Am I the ONLY one still using MALA?

[MikeyJ122]

When I was putting together my machine, I couldn't get Hyperspin to work. My PC is an old Dell Dimension. I discovered MALA and got it working like a champ. I've actually been VERY happy with it. Sure it might not be the "prettiest", but it does the job. I also found it to be very user friendly. When I watch videos on YT of others set ups, it seems like only OLDER videos have MALA.

Do any of you guys still use it or have you moved on. If you have moved on, why? If you are still using MALA, why? I'm just curious.

On of the BIG reasons why I like it, is because I can run Terrordrome and MUGEN just like any other emulators. I actually discovered MUGEN before I even created my machine, so I have put a LOT of work into that game. So it's a MUST have for my system. Not to mention it's kinda like a "greatest hits" type game for my machine. What other game can have Mario, Sonic, Sub Zero, Ryu and Donkey Kong in the same game?

Anyways, I WILL probably always run a MALA on a windows PC, if for no other reason but because it runs MUGEN.

[dgame]

Still use MaLa. Do you use dynamic elements in your layout?

I posted my MaLa layout here:
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,120617.msg1600225.html#msg1600225

Welcome to the forum

[MikeyJ122]

Yes, I use some interesting elements in my layouts. I have dedicated layouts for all of my emulators. I also have a video and music that changes for each emulator. All though I couldn't get a video for each game (I think it over loads my PC). So I instead have a "greatest hits" type video that plays for each emulator. I also have a video that plays at the beginning of launch of the program, that I REALLY like. It can be bypassed of course, but it adds a nice touch at start up imo. I've always been pretty satisfied with MALA, so I haven't really felt the need to change. Although other FE might be fancier, it get the job done and looks good doing it. Which is all that really matters to me.

Thanks btw, I've been a long time lurker, just never posted before. I actually got my layout designs from this very forum a few years ago.

[loadman]

I still use it :-)

[MikeyJ122]

I knew there had to be a few 

[MikeyJ122]

I still use it :-)

BTW, I just realized you are the creator of it. I like your work 

[mike boss]

I love Mala, I think it is very polished and has all the features you could want.
I love creating my very own custom layouts for all my projects (I also display my work here, and I am available to custom work (SHAMELESS PLUG) ...).

Mala is a top shelf program, I love it.

[MikeyJ122]

So I just SOLVED a MAJOR problem I was having. I was honestly about to ask @Loadman for some help. I recently added some new emulators to my system, and I COULD NOT get the games list editor to recognize them. They were in the tree, and worked in MALA. It was just games list wouldn't recognize them. Which wasnt a MAJOR issue, but I like things nice and tidy, so games that are misspelled or have (world) or whatever after them really bothered me.

I still couldn't get games list to work properly (I have NO idea what's going on there). But I found a work around. I just went into the roms folder and renamed the roms, then refreshed the "All games lists" in Mala. So it cleaned up the names, and the roms work, so now I'm happy.

It was a rough 24 hours though, I gotta be honest. I even looked up Launchbox and was considering dropping Mala over this. My machine is Windows XP, and Launchbox wont run on XP. So I basically knew it was Mala or bust. I'm just glad I found a work around, that didnt entail reinstalling the system from scratch. It's a pretty big chore renaming and configuring 1000 games, when 70% were fine as they were.

I've been putting a lot of work into my machine lately (I plan on buying the 4 player 32" set from recroom masters as soon as I can afford it. So I just want to get my actual PC as good as possible before I make the big purchase. I had 3 games missing from my system that REALLY bothered me, Daytona USA, Dragons Lair, and Gauntlet Legends. Well... I got Daytona (and others) working thanks to the 0.9 version of the Model 2 emulator. I also got Dragons lair working (it's the Sega CD version, but hey at least I have a version). I have tried and tried to get Gauntlet Legends working. Which it does... sort of. It's just SUPER laggy, and basically unplayable. So that's a bit of bummer, but 2 out of 3 isn't bad. Plus I've added 200 or more additional games (since I was already making additions). After checking out this forum for Gauntlet Legends help, Ive discovered that game gives a lot of people trouble. So I guess it's just NOT possible to work on my old Dell Dimensions XP PC. Which I'm not about to upgrade anytime soon. I would honestly get my OG Xbox modded with games like Gauntlet and others preloaded on them, before I mess with my Mame machine. It does 99% of what I've asked it to do, so I can't complain there (especially getting Sega Model 2 working, that's a pretty awesome bonus).

Anyways, despite the set backs, Mala came through in the end for me. I'm just about done messing with it though, lol. Leave it alone, just be thankful for what I got, lol.

[TheElectricMonk]

Chalk up another MALA user here.

It does everything I need it to do, so I was never really tempted to look at other frontends. I like the fact that I can just declare roms as .bat files and basically have a playlist that runs whatever I want it to.

