Advance MAME. Time to switch

meleu

@marie011101 said in Advance MAME. Time to switch:

I am just trying to get an opinion on the better emulator to use for MAME on my RP3

If you want to get an opinion, here is mine:

use lr-mame2003 (with 0.78 reference set) for most of the arcade games (exceptions below).
use lr-fba (FB Alpha v0.2.97.39 reference set) for some classic fighting arcade games (Street Fighter series, Marvel vs. Capcom, essentially those from Capcom...).
use lr-fba (same reference set as above), but putting the roms on neogeo directory, for the classic SNK games (Metal Slug series, Samurai Shodown, Art of Fighting, King of Fighters, Fatal Fury, etc.).

I don't know if it's the best choice, but it's how I organize my arcade ROMs and I'm very happy with the performance and game collection in my raspi2.

caver01

@marie011101 said in Advance MAME. Time to switch:

@caver01 {love your avatar...Joust is my all time fav game} I am just trying to get an opinion on the better emulator to use for MAME on my RP3

Thanks. I play Joust, Solid Red Label clone. I grew up with that game in local arcades, so it's probably my favorite too.

Everyone will have their own opinions about what works best, but here are my choices and the rationale behind them.

The CRT-PI shader in RetroArch does such a good job at recreating scanlines/shadow masks (with minimal performance impact) that I want to use a libretro core whenever possible.
lr-mame2003 has the best combination of performance, features, and ROM support, so this is my "base" for arcade games.
lr-fbalpha overlaps plenty of ROMs with MAME, but seems to play games better. So, I "override" my base lr-mame2003 for fighter games, neogeo, and a few others.
Where lr-mame2003 fails due to compatibility, or I need to use a newer ROMset, AdvanceMAME3 takes up some slack. AdvanceMAME is fast, has a newer ROMset, and is HIGHLY configurable, especially where complex controls are concerned. However, it is NOT a libretro core, so I can't use CRT-PI shader (not RetroArch).
Vector games--I use AdvanceMAME3 for these, as this emulator can render the vector lines at your display's native resolution making them very sharp.

So you see, it is rarely a one-size-fits-all proposition, as others have also noted. I also use the ARCADE folder for all of these and specify which emulator gets launched using Runcommand. This also means that you need to have multiple romsets and keep track of everything somehow (spreadsheet) and is not conducive with dropping an entire romset onto the Pi (as the versions will conflict/overwrite in the single Arcade folder).

meleu

@caver01 said in Advance MAME. Time to switch:

lr-fbalpha overlaps plenty of ROMs with MAME, but seems to play games better.

when you say "seems to play games better", are you referring to performance?

caver01

@meleu said in Advance MAME. Time to switch:

@caver01 said in Advance MAME. Time to switch:

lr-fbalpha overlaps plenty of ROMs with MAME, but seems to play games better.

when you say "seems to play games better", are you referring to performance?

I am, but considering that I have rested on that mindset for so long now, I admit that I have not gone back and done much comparison between lr-fba and lr-mame2003 recently--especially since upgrading from a Pi2 to an Pi3. Maybe the experience is closer now? I think we are following the same assumptions though--play the fighter games, neogeo, SNK Capcom etc. with FBA.

What is your rationale for that choice? Is it also performance?

marie011101

@meleu Now this is very helpful

marie011101

@caver01 Thanks again...great advice. Go catch some jousting "eggs"

meleu

@caver01 said in Advance MAME. Time to switch:

What is your rationale for that choice? Is it also performance?

Well... I think the conclusion that "fba is good for fighting games" is an example of collective consciousness in the retrogaming community. :-)

I have no arguments to defend this position and can't find any convincing written explanation (TBH I asked that to you in order to get some light in this subject :) ). I've "heard" it somewhere, did this way and it just works!

AFAIK our friend @dankcushions plays with the lr-fbalpha code. Maybe he can give a more informed opinion.

caver01

@meleu There was definitely a time not long ago when I could play something in the Metal Slug series in MAME, and it seemed fine, then I would load the same title in FBA and it just felt smoother, faster--as though the game was getting to the screen more directly. I don't know if it was input lag, or maybe frame rate, but FBA seemed to be a better experience. I always chalked it up to design goals by the devs: MAME has always been touted a means to accurately emulate the hardware for archival purposes, often at the expense of performance, while FBA seemed to favor playability (whether or not I am correct about that, I don't know for certain).

Having said that, I still standardize on MAME as my base, as I appreciate the MAME GUI menu and the ability to customize controls per ROM. I can do that in real-time vs. making edits to config files for FBA. I suppose I could edit controls in the Retroarch menus too, but I am just not as familiar with them and I know there are pitfalls.

meleu

@caver01 Well said. Thanks for sharing this info.

I still standardize on MAME as my base, as I appreciate the MAME GUI menu and the ability to customize controls per ROM. I can do that in real-time vs. making edits to config files for FBA.

Actually it's pretty simple to do in libretro cores (as lr-fbalpha). Check the Core Input Remapping in the docs.

Cheers!

dankcushions

@meleu :)

fbalpha is a maintained core (it has a number of programmers working on it) whereas mame2003 is basically mame exactly as it was in 2003, as far as emulation goes.

fbalpha is also used in the fighting game community (i think it's the core of that online thing that was/is quite popular), so i would guess that most of the popular fighting games are running pretty much perfectly.

so on that basis, i assume that fbalpha is the better one.. but that said, i use mame2003 for every 2d fighter it can do, and i've not noticed anything much, other than it not supporting certain rom hacks that fbalpha does. if i could wave a wand that would swap them all over for me i would probably do that, but it sounds a lot of hassle :)