HBMame Libretro

[HoJo215]

So I stumbled upon this:

https://github.com/libretro/hbmame-libretro

and it works flawlessly on x86 for those that compile.
Not that it's hard on linux / ubuntu..

Just open a terminal into the folder and type:
make -f Makefile.libretro -j4

Hopefully this get's an official place in libretro's git at some point,
or at least a retropie script.

Credits to Zoltan45 for putting in the work.

[Sly DC]

I really hope that HBMAME will be available soon for Retropie as it has many great ROM hacks. :)

[Folly]

@sly-dc

I looked at the website of hbmame.
I can't really find what hbmame makes it so special.

Can you tell me more about it ?

[barbudreadmon]

@folly said in HBMame Libretro:

@sly-dc

I looked at the website of hbmame.
I can't really find what hbmame makes it so special.

Can you tell me more about it ?

HBMAME is a MAME fork that supports homebrews and hacks. That's the only difference.

@sly-dc said in HBMame Libretro:

I really hope that HBMAME will be available soon for Retropie as it has many great ROM hacks. :)

I believe many of them are already supported on retropie through FBNeo, but if we are missing some good ones, suggestions are always welcome.

[Folly]

@barbudreadmon said in HBMame Libretro:

@folly said in HBMame Libretro:

@sly-dc
I looked at the website of hbmame.
I can't really find what hbmame makes it so special.
Can you tell me more about it ?

HBMAME is a MAME fork that supports homebrews and hacks. That's the only difference.

Well, that is indeed what I read.
But that is a very global statement.

• What kind of hacks ?
• Which homebrews ?
• Which games are not in mame and which are in hbmame.

I looked at some commit history.
I see some differences in the commited softlists, mostly non-arcade.

That doesn't mean that homebrews cannot be played on mame when we use mame to manually load media.

I want to know what hbmame really sets it apart from mame.

[barbudreadmon]

@folly said in HBMame Libretro:

Which games are not in mame and which are in hbmame.

As i said, hacks and homebrews, by policy MAME doesn't support any romset that wasn't dumped directly from a pcb. I can't give you a list, there are thousands of them.

[Sly DC]

HBMAME emulates any kind of hacks like graphics, speed-ups (like Ms.Pac-Man going super fast), translated roms (French, Chinese, etc), new levels or new maps (like Tempest with all new levels or Bubble Bobble Lost Cave, which has ALL new levels or...Donkey Kong Spooky Remix or Christmas Remix...even Donkey Kong II: Jumpman Returns which this one makes it a complete new game).

There are also so many different hacks for Neo-Geo and Fighting games that is almost insane to choose one (but i'm really into Classics Arcade Games than fighting/brawl games).

Here's a few pics:

The best is that you should install HBMAME in your computer, install the roms and try it out for yourself, that would be my best suggestion, but i would be very thankful if anyone will port HBMAME for the Retropie! ;)

[barbudreadmon]

@sly-dc said in HBMame Libretro:

HBMAME emulates any kind of hacks like graphics, speed-ups (like Ms.Pac-Man going super fast), translated roms (French, Chinese, etc), new levels or new maps (like Tempest with all new levels or Bubble Bobble Lost Cave, which has ALL new levels or...Donkey Kong Spooky Remix or Christmas Remix...even Donkey Kong II: Jumpman Returns which this one makes it a complete new game).

As i was saying, most are already available on retropie, through FBNeo and/or mame2003+.

I didn't know tempest had hacks, any suggestion about the ones i should add to FBNeo ?

[Folly]

@sly-dc

Thanks for for giving some useful examples.

Tried some things but all compilations, libretro and standalone, fail on my "I3 x64" with debian 11.

Not really sure why, so for now I have to stop because it takes too much time for me.

Btw. Seems the libretro version isn't updated anymore.

[barbudreadmon]

@folly said in HBMame Libretro:

Btw. Seems the libretro version isn't updated anymore.

Not surprising, afaik mame2003+ is the only mame libretro core with active maintainer(s)

[Lister of Smeg]

@folly Here's a list
(I thought this project died when robbbert stopped releasing MisFitMame - can't believe that was 10 years ago)

[Folly]

@lister-of-smeg

Aha, so it is on progettosnaps, earlier I wanted to have a look over there but you have found it already.

