What are people using for arcade games on Android?

[Alumriel]

18 minutes ago, JoeViking245 said:

Don't forget to be nice and let it 'seed' for a little while afterwards. 

100% agree. Pleasuredome is very strict about greedy people. But they are a superb source. Well worth the effort.

[lukeskope]

I have nothing against MAME, but maybe ages ago before it had the best compatibility with CPS and NEO GEO, I kind leaned more on FBA.  I'm using the Final Burn Neo core with Retroarch and it plays all the games I love.  I tend to stick to 2d sprite stuff so FB-Neo fits all my needs.  If I want some 3d action I generally see if there's a Dreamcast Port or a good NAOMI/Atomiswave version and run the Flycast Core in Retroarch.  Between these 2 cores I'm getting all the Street Fighter stuff, Marvel Vs Capcom 2, DOA, Virtua Fighter, MK, KOF - so 2D/ early 3D fighting games running the gamut (except Killer Instinct).  Also getting all the Metal Slug stuff, Crazy Taxi, Beat 'em Ups like Ninja Baseball Batman and Simpson, Turtles, etc.  

[dmaker]

It's funny, I end up getting these huge romsets ( upwards of 100GB or more) and all I really want to play once in a while are games like asteroids, pacman, space invaders, donkey kong, etc. Mostly just 80's arcade games. 

 

 

[lukeskope]

I get the entire set but then only extract the ROMs I want and even still only put a smaller subset on my android device.  All I really care about are Capcom/Neo Geo classics with KONAMI beat em ups and random shit like Wrestlefest, NBA Jam, Pac Man, Edward Randy, DoDonPachi for variety

[dmaker]

Not sure what I am doing wrong, but I got a .235 set and copied a handful of my favorites to my arcade folder, imported them into Launchbox, made sure retroarch plus was set to use the default arcade core, but when I try to play a game it says error unzipping rom file. But then if I try that rom a second time, it doesn't do that, but the screen goes completely black and nothing else happens.

 

EDIT: Ok, maybe it was just that rom. 1941 seems to work.  It does look like I need to first try to play a rom, let it error out about unzipping. Then try that rom again and it might work.

 

Edited August 28, 2021 by dmaker

[neil9000]

Just now, dmaker said:

Not sure what I am doing wrong, but I got a .235 set and copied a handful of my favorites to my arcade folder, imported them into Launchbox, made sure retroarch plus was set to use the default arcade core, but when I try to play a game it says error unzipping rom file. But then if I try that rom a second time, it doesn't do that, but the screen goes completely black and nothing else happens.

You should never be unzipping MAME roms, so turn that option off.

[neil9000]

Also unless its a non-merged romset you cant just pull games out like that.

[dmaker]

It's a merged set. 

 

I will turn that option off.

 

Now I need to figure out my input issues. Retroarch doesnt seem to like my logitech k830, nor my nvidia shield gamepad by default. I get into a game and have no way to insert coins or even exit the game. I have to go to my PC, launch Vysor and do it that way.  grrr

 

[Retro808]

2 hours ago, ayren.boyce said:

It would be nice to get this to work I have so many MAME roms but nothing works 

Showbox jiofi.local.html tplinklogin

What exactly is going on so we can try to help. It works, we just need to know more information from you to be able to assist.

[neil9000]

33 minutes ago, Retro808 said:

What exactly is going on so we can try to help. It works, we just need to know more information from you to be able to assist.

I banned as a spammer, they had 3 posts, all from this morning, all three containing random links.

[Retro808]

8 minutes ago, neil9000 said:

I banned as a spammer, they had 3 posts, all from this morning, all three containing random links.

Ahhh. People with nothing better to do than waste other people’s time. 

[dingodan]

I just setup mame4droid with a 0.139 rom set. Mame4droid really wanted the roms in its own directory, so I edited the launchbox xml. Surprisingly, it worked. Launchbox can read roms in ../Android/data/com.dev.mameapp/roms

Maybe I'll try the retroarch core with a newer set, as suggested above.

RIP PD 😔 🪦 if anyone can recommend an alternative I'd really appreciate it - pls send me a PM. 

[Jason Carr]

Not to bash @C0ntrA, but please don't do this. It supports hard drive sellers who are literally making a living by stealing other people's work. Most importantly, the games.

To be clear, I haven't re-read-up on this thread, but there should be no reason why anyone would need to buy a drive in order to use MAME well on Android. The Retroarch MAME core works really well, and you can use the same modern ROMs that you use on the desktop.

[ItchyRobot]

For my Launchbox/Android build on my phone, I am using Retroarch and specifically the Mame 2003 plus core since it seems to be the most compatible with my 0.198 roms. The most up to date Mame/retoarch core had a lot of issues with dual stick shooters like Back Widow and Robotron not shooting at diagonals - the 2003 plus core fixed that issue.

For my PC build, I use MAME 198 with 198 roms. Matching, as always suggested. I am stuck on 198 because I have no desire to go through the hassle of the cascading problems that can come from updating MAME from such an old build.

Edited October 4, 2021 by ItchyRobot

[Lordmonkus]

2 hours ago, C0ntrA said:

Not everyone would be so keen on that idea, but no way am I picking up roms one by one and determining their versions and downloading media files etc etc, no thanks ma'am!

My logic behind this, is that I will have full access to all the roms I need and can simply pick the ones I want out of that drive while continuing to use Launchbox as my front end.

You don't need to go and download roms one by one and no one should ever be doing this anyways. Mame sets are not difficult to find and now that The Pleasuredome web site and tracker is gone it's even easier to get complete rom sets since they are no longer locked behind a private tracker.

You can download a complete set and hand pick your roms out quite easily which is what I do.

So yeah, your entire post is wrong, you promote the buying of illegal hard drives which may have who knows what malware on it and your premise of picking games one by one from websites is wrong.

The buying of "pre-laoded hard drives" isn't as much of an issue because of "it being naughty" but more of an issue because they invariably cause issues for the end users and we end up having to provide support for them because the sellers are real scumbags. Why should we go out of our way to provide support for these people that steal roms, emulators and art work  from the community to make a profit off it ?

[Lordmonkus]

Quote

It's really no different than paying someone to fix your toilet when you could "do it yourself for free".

No, it's more akin to paying someone to break into someones house to steal their toilet and plumbing and tools to come and replace yours instead of you doing it yourself.

[Jason Carr]

@C0ntrA What you do and how you acquire ROMs is one thing, but we won't stand for promoting hard drive sellers on these forums, so please keep that stuff to yourself.

[dingodan]

2 minutes ago, ItchyRobot said:

For my Launchbox/Android build on my phone, I am using Retroarch and specifically the Mame 2003 plus core since it seems to be the most compatible with my 0.198 roms. The most up to date Mame/retoarch core had a lot of issues with dual stick shooters like Back Widow and Robotron not shooting at diagonals - the 2003 plus core fixed that issue.

For my PC build, I use MAME 198 with 198 roms. Matching, as always suggested.

@ItchyRobot
Do you notice any major differences when playing between 0.139 and 0.198? 0.198 and 0.235? I used to keep thing up to date just because, but have fallen quite far behind.

[C0ntrA]

I wasn't "promoting" anything...I was being truthful of my avenues.

Prob should have kept it to myself yes. Just like a good 50% of the users in here are doing just now I am sure.

Brutal honesty has always been a curse of mine.

[Lordmonkus]

Nice statistic you just made up.