Why are there so many bad MAME roms?

[norkusa]

I just got a new Intel Mac, so I've been getting back into the emulator scene now that I got a computer that's fast enough to play games on. I've been messing around with MacMAME a lot and one thing that I've noticed is that there is a BIG chunk of ROMS that don't even work (like 20-30% of the ones I've tried). I usually get a message saying that required files are missing from the ROMs.

Is this normal for MAME? I haven't messed around the PC version of MAME, so I don't know if that's any different. Are there really that many bad dumps of roms out there or is it just something with the emulator I'm using? Will I have better luck with the PC version of MAME?

[jajaja]

Maybe a stupid question, but do you have the ROM file? If you try to load a ROM from the list that isnt in the right ROM folder you will get that "missing files" error.

[norkusa]

Maybe a stupid question, but do you have the ROM file? If you try to load a ROM from the list that isnt in the right ROM folder you will get that "missing files" error.

What list are you talking about? I'm just putting the zipped roms I have in the main MacMAME rom folder. Once they are in there, they title shows up in the game select scroll-down menu and I select it.

[jajaja]

Hehe ok, im not familiar with what MAME emu for Mac, but for PC you can view all games (and just the ones that are in your ROM folder of course).

[jajaja]

*no edit button, damnit*

I mean, you can view all MAME games in the list, even the ones you dont have the ROM files for. You can also try to launch all, but it will fail of course, with the missing files error you described.

[norkusa]

Ahh, okay. Yeah, I think MacMAME is different. It only lists the roms that are in your folder, so I don't think that's my problem.

I've been reading up on this and I can understand why some of the newer roms don't work. Apparently ones like Killer Instinct need separate files besides the ROMs in order for them to work, but that doesn't explain why the older ones aren't working. They must just be bad dumps I guess?

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

It's because every time MAME gets updated, some of the ROMs that worked with the older version will no longer work. It's usually just because some of the individual chip images within the zipped ROM have been renamed or something small like that, but it totally breaks compatibility. The MAME community does this because they think of themselves as an "archiving" community rather than just an "emulation" community so they want their ROMs to as accurate a rendition of the original arcade boards as possible. Unfortunately it makes dealing with MAME a huge fucking pain in the ass. You have to know what version of MAME your ROMs were meant to go with and then using a program like CLRMAME and the proper DAT file for the version of MAME that your MacMAME is built on, you can update your ROMs to work.

And of course, newer version ROMs won't work with older versions of MAME, which becomes a pain for instance in my case where I have all v0.100.1 ROMs, but I'd also like to make a MAME disc for my Dreamcast, but can't since the Dreamcast version of MAME was built on v0.78 it something like that. I don't know if there's anyway to downgrade your ROMs like that at all.

So yeah, a huge pain in the ass. It's why I stayed away from MAME for so long. Eventually what I decided to do was just jump in grab a version of MAME and current ROMset and then jump backout and ignore all the updates from then on since I don't want to devote my whole life to keeping everything up-to-date together.

I really wish the MAME people would just stop doing all this ROM updating except when it's truly necessary. It seems like it would make life easier for everyone.


...word is bondage...

[Necrosaro420]

Arcades have been around forever

[Sweater Fish Deluxe]

Actually, there's another possibility as well. There's different kinds of ROM sets with MAME. Think of Pac-man; the original game can be considered the "parent ROM," but there's lots of other games based on Pac-man like regional variants or hacks that used some of the same ROM chips as the original but also some that were deifferent. With MAME, you have some options in how to deal with these sorts of games.

First, you can get ROMs that contains the "parent ROM" as well as its "clones" combined into one ZIP, so you could download a file called PUCKMAN.ZIP and then look at your game list in MAME and see that you have not only Puckman, but also Pac-man, Joyman, Piranha as well as different versions of Puckman and Pac-man (which often can't be told from each other in game at all, but only with a hex editor). That's called a merged ROM.

