I need help with MAME on my RaspberryPi 3

martinrdgz

@simonster yes you're 100% right

simonster

These are the ones I know.

"samples" contains a set of sound samples required from some early games (where the audio cannot be emulated for some reason or another)
"m37b5s " is the source code that is compiled to build a version of MAME that supports 0.37 roms (you do not need this)
"ROMs are Non-Merged" is a note that the Roms rely on parent versions when required (such as the 2 player version of turtles - tmnt2p, requires the 4 player version to work, as it only contains the different roms). There is an article in the wiki on Merged vs non-merged sets.

martinrdgz

@simonster Thanks! Also I'm getting the .078 romset too

rbaker

@martinrdgz did you read this non technical guide I wrote?

https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/7247/guide-arcade-games-and-how-to-play-them-a-non-technical-mame-fba-tutorial

meleu

@simonster said in I need help with MAME on my RaspberryPi 3:

but hopefully is now on the right track.

The right track starts at reading the Arcade wiki. If this is hard to understand, this track can start at reading the How to use MAME with RetroPie guide or the link posted by @rbaker above.

Without reading the docs, it's not the right track.

martinrdgz

@rbaker My bad, I might have missed it since I’m struggling with researching and understanding all of this, but I’m on it now. Again, I want to thank everyone from the bottom of my heart who has tried to help me understand and offered their support. Thank you so much, you all don’t know how much this means to me.

simonster

@meleu

Agreed, I think the article by @rbaker is great. I just wanted to make the point that I didn't think he was using a third-party image.

dankcushions

@simonster said in I need help with MAME on my RaspberryPi 3:

"ROMs are Non-Merged" is a note that the Roms rely on parent versions when required (such as the 2 player version of turtles - tmnt2p, requires the 4 player version to work, as it only contains the different roms). There is an article in the wiki on Merged vs non-merged sets.

pedant alert: it's the opposite :) non-merged means clones don't need parents; all roms work standalone: https://github.com/RetroPie/RetroPie-Setup/wiki/Validating,-Rebuilding,-and-Filtering-Arcade-ROMs#crash-course-in-arcade-roms

also, i don't know why OP is using mame 0.37b5 - recommended for pi3 is 0.78 + lr-mame2003: https://github.com/retropie/retropie-setup/wiki/Arcade#step-one-choose-an-arcade-emulator

Darksavior

@dankcushions said in I need help with MAME on my RaspberryPi 3:

also, i don't know why OP is using mame 0.37b5 - recommended for pi3 is 0.78 + lr-mame2003: https://github.com/retropie/retropie-setup/wiki/Arcade#step-one-choose-an-arcade-emulator

It's because he downloaded a 3rd party image with that installed and now he's wondering why his games don't work. Not sure why there's so many responses on trying to help this lazy guy. I stopped helping until he starts with a clean image.

martinrdgz

@darksavior Look, I don't appreciate you calling me "lazy guy" when you don't even know me. I would like to be treated with the same respect I've been giving others. If you want to start name-calling, I’ll treat you the same way. For all I know, maybe you’re someone who doesn’t have a job and still lives off your parents' income, simply [you don’t understand the responsibilities of life].

Now, I don’t think you'd appreciate me talking to you like this when I don’t even know you. If you don’t have anything good to say, please keep it to yourself.

Also, you mentioned I’m using a 3rd-party image—what I did was extract the ROMs and delete the image. There's no need to get worked up like it’s a big deal. If you think it’s such a problem, I don’t mind deleting everything and getting the ROMs myself. And just to clarify, I never said the MAME 0.37b5 romset came with the 3rd-party image.

sirhenrythe5th

Folks, calm down.
It is just about gaming, nothing to get in war.

simonster

Thanks @dankcushions , I was tired and started writing non-merged and ended up thinking split sets when writing. Oh well!

So @martinrdgz - each game in the non-merged set is self contained (i.e. doesn't rely on parent games).

caver01

@martinrdgz I think the problem with a third party image in this case, even if you are not running that image, is that you really don’t know that the ROMs that are on that image are correct to begin with. They might be, or they might not be. You could be just copying over incorrect ROMs that the person who made that image had wrong all along. There’s no way to be sure.

SO, let’s say you are trying to do the right thing, using the official image, but you are filling it with ROMs from an unknown source. Then, if a game doesn’t work, how can you be sure you have the right version of any ROM? You are relying on that 3rd party image being correct.

Most of the advice here is about getting the knowledge to understand exactly what you need without breaking forum rules about where you can go to get what you need. Understanding MAME is the key to this process. Knowing that each version of MAME has a corresponding set of ROMs that work with it is the point. Sometimes, a given ROM won’t change from version to version and you get lucky, but more often than not, folks don’t understand that the version of the entire set has to match the version of MAME being used, and if it doesn’t, you will eventually come to a ROM that fails even while some of them might accidentally still work.

It is best to abandon that third party image as a source of ROMs and look for the reference sets you need. As others have recommended, using ROMset 0.78 and using it with lr-mame2003 is your most flexible option.

Sano

I would add that Retropie is mainly an opensource project, based on Linux.
Free software users/devs are nearly always prone to help people, as long as said people does a minimum of efforts by reading manuals, doing google searchs, or trying to understand what they are doing.
Not that we are necessarily pedantic (I'm a linux user for nearly 2 decades now, and have tried to help people on the internet for nearly as long, so I'm including myself), but :

docs represents a lot of work to do, and it's not well seen to ask questions without event consulting it
devs/helpers are nearly always volunteers, doing this kind of stuff on their free time, and answering a question that is well documented is a waste of time that could be better used coding or helping users with more interesting issues
...

Here is a classic paper that anyone should read at least once : http://catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html#intro

martinrdgz

I would like to thank each and every one of you who has tried to help me understand the MAME system. It means a lot to me. I have learned a lot and now have MAME working. This wouldn’t have been possible without all of you. Thank you so much!