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Help switch from Retroarch to Mame for Intellivision


BuffySlayer

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Hello there. I'm a bit of a noob, but managed to follow Launchbox tutorial on adding Intellivision games into Launchbox using using freeintv core in Retroarch. Games open fine but I have little to no control with either my xbox 360 controller or my arcade joystick/buttons, and no option for remapping buttons. So I want to swap to Mame as I'm more comfortable mapping the keys with it, but have not managed  yet. I think I'm getting a bit confused with folder structure and where to put the bioses required. 

Currently have intellivision games in int. format in folder named Mattel Intellivision, with bioses zipped in same folder. I also tried creating Intv folder in Mame folder with bioses in that, no good. 

So, what am I doing wrong? Do they need to be in different format? Do I maybe just add roms to Mame rom folder? 

FYI, my mame set is non merged 0.243 that I curated using All killer no filler bat file found on here, and it's working fine. 

Any and all help much appreciated 😊 

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5 hours ago, BuffySlayer said:

Currently have intellivision games in int. format in folder named Mattel Intellivision, with bioses zipped in same folder. I also tried creating Intv folder in Mame folder with bioses in that, no good. 

".int" format should work with standalone MAME.

Try:

Create an "intv" (lowercase i) folder inside your ../MAME/roms/ folder (MAME being the folder that has mame.exe in it)

Place you Intellivision roms and bios files in it.  (Bios files being "intv.zip" and "stic.zip")

Start mame.exe.

Type "intv" (no quotes)

Select "Intellivision"

On the left side of the screen, click "Available".

Do you see a list of 'games'?

image.thumb.png.6884bdacc78125dc7379b86afa2892d4.png

If so, double click one of the games, see what happens and report back.

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Hi and thanks for the tips.

I've followed your advice and created intv folder inside Mame roms folder. I placed the games and the intv.zip, but i do not have the stic.zip - do you know which files reside in this, as per below i have voice and ecs zips?

When i open mame and type in intv, all the games come up, but disappear when i click on available.

image.png.3bc7c3d632f223c29f328ae1ad0dfc57.png

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56 minutes ago, BuffySlayer said:

still no joy with games being available

In your MAME folder should be a file "mame.ini".  [With MAME not running...] Open it with a text editor (notepad or whatever) and look for the line that says rompath.  On that line it may only have the name (folder, actually) roms.  Change that last part to  "roms;roms/intv"  including the quotes and semi-colon (with no space after it)

rompath       "roms;roms/intv"

 

image.png.4a7f24b55da21aac992f434c056c7e15.png

 

Save, close, start MAME and try the afore mentioned steps again.

 

If you don't find a mame.ini file (look in both MAME's root folder and in the ../MAME/ini/ folder), do this instead: 

  1. Start MAME
  2. double click Configure Options
  3. double click Save Configruation
  4. Press Escape
  5. Press Escape again to exit MAME
  6. Now jump to the steps above to edit mame.ini
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Ok, so screenshot below is of my mame.ini which i saved, but upon opening mame, games still disappear when i click on available. When unfiltered, if i click on them i get error "Required ROM/disk images are missing or incorrect....." - I'm pretty sure the files are ok though as they opened and worked with retroarch but i just had no control. This might be a silly question, but could the fact i'm using a 0.243 no nag version of mame make a difference?

 

image.png.df24b2eb5474cd37f5a548058a7c57d9.png

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10 hours ago, BuffySlayer said:

could the fact i'm using a 0.243 no nag version of mame make a difference

No.

Belated thought... since your ROMs are in .int format, they're probably named after the games proper title.  MAME looks for it 'short-name'.  So for "Armor Battle", it's looking for "armorbtl".  That's why they don't show as "Available".

A different test:

open the Windows Command Prompt to the location where you mame.exe file is located.  Type in

mame.exe intv -cart "D:\MAME\roms\intv\Armor Battle.int"

Change the path and rom name to one that actually matches one you have.  Press Enter.

 

When (if?) that works...

With using non MAME Software List ROMs, they'll still work.  But you'll need to un-Check both Remove quotes and Remove file extension and full path in your emulator settings.  You'll probably want to create a new instance of your MAME emulator in LaunchBox.  Just add a new emulator and point to the same mame.exe.  Uncheck those boxes. Then in Associated Platforms, set the platform (Mattel Intellivision?), the Default Command line to "intv -cart" and check Default.

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Thanks Joe, I'll give this a go (it's right at my skill limit tho). If I stuff it, would it be worthwhile looking for a rom set with the shortened names? Or, renaming games (there'll only be 20 or 30 games that I'll play, not all 130 odd)? I have found mame intv xml which lists game names.. 

