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Who makes their own games?
Gambit:
Are there things that need to be kept in mind when designing games for MAME cabinets?
I have a DirectX game that I plan on rewriting to take advantage of the extra things specific to arcade cabinets. Not sure where to start reading about it.
NIVO:
the biggest i can think of offhand is simply allow every key to be remappable. Entering/exiting and menus all need to be allowed to be controlled using a joystick, button(s). Of course trackballs as well, but for the most compatiblity, the joystick is the most common on every control panel out there.
Howard_Casto:
Also some common sense stuff like:
Make sure the game can run at 640x480, less if you want it to run on arcade monitors.
Don't be dumb and hardcode any inputs. I've seen games that do a great job of making every gameplay key remappable and yet they still make you press enter to start or something dumb like that.
Keep text large so it can be seen well on low-res monitors.
Ditto for the graphics.
That's all I can think of.
Minwah:
Basically what has been already said, but it should be said again ;)
Enumerate all available video modes and allow any of them to be used. Some games do not include low-res modes etc..
Allow mapping of all inputs, and allow mouse/joystick(s) to be used.
Don't have some menu/interface which requires different inputs to the in-game ones....so don't hardcode say cursors and enter like most games do. Probably the easiest way is to use the in game keys for the menu (if a menu is even used).
Good luck :)
NIVO:
oh yes, 1 last thing. Allow us arcade nuts to beta test for you, its the best feedback you could possibly get :cheers:
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