Cannot get ANY MAME roms to work with Lakka

Libretro Lakka
#1

I have a mame arcade machine down in my gameroom and I wanted to mess around with my RaspberryPi 4 with Lakka to see if I could get it to do what my arcade machine does.

Epic-est of epic fails.

My PC with Retroarch runs the roms just fine. On retroarch, I have ROMs the run under Arcade (MAME- Current) [0.220], Arcade (MAME- 2000) [0.37b5], Arcade (MAME 2003-Plus), Arcade (MAME 2010) [139u1], Arcade (MAME 2015), and Arcade (MAME 2016) [0.174].

On Lakka, it looks like I have two options for MAME Cores; MAME 2010 [139u1] and MAME 2003-Plus. But when I run those cores and search the directory for roms, do directory is created. When I loaded NES, SNES and N64 ROMs, the playlists were created with no problem. Any suggestions for getting Lakka to recognize and create playlists for MAME 2010 and MAME 2003-Plus ROMS? Thanks in advance.

David

#2

I believe arcade ROMs need to be torrentzipped to scan properly. Itā€™s usually easier/simpler to just use the manual scanner and feed it a DAT to get the ā€œprettyā€ names.

#3

As much as I hate to admit it, you advice is beyond my skill level. The first part (I think) I get; the ROMs are in a .zip format. The second part about the manual scanner and feeding it a DAT may as well be greek. Is that something I can do in Lakka or do I need to do it somewhere else? Thanks in advance.

David

#4

Yeah, torrentzip is a special kind of zip that has a deterministic checksum. If you and I zip up the same file without it, thereā€™s no way to ensure that our archives will have the same checksum, so our scannerā€“which uses checksumsā€“wonā€™t be able to match against the databases.

Yes, in the scanning menu, thereā€™s an option to do a ā€œmanualā€ scan that bypasses the database/checksum checks, and on the manual scan submenu, thereā€™s a place where you can provide a DAT file to provide the scanner with some extra info about the games itā€™s scanning. This is such a DAT here: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/libretro/libretro-database/master/metadat/mame/MAME.dat

#5

Ok thanks. Is there a program I can use to re-zip folders to create a torretzipped archives? That sounds like it might be easier than adding the DAT files. If not, I can try the second route. Thanks very much for your suggestions. :slight_smile:

Dave

#6

The DAT route is easier than it sounds. however, I think you can get torrentzip from here: https://sourceforge.net/projects/trrntzip/ and try a few files. If it works, you can probably script handling all of them at once.

#7

Hello. I came across this same problem - Iā€™m using Lakka on a Raspberry Pi 4, trying to scan MAME ROMs that are over on my NAS.

I am trying to go via the MAME.DAT route. I have copied the file from the link above onto the NAS in a location that the Pi can see it. I have set up the manual scan to point to the folder containing the ROM images (ZIPped), and I have attached the MAME.DAT file from the link above.

When I hit ā€˜Start Scanā€™, it says ā€˜Failed to load arcade DAT file. (Invalid format?)ā€™

Does the file need to be in the same location as the ROMS? I have set up the manual scan for MAME-2003, as that is the set of ROMs I have.

Am I doing something wrong?

#8

Did you fix the problem with the MAME ROMs, I have searched to find the ROMs but unsuccessfully, if you manage to fix your problem please share the solution.

#9

It helps getting a actual rom set, that has the info on the mame version and rom set type. I get mine over at Archive. Sometimes I end up manual scanning arcade roms, if memory serves me right you can find the dat file on Github for MAME and other cores.

One of the sets I used ā€œMAME_2010_full_nonmerged_romsetsā€, when getting roms online I find it safe practice to use a VPN and Mac changer combo.

See if this video helps, Itā€™s for a Raspberry Pi 4 running Lakka OS, Though in the video there is no samba or ssh used because it is mounted directly to a pc running Linux Mint.

#11

I see your link was removed. There is a reddit channel that discusses roms, or you can go watch the rom source video on Odysee

I donā€™t think I would be able to post a video showing rom sources so just go to the channel and view that video.

#12

I was reading something about MAME ROMs and Lakka on Reddit but never understand what is the problem, never mind I will try reinstalling it again.

#13

This document may be helpful: https://docs.libretro.com/guides/arcade-getting-started/

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#14

Solve the problem with MAME ROMs :slight_smile:

#15

Why some of the MAME ROMs donā€™t show on the Emulator?

#16

Same problem here. Installed Lakka 3.3 on RPi 3B, uploaded a couple of SNES roms (both tested on snes9x and working) trough samba ā€¦ scanned foldersā€¦ nothing shown.

#17

You can do a manual scan to add them to your playlist. They do recommend you use No-intro Romā€™s since the database is matched against those when scanning normally via scan file or scan directory. If needing to find a proper rom source we can not link that here but I can point you a place where they discuss roms such as the Reddit ā€œRomā€ channel.

@muvaf sometimes its the rom not matching up to a dat. You can find and donwload dat files, which I normally do when Im manually scanning MAME or FBNeo rom sets.

#18

@weirdgyn @muvaf it helps having a good rom souce. This video goes over rom sources

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#19

With manual scan everything workedā€¦ thnx !

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