Fighting Games on MAME, Why do u they suck

[HomeRekka]

Mame seriously makes me wanna jump out a window.

Plain and simple, why doesnt it work? Firstly, my end goal is to play fighting games from SNK with a Fightstick TE.

NeoRageX plays all the games I want to use, perfectly, (IE, KOF, Garou, SNK vs Capcom, Samurai Showdown etc etc.) However, it does not support Fightsticks, or a number of other sticks either.

Fightstick TE works on MAME, but the games dont (how mucked up is that lol).

Heres the problem, I have the MAME Roms for these games, I try using them in Mame32, MameUI and Mame0133 with 0% success. Each seems to beleive certain rom files are missing. Some of them say BIOS files are missing.

I have the latest bios files, and 5+ versions of MAME. So what is going on? When did emulation become so messy?

[jb143]

It seems to me that you don't have the latest rom files. Newer versions of MAME sometimes need newer (complete) dumps of the ROMs that may have worked on earlier versions of MAME or on other emulators.

[XYXZYZ]

What I do is go to somewhere like Pleasuredome, get a torrent for the latest MAME ROMs, get all your ROMs from that source. The get the MAME version that corresponds to the torrent, and everything should be in order.

[ubersaurus]

I suggest forgetting about MAME and just grabbing Final Burn or something. Those emulators are pretty much designed around CPS and Neo Geo.

[Cryomancer]

Neo Geo games need the Neo Geo BIOS. neogeo.zip, usually. And make sure you aren't unzipping your roms, etiher.

I second pleasuredome, but i can understand that a lot of people don't want the joy of thousands of arcade games ready to play, for some reason.

[BetaWolf47]

MAME, or anything that uses that file structure (i.e. MESS) is a motherfucking BITCH to get working sometimes. Tracking down good ROMs is a pain in the ass, configuring some to work is a pain in the ass, and finding the right extension files (CHD, BIOS, etc.) is a pain in the ass. I still have yet to get the old arcade Battletoads to get working on recent versions of MAME. Plus configuring controls for every little game, lest you want controls to be good on NEO-GEO games but bad on CPS games. If there's an arcade emulator that does it more conveniently than the MAMEUI line, please let me know.

[jb143]

I guess all this is just the price we all have to pay for not needing to pump quarter after quarter into the machine to play them now.

[InsaneDavid]

'cuz u don't have the right filez.

MAME, or anything that uses that file structure (i.e. MESS) is a motherfucking BITCH to get working sometimes. Tracking down good ROMs is a pain in the ass, configuring some to work is a pain in the ass, and finding the right extension files (CHD, BIOS, etc.) is a pain in the ass. I still have yet to get the old arcade Battletoads to get working on recent versions of MAME. Plus configuring controls for every little game, lest you want controls to be good on NEO-GEO games but bad on CPS games. If there's an arcade emulator that does it more conveniently than the MAMEUI line, please let me know.

IT'S FREE.

[Ed Oscuro]

Setting up MAME's files is easy, you don't even have to mess around with ClrMAMEpro.

ALSO, there are two issues mentioned in this thread.

On the topic of sticks, make sure the sticks are plugged in before you start MAME.

If they still don't work then there's something terribly wrong with those sticks because every USB joystick that reports its button and key mapping to Windows in a standard fashion should work.

You can try using PPJoy (which I haven't tested, just seen about the webz, so YMMV) or something similar (maybe Joy2Key will work?) to get a keyboard key mapping for your stick.

Other than that, I'm kinda surprised a 360 stick wouldn't work on a PC. My Mad Catz 360 stick works just fine (for programs that need analog sticks, anyway).

[XYXZYZ]

MAWS is a good resource to find out the last MAME version a ROM has been updated for; if you're using MAME 128 and you see the that pacman or whatever was last changed in version 131, you know it's not going to work. MAME builds with built in UIs have a ROM audit feature, so you can see what ROMs are required or missing before you play a game.

[HomeRekka]

If they still don't work then there's something terribly wrong with those sticks because every USB joystick that reports its button and key mapping to Windows in a standard fashion should work.

Other than that, I'm kinda surprised a 360 stick wouldn't work on a PC. My Mad Catz 360 stick works just fine (for programs that need analog sticks, anyway).

Thanks to all for your feedback, I really feel confort in knowing im not the only one experiencing these issues.

Ed, the stick actually works for a number of programs, and I have no difficulty having MAME detect the stick. If you'll look back, you'll see it's just NEORAGEX that has stick issues, and it seems to be with a number of sticks too. The Fightstick TE I have works well on ZSNES, Street Fighter 4 PC etc, its just that NEORAGEX, the most stabe fighting game emulator I know, is very old and never updated for stick compatibility.

[BetaWolf47]

It's not "the most stable" as you say it. It just uses a different rom set than other, more updated emulators around. There's torrents for Neo-Geo ROMs floating around that only work on NeoRAGEx. Otherwise you can find MAME packs that only work on MAME and its variants.

[Ed Oscuro]

I see what's going on here. Definitely get some up-to-date MAME ROMz and voila, the stick will work, and the games too!

If NeoRageX runs games for the guy, and he's complaining about it not being updated, then he probably has an up-to-date ROMset for it, BetaWolf. The program he's using wrong / outdated ROMz on is MAME - all the games listed there do work in newer (and even older) versions of MAME, no problem.

[AB Positive]

Neo Geo needs that neogeo.zip bios, as that was the first thing that popped into my mind too. Plus, roms have to match the revision of the MAME too - I find Mame32 has the best fighter compatibility, it's what I use and I have zero problems with it. Then again I matched romset to the version too.

[ScourDX]

MAME is alright if you know where to look. Getting to work, well that is if you can find the right bios file. I remember Nebula & Winkawaks are highly recommended if you are into NeoGeo & CPS2 fighting games. Now I'm not sure if both program exist.

[Kitsune Sniper]

I think the question that should be asked is why are you using such an ancient emulator? There's no excuse not to use something newer, unless you're still running a Pentium III or something.

[AB Positive]

I think the question that should be asked is why are you using such an ancient emulator? There's no excuse not to use something newer, unless you're still running a Pentium III or something.

Or want decent netplay. Mame32 + Kaillera is still a nice netplay option to this day.

[ubersaurus]

Or want decent netplay. Mame32 + Kaillera is still a nice netplay option to this day.

2DF and GGPO are both leagues better than kaillera, to be perfectly honest :P

[Ed Oscuro]

I find Mame32 has the best fighter compatibility,

Aside from multiplayer - there shouldn't be any advantage to using one build of MAME or another when it comes to compatibility with the MAME drivers. Some builds, like MAME Plus! actually offer console and other extended drivers, but I don't even know where to find them in the GUI let alone play games with them.

I say "shouldn't be" because it's always possible one port or another will gum something up, and MAME Plus! has a disclaimer about sending bug reports on their download page. Still, my switch from MAME UI 32 to Plus! was as painless as could be, and I don't miss the straitjacket of the too feature-lean MAME UI build.

Now I'm not sure if both program exist.

???

[Kitsune Sniper]

Aside from multiplayer - there shouldn't be any advantage to using one build of MAME or another when it comes to compatibility with the MAME drivers. Some builds, like MAME Plus! actually offer console and other extended drivers, but I don't even know where to find them in the GUI let alone play games with them.

I remember that in order to play the home versions of the NeoGeo games, you had to right click on a game, go to Properties (Options?) and choose the region / bios that way. Home/Arcade, US/Japan/Asia/Europe, and so on.