Second, you could have one zip called PUCKMAN.ZIP and then other ZIPs for Pac-man and Piranha and games like that and each ZIP will work fine on its own because they contain all the files needed. These are called split ROMs

Third, you could have the separate files like above, but instead of having all the needed files in PACMAN.ZIP and PIRANHA.ZIP, etc. the ZIPs might only contain the files that are different from the ones in the PUCKMAN.ZIP archive, whic means that PACMAN.ZIP and PIRANHA.ZIP will not work unless youalso have PUCKMAN.ZIP in the same folder so that MAME can get the files it needs from it. These are oxymoronically called merged-split ROMs.

So maybe you have merged-split ROMs of some clone games without having the parent ROMs needed to run them.

Yet another reason that MAME is way too complicated for sane people to deal with. It's great being able to emulate all these games that I wouldn't be able to play otherwise (not just the classics that I haven't played in years, but also lots of games I never would have even heard of otherwise), but I just can't believe they couldn't have made the whole thing a little more user friendly.


...word is bondage...

[Wavelflack]

I think it's because parent roms are being too permissive these days.

[Pente]

What Sweater Fish Deluxe said. Read it.

It's funny these days because you can choose how you want your romset done. Merged. Non-Merged, and Split (See description on page here) Although I'll tell you right now the majority of Mame users use SPLIT romsets which require a parent rom set which will contain the majority of the roms needed and can be run on it's own (i.e. Puckman.zip) and then tiny individual clone/child sets which will use the majority of the parent roms, but have some roms of it's own that change something or other (i.e. pacman.zip which will use the parent Puckman.zip for most of it's roms, but then have it's own little rom or two with english text in it)

'Course there's a very easy way to avoid thinking about this all yourself. Simply get on a mame newsgroup, and DOWNLOAD the latest roms. click. click. done. You got the latest working romset. You can't get much easier than that

[jajaja]

Ahh, okay. Yeah, I think MacMAME is different. It only lists the roms that are in your folder, so I don't think that's my problem.

I've been reading up on this and I can understand why some of the newer roms don't work. Apparently ones like Killer Instinct need separate files besides the ROMs in order for them to work, but that doesn't explain why the older ones aren't working. They must just be bad dumps I guess?

I think it is the emu. I've had the problems myself even when i had the ROM, but the MAME emu for PC lets you launch every game (atleast try) even if ROM is missing or bad, but you will get errors of course. I forgot to mention something earlier, i also ment that the ROM had the same name, not just missing, but you already said it detected the ROM so i guess thats not the problem.

What games do you have problems with? I can see try on my PC if they will work.

[Trebuken]

For the PC there is Romcenter and ClrMame which will clean up/merge/rename all your rom sets as long as you have the proper files. I've been using RomCenter for years.

I do not know if there is a Mac version of either but might be worth searching for, or for a similar Mac utility.

Later,
Trebuken

[roushimsx]

For the PC there is Romcenter and ClrMame which will clean up/merge/rename all your rom sets as long as you have the proper files. I've been using RomCenter for years.

I do not know if there is a Mac version of either but might be worth searching for, or for a similar Mac utility.

I used Romcenter for the longest time as well and just finally switched to CLRMAMEPro about 2 years ago. For MAME-related stuff, CLRMAMEPro is tits.

There's a few ROM managers for MacOSX, but nothing that remotely compares to CLRMAMEPro. Also, MacMAME has always been way behind the x86 versions and pretty darn inferior overall...I guess with the new intel-based chips then they'll stay more up-to-date (thank god), but the tradeoff is now you've gotta overhaul your romsets.

alt.binaries.emulators.mame is the place to go, man. There's floods all the time of the entire set and there's even a subgroup dedicated just to CHDs if you're into those things (not me!).

[Kid Ice]

I do find that some older games (like say Galaga) don't work when I update MAME...not %20 to 30 though, that's a lot (I'd say more like %5). I only update MAME every couple years but when I do I get a fresh set of ROMs instead of using the old ones. In all my years of using MAME I've never had a set up where %100 of the ROMs worked (I mean the ones that are supposed to work). There's always that 3% to 5% that don't run or have some annoying quirks.

I played Gyruss on a supergun at the last NAVA meeting and I was quite surprised at how different the look, feel, and music are from the MAME version. I get the feeling that's the way I'll be going for arcade games in the future.