@barbudreadmon
Could be useful to check for FBNeo.

[barbudreadmon]

@folly said in HBMame Libretro:

Could be useful to check for FBNeo.

I prefer a curated list of hacks people would like to play, rather than having thousands of hacks no one will play.

[Folly]

@barbudreadmon

Indeed, that a better way ;-)

[JimmyFromTheBay]

@folly said in HBMame Libretro:

@barbudreadmon

Indeed, that a better way ;-)

Okay, this is a field where I can help, because curation is my thing :)

As you know I've already managed to get a lot of the better HBMAME games running by workarounds, so while it'd also be nice if something supported those ones natively to make life much easier for people, the below is a list of the ones that have so far defeated my attempts to run them, but are worth preserving because they're interesting and/or fun in their own right.

Alien Armada (HBMAME name aa.zip) - a remarkable hack of Crush Roller/Make Trax to play a good version of Space Invaders

Codename: Blut Engel (cnbe2018.zip) - completely original shmup.

Crash (crashh.zip) - Crush Roller/Pac-Man hacked to play a version of Head-On

Jonas Indiana And The Lost Temple Of RA (ltorb.zip) - completely original platform game.

Lazy Bug (lazybug.zip) - a hack of Crush Roller/Pac-Man to play a version of Lady Bug

Pac-Man X/Ms Pac-Man X (pacmanx.zip, mspacmnx.zip) - high resolution versions, discussed in previous thread but I wasn't clear if emulation of them was impossible entirely or just not possible via my fakeout method.

Pac-Manic-Miner-Man (pacminer.zip) - incredible port of the legendary Manic Miner to Pac-Man hardware.

Sokoban LE (sokoban.zip) - a completely original game, I've no idea where to start with this one.

Speccies 2 (speccies.zip) - see Sokoban LE.

Sqij (sqij.zip) - see Speccies 2.

Super Zola Pac-Gal (zolapac.zip) - as mentioned in the other thread, a Ms Pac-Man hack with a timer feature that I haven't been able to get to work like other Ms Pac-Man hacks.

Wavy Bug (wavybug.zip) - a hack of Crush Roller/Pac-Man to play a different version of Lady Bug to the one in Lazy Bug.

[Folly]

@jimmyfromthebay

Your reply is basically for @barbudreadmon, correct ?

[barbudreadmon]

@jimmyfromthebay I'll probably add the hacks/HBs that run on original hardware, and maybe the ones which only require very small hardware modifications. I'm definitely not adding pacman HD. Also, we already support the 2 neogeo homebrews, although the required romsets might be slightly different from hbmame's.

[barbudreadmon]

@jimmyfromthebay

• cnbe2018 : i had to convert hbmame's romset to something usable in FBNeo, this game is PD so i'll share the converted romset here : https://anonfiles.com/Ba0ercD1x7/cnbe2018_zip . Note that i don't know if there is anything different from cnbe which we already supported : it's 12 years older but has the same warning about the game's development being on an infinite hiatus.
• ltorb : we supported that exact romset as ltorb1 years before hbmame... i just renamed ours for convenience because asking mamedevs to follow our naming is probably a lost cause...
• crashh : support added, nothing special to mention
• lazybug : support added, nothing special to mention
• pacminer : support added, nothing special to mention
• sokoban : support added, nothing special to mention
• speccies : support added, nothing special to mention
• sqij : support added, nothing special to mention
• wavybug : support added, nothing special to mention

The other pacman hacks aren't meant to run on real pacman hardware so they'd require more work as we don't support their "custom hardware" at all, i'll try to add them if i find the motivation. All hacks aside from pacman HD got added, sorry but i'm not into "HD remasters" and furthermore adding those would be a pain.

Edit : i added aa and the 2 other hacks based on the same "custom hardware" (dderby and bace)
Edit2 : i added zolapac, but is it normal for this game to be very fast ?

[JimmyFromTheBay]

@barbudreadmon said in HBMame Libretro:

Edit2 : i added zolapac, but is it normal for this game to be very fast ?

Yes, it has the high-speed "cheat" option on permanently.

And thanks!

[barbudreadmon]

@jimmyfromthebay said in HBMame Libretro:

Yes, it has the high-speed "cheat" option on permanently.

Thanks for confirming.

If you know of any other worthy hack/homebrew, let me know.