How to play MAME ROMs (games) in OS X
October 11th, 2007 by Ross McKillop |
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Today I stumbled across an old CD I have full of MAME ROMs. I thought I’d see if you could play them in OS X, and sure enough it’s actually quite straight forward. This brief tutorial will guide you in playing MAME games in OS X.
- To get started, download and install MAME OS X. Once installed, launch it from your Applications folder.
- The first time you run MAME OS X, it will ‘audit’ several hundred (thousand?) ROMs (games). This can take upwards of half an hour to complete. If you don’t want to import/audit all of these games (and the audit does download any ROMs, it just creates a huge list of them)..
- …select File -> Abort Audit.
- Otherwise, once the audit has completed, you’ll be presented with a huge list of games.
- To actually play a game, drag the ROM (as a zip file) to the Your Username -> Library -> Application Support -> MAME OS X -> ROMs folder. PS. you can find lots of ROMs here.
- Then start the game by double-clicking it from the massive list of games in MAME OS X. NOTE: if you have trouble getting games to launch, please see this comment by Joshua Pierce. Thanks Josh!
- Something you may want to take a look at is MAME Library, a free program that makes organizing, finding and launching games even easier. If you’ve ever used iPhoto, you’ll be very familiar with the interface. When you launch MAME Library for the first time, it will import the database from MAME OS X. This only takes a minute or two.
- MAME Library organizes your games/ROMs via screenshots (which you can take by hitting F12 while playing a game).
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21 Responses to “How to play MAME ROMs (games) in OS X”
By Dennis on Oct 12, 2007 | Reply
hello,
mame doesnt work for me most of the time. when i try to load a game it says that some files are missing and that i should look at the log file or something. any clue?
it only worked with alex kidd but with scratches on the sound. And i couldnt play, none of the buttons were working. Only P for pause.
thanx
Dennis
By Ross McKillop on Oct 12, 2007 | Reply
@Dennis:
And you’re sure the zip file is in the right place? I was able to play Contra (US), MegaMan and a few others no problem. I did have some issues w/ a couple of the games, but by and large most of them seemed to work. After you add a zip to the folder, select File > Audit Unaudited Games. Then try and play the game again.. Hope this helps!
By Andrew on Oct 30, 2007 | Reply
im having the same problem with the missing files and auditing the file didn’t work. i downloaded marvel vs capcom highlighted it and clicked audit selected games and tried to play it after it was done but it still didn’t work
By Andrew on Oct 30, 2007 | Reply
also the zip file is in the right place
By Ross McKillop on Oct 30, 2007 | Reply
@Andrew -
Over the last few weeks I’ve noticed that it’s kind of ‘hit and run’ when it comes to some games. They work no problem in Windows MAME, but in OS X they don’t launch at all…. I’d say it’s even as high as 25%
don’t work…
By James Eivers on Nov 8, 2007 | Reply
Hi, every time I download a MAME rom it automatically unzips?
By Jakob on Nov 20, 2007 | Reply
According to what Ive found, its supposed to mean that your missing a .CHD (Core Hard Drive) file, sound files, or some other file, I dont know how or where to get these files, but its what it says (too bad I didnt figure that out before I got my hopes up for a 46 mb metal slug game)
By peter on Dec 12, 2007 | Reply
^^ btw marvel vs capcom isn’t a chd game. The most up to date resource is mamedev.org . Aaron Giles is the mastermind behind it. Read his updates and post there for yor questions to be answered asap.
By peter on Dec 12, 2007 | Reply
guys go to mininova.org and get the mame chd torrent and the mame roms torrent, both required, and will have it all!!! you can even get 1.20 roms and 1.19 chd, its all good
By Marty on Apr 25, 2008 | Reply
When I try and run MameOSX, it crashes immediately giving me a Bus Error… any ideas? I’m running 10.5.2.
By Joshua Pierce on May 3, 2008 | Reply
This page ends up being the top listed item for many of my searches for a OS X version of MAME, so I figured I’d post this in case someone else has the same problems I have.
Anyway, I was a bit confused, and had the same problem as Andrew. MAME OS X did the complete audit thing, and then gave me a huge list of games, most of which I knew I didn’t have. Trying to play the ones I did know I have gave me errors telling me the files where missing, same as Andrew. The ROMs where in the right place.
Looking at the logs - it’s calling for quite a few missing files. I unzipped the ROM in question, and all of those missing files are there, so I assumed it’s not seeing the ROM file.
So anyway, long story short - I went into the preferences, and re-pointed the application to the ROM directory manually, setting that directory as the same one it *should* have been looking at from the beginning, and had no problems since then. What was any different, I don’t know, but since then, I’ve had no problems.
By Ross McKillop on May 3, 2008 | Reply
@Joshua Pierce:
Thanks very much for that tip - I’m going to update the tutorial w/ your info.
By Alex on May 6, 2008 | Reply
I can not get any of the games to start and I cant drag any of them to unzip them. If you have any advice on unzipping the rom from the list and getting it started please let me know. Thanks
By Andrew on Jun 3, 2008 | Reply
If OSX automatically unzipped the folder all you have to do is to right click the folder and archive it then it should bring it back to a zip file. It worked for me.
By Sebastian on Jun 26, 2008 | Reply
Does street hoop works on macmame? Any ideas?
By Steve on Jun 29, 2008 | Reply
I can get as far as “Type OK or move the joystick left and right to continue” but no further. Any ideas?
By Steve on Jun 29, 2008 | Reply
OK it doesn’t like my cordless Logitech keyboard. Got the old Apple one out of the box and am currently playing Pang!
By Gyll on Jun 29, 2008 | Reply
Hello everyone I am trying to open this game called Alien vs Predator on the program called MAMEUI32 0.122u8 and it is saying that I am missing a crap load of file to make the game run my computer is a dell and it runs on Microsoft XP some one pleas help me out I really wanna play this game
By Pigumon on Jul 14, 2008 | Reply
OK Guys, this is my theory so far. I’m pretty sure the missing files are contained within the APPLICATION, that’s why there’s an entire list of games already in the app, and that’s why the same roms will work on a PC but sometimes not on a Mac. Because the PC version is constantly updated. If you look online, you’ll see a lot of rom bundles with a particular version number, and they’ll usually tell you to use the same version number of the app. So that’s why I think you need to keep up to date with your app.
Also **VERY IMPORTANT**, when you first launch Mame OS X, it creates a ton of folder in your home directory’s Application Support/Mame OS X. This is where you should drag all of your ROMS. If not, it won’t know where to look. OR if you have them store somewhere else, go into prefs (like Joshua did) and select the proper location.
**Also Important** for space saving, You DON’T have to UNZIP your roms! The app can read the zipped files easily.
By Mike on Jul 17, 2008 | Reply
I have gone through both Joshua and Pigumon’s suggestions, and still end up with the “Missing Files” dialog box of death. Any further suggestions?