Tutorial: Handheld and Plug & Play systems with MAME

Folly

It took some time for me to be able to check your konami/tiger handheld joystick configs.
I have a BigBen_Interactive_Usb_Gamepad.
I always used my old retroarch.cfg with joystick settings but I now created a file for automatic detection in :
/opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch-joypads
Quite some automatic detection configs can be found over here :
https://github.com/libretro/retroarch-joypad-autoconfig/tree/master/udev
I also see 8BitDo's, so you might want to use them too.
To my knowledge they aren't added in RetroPie by default.

For now I only tested most konamih games and that worked for me.
All "shooting" worked with the X button.
Probably tigerh games will work too and the configs can probably be used for more joypads and joysticks.

If I have the time I will try to see If I can add a few lines for these configs somehow.

bbilford83

@Folly Thanks! I think I did already have those there, but the handhelds still required game-by-game mapping because they all have different set-ups you can see by looking at the images of the handheld. So hopefully they could still be helpful.

Folly

@bbilford83

I added both, see post.

Retrodade

Help please,
I hope you can help, So far I was able to get all these handhelds working with the exception of all_in1 section set, other than "mc_tv200", is that because this one has mame/art?
is this what I'm missing for the all_in1? I haven't had any luck trying to search hoping reaching out is ok and thank you!

oh, also here is what error log shows,
Parameters:
Executing: /opt/retropie/emulators/mame/mame -autoframeskip "mc_89in1"
89in1.bin NOT FOUND (tried in mc_89in1)
Fatal error: Required files are missing, the machine cannot be run.

seems like every all_in1 is asking for .bins
ideas on my issue

Folly

@Retrodade said in Tutorial: Handheld and Plug & Play systems with MAME:

So far I was able to get all these handhelds working with the exception of all_in1 section set, other than "mc_tv200", is that because this one has mame/art?

Executing: /opt/retropie/emulators/mame/mame -autoframeskip "mc_89in1"

It looks like you did the setup manually, setting the rompaths in the mame.ini, correct ?

If mc_tv200 works then your install looks correct, but since others don't work I doubt it.

You have to know, It doesn't matter if you have or haven't artwork for games, games can run without it.

If other files don't work that that is because mame can't find them.
So make sure the rompath is in the mame.ini (if you did your setup manually).

Or you have old or incorrect game roms, so you should check.
My working file, with this sha1sum, is :

sha1sum /home/pi/RetroPie/roms/all_in1/mc_89in1.zip 
29e581c0b135f896d3efdb70939ef102926039bd  /home/pi/RetroPie/roms/all_in1/mc_89in1.zip

Be sure to pick them from mame-merged.

P.s.
Consider using this module-script :
https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/29682/development-of-module-script-generator-for-lr-mess-lr-mame-and-mame-standalone
Rompaths will then be automatically applied to the "runcommands".

Retrodade

@Folly said in Tutorial: Handheld and Plug & Play systems with MAME:

mame-merged.

Thank you for getting back,
I did use the add dev installer as you described
I did use 2 sets of mame merged to put it all together as 1 didn't have all from list, could that be my issue?
I went through mine some work some don't
so, I'm guessing one of those merged sets is the issue?
time to remove them n start a new search I think
I'll let you know how it goes.
Thanks again for your input/direction

Retrodade

OK we got it, after having some issues set them to mame-autoskip and they worked and really want to Thank you for reaching out!

Retrodade

This post is deleted!

Retrodade

yes it was needed i did my best
Thanks for all you do
2 questions.

image scrapes/gameslist for your Atari Portfolio, didn't did not any. currently putting together gameslist and at least screen shots if interested I can forward your way when completed unless you have them already.
I also installed the all_in1 to my downstairs image but i spent a lot of time mapping controls which id like to just drop in ...any way i can do that? location of mame mapping for these handhelds I've done to just drop n call it a day? lol
and again, thank you for making retro gaming more fun

Folly

@Retrodade

Ok that is interesting.
@bbilford83 did also such a thing setting up button-mappings but then for konamih and tigerh.
If somehow your button-mappings will work for his joystick then we have something uniform and we can merge them.
Otherwise we can also add them to my script but in a different line.
Can you share them on a google-drive just like @bbilford83 did ?
Then we can have a look on how to implement.

Aha, Gamelists for Portfolio that's nice.
Are you doing it in the same way we did for konamih etc ?
If you can share it that would be great we can push it to @DTEAM 's google-drive so it will automatically be added when downloading gamelists.
Good idea ?