Edited by BuffySlayer
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4 hours ago, BuffySlayer said:

Screenshot below has me more confused....(tried with and with and without space in front of mame

image.thumb.png.494f50c657882b9bc4c226101c03d068.png

I did also try renaming a couple of games, and once renamed they do show up as available once filtered, but still don't run, with same error

Are you in the directory where mame.exe is located?

Are you using Powershell or command prompt? If Powershell, make it .\mame.exe

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Very much not an expert in this area. I typed cmd in search and opened command prompt. It opened to my c drive, but my mame.exe is in E drive, so I typed E: & enter, then what is in the screenshot. My mame.exe resides in the Mame 0.243 Roms and chd folder

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16 minutes ago, BuffySlayer said:

Very much not an expert in this area. I typed cmd in search and opened command prompt. It opened to my c drive, but my mame.exe is in E drive, so I typed E: & enter, then what is in the screenshot. My mame.exe resides in the Mame 0.243 Roms and chd folder

You have to change into the directory mame.exe is in then.

Quote

cd "LaunchBox\Games\Arcade\MAME 0.243 ROMs and CHD (merged)"

 

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Ok, so that kind of worked, thanks! Game started and i pressed tab to set some controller buttons (i have ipac joystick & 8 buttons), but not all were able to be set.

When i exited, i got this Invalid Bios error message....any thoughts? 

image.thumb.png.b830bf14b1bc66e0dffd13cfe33163ef.png

Below are contents of my intv.zip & stic.zip - anything look amiss?

image.png.87f46313b885ea7a00c87c0d47f5910f.png

image.png.ee8ee6326d8231dc25b3ad7047056c07.png

Thanks guys, i really appreciate your help so far. I would never have gotten this far on my own.

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When it comes to MAME roms, names really don't mean much, it's all about the checksum.

You can always use 

Quote

mame.exe intv -listroms

to see the checksums for the files it expects. Then you would have to compare with the checksums for the files within your intv.zip rom. (If you have 7-zip installed, its has a right mouse click contextual menu for getting checksums)

 

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So close now - have games opening in launchbox!!

It was a really dumb error on my part, i'd put the bios zip files in the intv folder. Once i moved them to roms folder, voila.

Now for my final help request - does anyone using mame know which buttons to map to joystick? I have mapped most of the numbered keys to my 8 buttons, but my joystick direction is off, and there's x analog, x inc, x dec, etc - also which configuration corresponds to the side buttons on the old controller??

Any help once again much appreciated :)

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Glad you got it working!

8 hours ago, BuffySlayer said:

Now for my final help request - does anyone using mame know which buttons to map to joystick? I have mapped most of the numbered keys to my 8 buttons, but my joystick direction is off, and there's x analog, x inc, x dec, etc - also which configuration corresponds to the side buttons on the old controller??

How did you map the numbered keys?  (rhetorical)

Launch a game.

Press tab

Select Input (this Machine)

Select which control you want to change (highlight it and press Enter [not Enter on the 10-key]) and then press the key (or move your joystick) that you want to use for that action/movement

I've never used the Intellivision controller but looking at pictures, it has 2 buttons on each side.  Looking at the choices you have to configure in MAME for it, I'm going to guess that that the 2 top side buttons do the same thing (Upper).  And the 2 lower buttons are separate (Lower-Left, Lower-Right).  Essentially meaning you have 3 buttons to assign.

The default joystick movement/assignment is pretty descriptive.  X Analog Inc = [Kbd] Right.  X Analog Dec = Left.  If you think back to your math classes and plotting x-y coordinates, it's just like that. ;) The 2 settings shown that don't have "Inc" or "Dec", as indicated are for using your mouse.

image.thumb.png.bfbd17b48cd852f9e50b7ef49d8262e4.png

When you're all done, press Escape twice to exit back to the game.

You will now have in your /MAME/cfg/ folder, a file called "intv.cfg".  Anytime you run an Intellivision game, MAME will load these controller settings.

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Thanks Joe, 

My plan is to set my coin and start buttons to clear and enter. The upper button is most commonly used, so will map to first of my 8 buttons, then will map remaining numbers to 7 remaining buttons. This won't work with all games, but will hopefully get me through until this arrives - https://atariage.com/forums/topic/334580-a-new-controller-is-coming-soon/

Again thanks for your help.

As a little aside, my first job (as a 10 year old!) was selling Intellivision, Atari and Commodore 64 consoles and games at a stall in Flemington markets in Sydney. I would use my pay to buy games for my Intellivision, so this will bring back some great memories. 

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