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Just curious - MAME vs. collecting - one or both?

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Kevin Mullins:

What is this thing you call M-A-M-E ??  

Seriously though...... I have either dedicated or converted cabs, amongst other types of machines. You tend to run out of space quickly that route. I have yet to build a MAME cab, but will one day. (just not a priority) I also tend to cater to gatherings of littler kids and teenagers, so ONE machine, even TWO machines just won't cut it.

Really boils down to:
1. Space
2. Funds
3. Time
4. Type of USE



DaveMMR:

I already cleared it with the significant other.  When we get our house upstate, the basement is mine for dedicated cabs.  That being said, I love my MAME cab and the dedicated will be for the bona fide classics (Pacman, Galaga, et. al.) or games that I can't replicate too easily on the MAME cab (Marble Madness, Paperboy, etc.). 

Nipedley:

When I set out to buy my first cabinet I did so to find a clapped out old banger with the intention of MAME'ing it, not giving a second thought to having an original.

Turns out when the clapped out old banger cabinet arrived I discovered it's original form was my first love in gaming and that got me into restoring it. Since then all notion of a MAME cabinet went out the window and its stays on my PC, while the cabinets stay as the factory intended as far as possible :)

severdhed:

i think alot of us would rather have dedicated cabinets if possible. but often we are limited by space and money.  1 cabinet is much easier to get wife-approved than a bunch of dedicated cabinets.  i just simply dont have the room for a bunch of cabinets, so i have a mame cabinet.  although if i found a cheap DK cabinet, i'd find the room for it

Jack Burton:

When MAME is set up right I find it preferable to a dedicated cab.

Undeniably there is a magic to playing a pcb on a dedicated cab, but I find that when I really get down to playing the game that sort of fades into the background and I don't care as much anymore.  

For the games that MAME emulates 99.9% accurately this is especially true.   I don't think I could tell the difference between MAME and a Galaga PCB if MAME was mounted in the original cabinet running in native resolution on an arcade monitor with identical controls and speakers.  There might be the tiniest bit of difference in responsiveness of controls, and the screen might tear or jitter a little bit.  I don't notice these things when I'm playing the game.  The ability to play with different controllers, pause, save snapshots, and other MAME only functions means that I prefer to play on an emulator.  

I'll add this fact though.  Most of the classics I never played in the arcade for any relevant amount of time.  My experiences are completely rooted in my experiences of the last few years seeking out classics in the wild and playing them there.  I have probably played Galaga 40 hours or so in MAME, and 4 hours in an arcade.  Take from that what you will about my own opinions.

I prefer MAME because for any given cabinet it allows you to play a wider variety of games.  Many games share the same controls and a MAME setup in a dedicated cabinet would allow you to play all those games.  For Galaga this would be 163 games playable with a 2-way joystick and 1 button.  You can add another 43 games to that if you use the start button for button 2, and if your cab has a 2p button you can use that for button 3 and add a further 3 more games.

My personal setup that I'm working on will be a vertical MAME cab with an 8 way joystick that can be set to 4 way when necessary.   I will have 4 action buttons and 2 player buttons.  The top of the cab will have some hidden admin buttons.  For this cab I expect to be able to play a thousand games or so.

The ideal setup would be a combination PCB + MAME cabinet.  Leave everything as original as possible, then add a switch to enable MAME whenever you want to play something else.  


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