Retrodade

yes sure I'll get my game list together n share and you can do what you want with it a few games have issues auto booting so i may remove them (because I'm not sure what to type to start them)
it won't have videos as i can't play a game long enough lol
but somethings better than nothing

also, yes I had to do some remaps to controls on them since my exit on arcade didn't exit without a keyboard etc..
can you tell me where I'll find the controller maps in mame?
I'm using an arcade stick and buttons

also there are a few games with "TOUCH SCREEN" options, hoping i can get my lightgun to work them, if i can figure out how to enable mouse in the emu..hoping it will see it as tough screen

Folly

@Retrodade said in Tutorial: Handheld and Plug & Play systems with MAME:

yes sure I'll get my game list together n share and you can do what you want with it a few games have issues auto booting so i may remove them (because I'm not sure what to type to start them)
it won't have videos as i can't play a game long enough lol
but somethings better than nothing

Indeed, take your time.
I will see it when you are ready ;-)

also, yes I had to do some remaps to controls on them since my exit on arcade didn't exit without a keyboard etc..
can you tell me where I'll find the controller maps in mame?
I'm using an arcade stick and buttons

The mame mappings, you are looking for, are probably in :
/home/pi/RetroPie/roms/mame/cfg
In case of using lr-mess, the mame mappings are in :
/opt/retropie/configs/all_in1/lr-mess

The setting, you are looking for, is probably in the default.cfg.

also there are a few games with "TOUCH SCREEN" options, hoping i can get my lightgun to work them, if i can figure out how to enable mouse in the emu..hoping it will see it as tough screen

Good luck !
I think mame should work OOB with mouse.
If not then you can try lr-mess/lr-mame
My generated module-scripts enables mouse by default for lr-mess/lr-mame.
So that's worth testing, hopefully it all works OOB.

duglor

@Folly Is there a way to private msg you, Folly?

Folly

@duglor said in Tutorial: Handheld and Plug & Play systems with MAME:

I have send you a mail, you can remove yours from the post.

pariziv

@DTEAM @Folly

In the 90s I played these HP48GX games on a physical device:
https://www.hpcalc.org/hp48/games/arcade/

Then you had to copy them with a serial cable via kermit:
https://www.hpcalc.org/install.php

I saw that you can run the HP48GX via mame:
http://adb.arcadeitalia.net/dettaglio_mame.php?game_name=hp48g

I have the hp48gx.zip rom running now and it looks good with the mame art:
https://www.progettosnaps.net/artworks/packs/official/hp48gx.zip

Is there any way to load these games via:
/opt/retropie/emulators/mame/mame -verbose hp48gx ... ?

Folly

@pariziv

Starting with the hp48g, this driver does not have support for media and slots (serial port / ram-card / etc).

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ /opt/retropie/emulators/mame/mame -listmedia hp48g
SYSTEM           MEDIA NAME       (brief)    IMAGE FILE EXTENSIONS SUPPORTED
---------------- --------------------------- -------------------------------
hp48g            (none)
pi@raspberrypi:~ $ /opt/retropie/emulators/mame/mame -listslots hp48g
SYSTEM           SLOT NAME        SLOT OPTIONS     SLOT DEVICE NAME
---------------- ---------------- ---------------- ----------------------------
hp48g            (none)

For the hp48gp and hp49g this is the same.
So it will probably be quite difficult to get the software working these types.

However for the hp48gx (or hp48sx) "ports" are supported, which is perhaps an option :

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ /opt/retropie/emulators/mame/mame -listmedia hp48gx
SYSTEM           MEDIA NAME       (brief)    IMAGE FILE EXTENSIONS SUPPORTED
---------------- --------------------------- -------------------------------
hp48gx           port1            (p1)       .crd  
hp48gx           port2            (p2)       .crd

When running hp48gx I can now create a .crd file in the mame-gui.
Now using the the "disktype" program it will show up as empty disk image :

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ disktype '/home/pi/hp.crd' 
--- /home/pi/hp.crd
Regular file, size 128 KiB (131072 bytes)
Blank disk/medium

This output looks hopeful, though more research has to be done.
We have to try to format the card from within the hp48gx and look if we can get a usable disk-image that we can write files to in, for example, linux.

We can find a lot of information about these models over here :
https://github.com/wyatt8740/x48
Perhaps we are even able to use this emulator and tools to create .crd files.

Folly

@pariziv

I tried some ram files that were created by the x48 emulator I mentioned earlier.
They seem not compatible once something has been written to it.
So even if files could be transferred in the x48 emulator the ram card files would not work in mame.

For me it takes too much time to figure out some solution.
So I will probably stop trying.

Perhaps you have more luck asking the same question on the mame forum :
https://forums.bannister.org/ubbthreads.php?ubb=postlist&Board=1

pariziv

@Folly

Ok. Anyway thanks for taking the time to look into it. I see there's also an Atari Portfolio thread. I will try that first.

Folly

@pariziv

Yes that's my thread.
I was hoping that I could do somewhat the same thing with the hp48gx.
But I think the format of the ram images is totally different.

Retrodade

@Folly here are my scrapes and gamelist for Atari portfolio
if you like do what you want with them, all good.
hope i helped some!

I stuck them here
https://archive.org/details/gamelist_202211