[norkusa]

Thanks for that explanation, SFD. That stuff about parent/merged roms makes a lot of sense and that's probably why a lot aren't working for me. I guess I'll have to find a complete & up-to-date romset and start over with that.

I know a few people mentioned downloading sets from newsgroups. The problem for me though is that my ISP puts a cap on what I can download from NG's per-month (think it's only like 1Gb). Anyone know where else I can get a current set of roms? Or maybe sell me a copy?

I do have XP installed on my Mac...what I think I'll do is just instal MAME on that and delete the MacMAME. I was trying out both versions of MAME last night and noticed that most modern games run A LOT smoother on the Windows version of MAME. For instance, I didn't have any problems with games like Hard Drivin' or Terminator 2 in XP but when I played them in MacMAME, they were VERY laggy and buggy. Maybe I'll go back to MacMAME when an Intel version is released but until then, the Windows version is good enough for me.

[ganondorf]

They always work for me...

[Cryomancer]

Thanks for that explanation, SFD. That stuff about parent/merged roms makes a lot of sense and that's probably why a lot aren't working for me. I guess I'll have to find a complete & up-to-date romset and start over with that.

I know a few people mentioned downloading sets from newsgroups. The problem for me though is that my ISP puts a cap on what I can download from NG's per-month (think it's only like 1Gb). Anyone know where else I can get a current set of roms? Or maybe sell me a copy?

I do have XP installed on my Mac...what I think I'll do is just instal MAME on that and delete the MacMAME. I was trying out both versions of MAME last night and noticed that most modern games run A LOT smoother on the Windows version of MAME. For instance, I didn't have any problems with games like Hard Drivin' or Terminator 2 in XP but when I played them in MacMAME, they were VERY laggy and buggy. Maybe I'll go back to MacMAME when an Intel version is released but until then, the Windows version is good enough for me.

Check out pleasuredome.co.uk i think it was, or underground-gamer trackers for MAME sets.

Another problem you might be having is that you don't have the BIOS roms. Are you trying to play say..Geo Geo games? Those need the Neo Geo BIOS rom to function.

[InsaneDavid]

I just got a new Intel Mac, so I've been getting back into the emulator scene now that I got a computer that's fast enough to play games on. I've been messing around with MacMAME a lot and one thing that I've noticed is that there is a BIG chunk of ROMS that don't even work (like 20-30% of the ones I've tried). I usually get a message saying that required files are missing from the ROMs.

I've read this entire thread and instead of sitting on my high horse I'll explain this in English...

Here's the reason for "bad" roms in MAME. Please note "bad" roms and roms that won't load in the GUI are different. Bad roms exist because it's more important to dump the boards when possible and then build up support around them as the internals are figured out. This is also the reason there are so many relases of MAME and things are always chaning. Read some of the WIP pages sometime, there is TONS happening every few days. And yes, all these releases are necessary to keep the project moving forward.

Some games like Killer Instinct require disk images because there's so much data - Beatmainia is like this too.

Quite a few games are dependent on "parent" roms. For instance Neo-Geo games require the Neo-Geo BIOS roms. There are usually at least a few versions of each game, nearly every time there will be one of these that is the parent - none of the others will work unless you have the parent rom. I believe this is the problem you're having. For instance you can't have the Atari release of Pole Position work unless you have the Japanese version as the Atari releases are revisions - the Japanese one is the parent. (that's an example, I don't think that one is true but I can't think of one off the top of my head right now)

You usually won't come across split roms and crap when downloading roms, so ignore that for the time being, it'll just give you headaches.

If you want to get roms I'd suggest looking into a MAME Burner. Basically this is someone that charges you for media and sends you the entire MAME romset along with all the graphics (marquees, flyers, control panel art, etc.) and disk images on a stack of CD-R's or a few DVD-R's. That's how I've always done it. This is who I've always used, but I haven't ordered a romset in a LONG time.

[InsaneDavid]

Also check here for more information on MAME Burners, now that the FreeMameRoms collective is gone and Tombstones fell apart recently.