I've even used it for projects like a steampunk X-ray machine in a LARP I was running. The "roms" were jpeg files with different x-ray pictures, the "emulator" was IrfanView, and the menu was just images of different gears turning, so whenever I moved the joystick, it looked like the machine was grinding along instead of scrolling through a game list.

For me, MaLa has just three little flaws:
a) It's slow to change menus in resolutions larger than 800x600
b) Sometimes the layouts get screwed up when a game starts in another resolution (yes, even using the latest beta and having "reorder layouts" checked)
c) The game lists don't wrap properly, i.e. when you scroll to the end of the list, the first item doesn't appear straight after the last one.
But all these three are insignificant in comparision to the software's versatility.

[big10p]

Still use Mala here, on 2 cabs. No plans to change to another FE.

[Osirus23]

Using it on my cabs. It works and once I get a cab up and working I usually don't change anything.

[danny_galaga]

I'm still using it, just having a hard time trying to find out how I used to run my servostiks! They used to work but I've since re-installed windows. Is it Joychoose? I thought I had a folder with all I needed but cant find it now

[retrometro]

March 2020 checking in here with MaLa as the FE to Windows XP x64 on an ArcadeVGA 3000 and Wells Gardner D9400 CRT.

The last time I updated my cab was May 2015.  Then trying to get the latest mame in 2019 caused all sorts of issues.  The first was that between 2015-2019, the mame team required your GPU to have shader model support above 2.0 which most 2000 era video cards like my ATI X700 had.  So upgraded that to an ATI HD5000 series card which supported shader model 5.0 but not soft15khz which is what I used for driving the lower resolution at 15khz.  So then downgraded to an ArcadeVGA 3000 to support up to shader model 4.0.

Then, I found that the mame team had also moved on from their GCC compiler version so that somewhere between 0.204 and 0.215 they dropped support for Windows XP.  So then I found newer compiles that worked since I kept getting kicked out trying to compile it myself.  So that's checked.

Then, I found that MaLa 1.74-1.82 didn't support MAME XML past 0.162 which was fine as someone else here found that it only broke bc the mame proj changed an XML header that MaLa was expecting. 

The boot drive has been imaged multiple times, mame and MaLa backed up several times over to multiple physical locations...   

So now that this old bag of 2000 era retro setup is brought to 2020, let's see who will have the last running copy of MaLa!

[thatgammon]

 :cheers:nope will use it as long as im breathing..

[PaTrYcK]

I'm still with mala!

[FinnJävel]

Same here. It's buggy but it's so easy to create your own layouts.

[RichardAE]

one more

[Phreakwars]

Yep, I use it for older hardware. Still a great FE. Had to modify .xml for newer version of mame, but still works just fine. Here is a copy of my .XML This is MAME .225 https://mega.nz/file/ztIjiAbK#SvFy0f1OHnhdeHFqm-ollCIEHo4ZdwXF0ga9_9uClTk

[Tommy714]

I started using MALA about 16 years ago when I built my first machine.  I see absolutely no reason to change.  It is good looking, easy to use, and solid as a rock.

I'm running it on a Pentium 4 with Windows 98. 

Two player setups with 4 buttons each.

Trackball

Light Gun

Ultimarc ipac2 board

[johnye_pt]

Also using MALA in 2024!

I got lucky and found the exact same model of Arcade I used to play on when I was a teen.

Hardware: Asrock S478 board + P4 HT 3Ghz, Arcade VGA (modded 9250 ATI AGP card), Ultimarc I-PAC2 PS/2 version, SONY Trinitron 21" CRT with SCART RGB, working double coin door, stereo sound, marquee with LED lamp, 2 players with 6 buttons each + 2 Start buttons + 2 side buttons for Pinball games. Board and TV are setup to power on when they receive current, so everything powers on with the original top switch.

Software: MicroXP v0.83,  MAME 0.170, MALA 1.8.2.0 with SFII-CUSTOM-BLK-GREY layout, Snap + Video previews for all ROMs. MicroXP is a very small version of Windows XP Pro Volume SP3 (CD is 100MB) with nothing but the essential so it boots VERY fast, and it's configured to show the "It's now safe to turn off your computer" message instead of automatically shutting down. 

The ROMs currently on the machine are from the "All Killer No Filler Games Lists" + my personal Favorites, with a total of 733 games, separated by the game lists below:
Best of - All Games (733)
Best of BeatEmUps + Hack and Slash (90)
Best of Classics (Horizontal) (30)
Best of Classics (Vertical) (61)
Best of Platforms (77)
Best of Puzzles (61)
Best of Run and Gun (65)
Best of ShootEmUps (Horizontal) (81)
Best of ShootEmUps (Vertical) (83)
Best of Sports (87)
Best of Vs Fighters (102)
MY FAVORITES (160)