"It's a videogame console. No, wait. It's a work of art."

Some may say it's both. With Yoshi's Boxx, we bridged the divide between form and function. The Boxx provides a single physical portal for videogames, a customized case representing the emerging cyberart form known as case modifications or "case modding."

Case modding is a growing art form among geeks. Case mods are judged on the artistic beauty, technical difficulty, and uniqueness of the system. Like hot-rodders tricking out their cars, depth of complexity and brilliance of flash determines who is king of the strip. Case mods can range from simple tower detailing with airbrushed designs to wildly extravagant cases with enough lights and sounds to rival a slot machine.

The vision
What makes for a great gaming experience? Is it all about the raw numbers a system has? I don't think so. It's about what we see. We are by nature visual beings, so we like to make our environment aesthetically pleasing.

If you're like me, you prefer minimalist aesthetics. How much do you think is too much: one, three, six boxes cluttering your desktop, all of them distinctly different visually? Why not mount those systems in one box?

I had been thinking about a project like this for a while, so I decided to tear apart a few systems I had lying around and compact them into one case.

The following systems are installed in the Boxx:

• Atari 2600
• Nintendo Entertainment System (8-bit)
• Microsoft Xbox
• Nintendo GameCube
• Sony PlayStation 2
• A custom PC (here's the parts list)

Want to see photos? Here are preliminary photos as I built the Boxx. To see photos of the completed Boxx, click here.

Here's how I built Yoshi's Boxx.