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How to Use MAME For Playing Arcade Games On Your Windows PC

How to Use MAME For Playing Arcade Games On Your Windows PC

June 27, 2015 by Mitch Bartlett 12 Comments

So you want to play arcade games on your PC? Getting started with MAME is not easy for the average Joe. There is a lot to learn. Where do you put the game files? What commands do you use? How do you get the joystick working? Here’s a mini guide for those that just want to quickly get up and running with MAME for Windows.

  1. Download MAME Binaries.
  2. Extract the files. When prompted for a directory, provide a folder you wish to extract the files to. In this example, we use “C:\mame“.
  3. You will want to download roms to use with MAME. You can search roms for almost any arcade game, however it may not be legal for you to use many of them. You can always get legal ROMS like we did.
  4. When you download MAME Roms, they come in ZIP format. You do not need to extract them. Leave them zipped and place them in the “C:\mame\roms” folder.
  5. Bring up a DOS command prompt. To do so click “Start” > “Run” and type “CMD“.
  6. Type “cd\” to go to the root directory.
  7. Type “cd mame” to go into the “C:\mame” folder.

Now to start mame, you type mame, then a space, then the game file you want to use:

  • Example: mame robby

If you have a joystick or gamepad you wish to use, you have to use the -joystick switch:

  • Example: mame robby -joystick

Now the game rom should run.

  1. To insert a quarter, press 5.
  2. For 1 player, press 1. For 2 players, press 2.
  3. P pauses the rom.
  4. You can press Tab to access the options in MAME.

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Filed Under: Gaming Tagged With: mame

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Dandyboi says

    March 17, 2021 at 4:57 pm

    Heh, mine said my bios wasn’t compatible with MAME but it was working with no problem after i closed the error, a miracle I suppose

  2. myles says

    January 16, 2021 at 7:50 pm

    it really is a poorly designed system, open the software choose the game boom it should work. so many other better designed systems out there.

  3. Sunnytech says

    July 5, 2019 at 4:08 pm

    You have to download the MAME rom and the corresponding CHD file for it to work.
    Arrange this way in the mame rom folder.

    /rom/my game.zip
    /rom/my game/my game.chd

  4. Will says

    August 27, 2018 at 12:54 pm

    Marc says
    December 10, 2016 at 1:18 pm
    “You guys might need to type “mame64” if you installed the 64bit version of MAME.”
    =================================================================================================
    That worked for me. Thank you for that. ;>)
    However…
    Why do you have to do the long way ’round, with cmd, just to open mame? All you need to do is click on the mame64,exe. [or mame32.exe] in the mame program folder. lol

    And I cannot get a single game to load. I keep getting this text pop-up that says…
    [The selected machine is missing one or more required rom or CHD images. Please select a different machine. Press any key to continue. The list of games is massive but the rom folder is empty.
    But I loaded the folder with two dozen games and I still get the same msg.
    So the hunt for help continues…

  5. Noah says

    November 7, 2017 at 5:45 pm

    My command prompt says A required privilege is not held by the client.

  6. AceHigh says

    July 1, 2017 at 10:14 am

    i downloaded Mame64 on my flash drive forme the LPL because my pc at home dos not have enternet and wehen i installd mame all the game were ether red or grey and sead no at the end
    and are no workinig waht shold i do?

  7. jon says

    June 8, 2017 at 9:47 pm

    I keep getting “(name of game)” approximately matches the following supported games (best match first)

    And then its lists them i retype mame and then one of the games listed and OT gives me mpr- not found error: required files are missing the game cannot be run.

  8. Marc says

    December 10, 2016 at 1:18 pm

    You guys might need to type “mame64” if you installed the 64bit version of MAME.

  9. TNC says

    July 5, 2016 at 6:08 pm

    Same error as TIM above — “mame” not a recognized command etc

  10. Tim says

    April 29, 2016 at 12:07 pm

    Installed and placed rom in Roms folder, but keep getting – ‘mame’ is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file. – error message

  11. yenin says

    January 13, 2016 at 2:22 pm

    Can’t get it to work in windows 8

  12. Abdul Fahad says

    September 3, 2015 at 2:33 am

    To the mark..Thanks a lot,, it works now, but i need more resources for good games, where can i get them?

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Who’s Behind Technipages?

Baby and Daddy My name is Mitch Bartlett. I've been working in technology for over 20 years in a wide range of tech jobs from Tech Support to Software Testing. I started this site as a technical guide for myself and it has grown into what I hope is a useful reference for all.

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