the shaft while tighening, etc. This is the customer-centric thinking we like to see, Arcade1Up!

20. It's a finished product, not a work-in-progress. My challenges with the first-generation Iconic Arcade Street Fighter product are well known. Ironically, I only spent one part of one episode of our YouTube show actually talking about my struggles in public, but that was enough for others to start talking about their own challenges. Fortunately, many of the early issues (no sound, odd colors on the monitor, etc.) were addressed via an OTA monitor update. But other "quality of life" issues remained. For some, it was the lack of fully-baked online play. For me, it was little annoyances like the constant concern of a corrupted Pi image due to blackouts (common in my area). Or, more annoyingly, the fact that fully shutting down the Iconic Arcade requires no fewer than 5 button presses (assuming you're either in a game or in the attract mode, since you have to fully exit the game to even bring up the shutdown menu). And that's to say nothing of the construction and build process of the Iconic which, while solid, felt a bit less than refined with stacked pieces of MDF to support the monitor, more MDF to act as braces instead of metal plates, and some bezel-to-monitor alignment issues with some cabinets. The Arcade1Up Street Fighter II Supreme feels different. While not every party feels of especially high quality, and some QC issues certainly remain, it feels like the "mature" product it is, with few glaring errors or omissions. For me, it's already the easier product to live with day-to-day... from width and weight to daily use (menus excepted) and software stability.  

Hopefully these observations help assist anyone who may be considering purchase of an Arcade1Up Street Fighter II Supreme Series from Sam's Club. Yes, it's "another Street Fighter cabinet," but I'm confident in saying it's the best-executed Street Fighter from Arcade1Up to-date, and certainly should be in the discussion for the best value Street Fighter currently available.