Jason Hasselkus

Ok so lets review a bit about what we have at this point. We have our computer running Ubuntu, with Mame and WahCade installed and configured. So what’s next you might ask? Well your going to need some ROMs to play, and you probably went ahead and downloaded a few just to get WahCade configured correctly. So today we are going to geek out a little less and cover some really important details as to how this puppy is actually going to run. Shawn Powers does a really good job explaining just how one might “obtain legal ROMs”, and it goes a little something like this.

Most MAME ROMs are easily located for download on the Internet, but the legality of using those ROMs are questionable. There are a couple ways to ensure that you have the legal right to your ROMs

So here are the ways to find “legal” ROMs:

• Buy the actual motherboard from the original game. This sounds kinda funny, but it’s really not too difficult to do. Often times broken arcade boards from either local coin-op vendors or on-line, such as ebay, are really easy to find. Since all you want is the legal right to use the ROMs, it doesn’t matter if the board is broken or not, you just want to play the ROM.
• Purchase the X-Arcade keyboard, which comes with a handful of classic ROMs.
• There are plenty of free, noncommercial games available for download. Check out arcadecontrols.com to see what others have said about legal rights to ROMs and places you might find some.

Ok, so tomorrow we are going to cover the case, as that’s almost as important as getting Ubuntu up and running with our emulator. But right now, spend your time running around looking for ROMs. If you do end up going the coin-op vendor approach, ask them how much it might be for a used cabinet. You may just save yourself some time in coming back here for the next post. Building the cabinet is probably the most time consuming part of the whole deal. If you can cut that part of it short, then your going to be ahead of the curve. I like to think I can use other tools than a keyboard and mouse, so I built mine. The choice is yours, but don’t tell me I didn’t warn you.