Attract-Mode Support Forum

Attract-Mode Support => General => Topic started by: Gday Mate on February 04, 2017, 07:09:58 PM

Title: Setting up Attract Mode to run Atari 2600 games with Mame .181
Post by: Gday Mate on February 04, 2017, 07:09:58 PM

Hello everyone, I am trying to run Atari 2600 games using Mame .181 with Attract Mode as the front end, the games work fine using Mame from a command prompt using mame a2600 and selecting my game from the list but when I try and run it through AM nothing happens. I can see all the games in AM along with my cover art and videos so I have the paths set ok, my executable is c:\emulators\mame\mame a2600

I am running this on a PC running windows 7 pro
any help would be appreciated.

Title: Re: Setting up Attract Mode to run Atari 2600 games with Mame .181
Post by: akafox on February 04, 2017, 07:39:43 PM

Running MESS and not the raspberry pi..gee I thought PC were dead ;)

might want to check your executable line and your args line

executable should be:

Code: [Select]

c:\emulators\mame\mame.exe
args line should be:

Code: [Select]

a2600 [name]
Remember mame wants shourt file names here to compare the list xml. All your roms must be in a mame like fomat. Long names may work but I am not sure if that was changed or not. If you still have problems try stella. https://stella-emu.github.io/ (https://stella-emu.github.io/)

Title: Re: Setting up Attract Mode to run Atari 2600 games with Mame .181
Post by: Gday Mate on February 04, 2017, 08:02:01 PM

Thankyou akafox, I have now set up the Executable and the args and now it brings up the mame rom list and wants me to choose a game from the list and not the game I chose from the AM wheel, ie I click on space invaders on my AM wheel and it opens the mame rom list and wants me to choose a game from A to Z.

Not able to afford the raspberry pi at this time, would love to get one but maybe one day :)

I thought the new version of mame would run Atari 2600 games now that mess has been integrated but it just seems difficult to setup, I thought I would persist before going down the Stella route. Thanks for helping. :)

Title: Re: Setting up Attract Mode to run Atari 2600 games with Mame .181
Post by: progets on February 04, 2017, 09:23:59 PM

Your arguments are a little off. Try this (obviously change the path to mame.exe if needed).

exectable

Code: [Select]

c:\emulators\mame\mame.exe

argument

Code: [Select]

a2600 -cart "[romfilename]"


Title: Re: Setting up Attract Mode to run Atari 2600 games with Mame .181
Post by: Gday Mate on February 04, 2017, 11:55:57 PM

yes it finally works thank you progets, the -cart in the arguments was all it needed.   :) something that easy caused me hours of frustration.

Title: Re: Setting up Attract Mode to run Atari 2600 games with Mame .181
Post by: progets on February 05, 2017, 12:09:36 AM

Glad you got it working.

I'm sure you know that you can do many other systems in MAME too using these.

a5200 -cart "[romfilename]"
a7800 -cart "[romfilename]"
tg16 -cart "[romfilename]"
nes -cart "[romfilename]"
snes -cart "[romfilename]"
32x -cart "[romfilename]"
genesis -cart "[romfilename]"

You get the idea.

Title: Re: Setting up Attract Mode to run Atari 2600 games with Mame .181
Post by: akafox on February 05, 2017, 06:41:11 AM

I was thinking it needed a -cart switch but it seemed to work without it. I knew that to load anything else it was a -cart switch anyway. Thankd progets...


I use "mess roms" not the "raw rom" that might be the problem..