The NEW Build Your Own Arcade Controls
Main => Software Forum => Topic started by: drabina on September 09, 2018, 08:32:26 pm
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I have built a tabletop arcade cabinet that's powered by Raspberry Pi 2. I have tried Recalbox and Retropie but since I only have 9 buttons (joystick + 6 buttons on the control panel + 3 buttons on the front panel) I can't figure out how to run any games. Most of them either require to press F1 or change difficulty, players, etc via a keyboard that I do not have.
What other software can I use to get a working arcade on my RPi2? Easy software to configure would be great. I am interested in simple games only. No SNES, Nintendo, etc emulators. If required, I can upgrade to RPi3.
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What do you mean by simple games?
If you mean PC based systems like C64 etc you will need to run a keyboard as thats how they were designed to be played.
If you want to play arcade classics like pac man etc you can do that no problem using mame.
Once you have the controller plugged into the pi set it up in emulation station and you are good to go.
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I've been messing around with a tabletop build for a few months (not got much worth showing yet though) that only has 5 buttons total.
Titchgamer is right - once you have your controls set up in emulationstation then you should be fine for mame/console stuff.
The main advantage of the pi3 - over performance improvements - is that is has built in bluetooth so you can use a wireless keyboard if you ever need to do anything more complicated than play a game
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Thanks guys. By simple games, I meant PacMan, River Raid, etc which I think I can find all for MAME. I did play a bit more yesterday and got some games working under RetroPie. The bartop is now setup with some Atari 2600 and 7800 games. I have downloaded 0.78 MAME compatible ROMs but I had to put them into Atari folders under RetroPie (not under MAME folder). Kinda weird in my opinion but at least most of them are working.
There is a slight lag when entering options on RPi2 but the games run smoothly. RPi3 is only $35 so I may upgrade anyway.
As an alternative, is there an easy MAME only setup for Raspberry Pi? I am asking because, while I do not mind running RetroPie, it is setup to support many emulators and it looks like I am going to be running just MAME.
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You can download complete images with MAME and roms installed.
But TBH I would just get the games you want on there because MAMEs rom set is vast.
Also the rom set you need is specific to the version of retropie you run, I cant remember what it is but I know its a old version.
For best compatibility run the version it recommends on the RP wiki/github.
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I am reading more and more about the RetroPie and the emulators and I think the ROMs I found yesterday were Atari 2600 and 7800 ROMs. I still need to get the 0.78 MAME ROMs because some of my favorite games do not work under Atari emulators. Need to get the Boulder Dash working. :)