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MAME Ported to (Chipped) Xbox
metallik writes: "A version of MAME for the Xbox game console has just been released. This release will only run on Xbox consoles equipped with a mod chip. MAME is the Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator, one of the more successful open source projects out there. It emulates over 3800 arcade machines, from Space Invaders to Mortal Kombat III, many of them perfectly. This is probably only the first of many such PC software projects to be ported to modded Xboxes. At $199 (plus modchip), the Xbox will soon be an extremely attractive set-top box (if not for the reasons Microsoft wanted it to be...)" A while ago, we posted about getting MAME to run on a developer-kit Xbox, but since mod chips are now available, this sounds like a more practical approach. Update: 06/23 18:40 GMT by T : Note: Thanks to Santeri Saarimaa for a note that the project is now hosted here instead.
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It would be rather ironic too, considering consoles are killing the arcade games industry as far as I understand. Years ago arcade machines had better games and hardware than consoles, now it is the other way round so there is less reason to play arcade games.
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You mean something like this?
Oh, for crying out loud. Every time an emulation topic comes up someone bemoans the loss of mame.dk. It's not and never was the end all of places dedicated to the acquisition of games. Here:
Miss Mame Roms Resources
Go there. Even if you can't manipulate the pages to find the same things that mame.dk had (which you should be able to), you can at least find the mame burners website which is completely valid.
Google is a useful tool. It will help if you just ask.
Besides, there's always newsgroups.
You can run MAME on a dreamcast without a chip plus the DC is only 50 bucks and not ugly.
I don't know why the DC Emulation scene seemingly gets no respect or credit in the "geek" community, considering the amazingly amount of work that's been put into various types of emulation. Granted, it's considered a "dead" system, but the technology is still there and still relatively current. At present, a $50 Dreamcast can successfully emulate MAME, NES (the best console emulation i've ever seen), Master System, Gameboy, amongst others. DreamSNES is working on SNES games, and is making some serious headway (they're running at about 88% speed, now), and there are still other emulation projects on the horizon, plus a batch of decent-and-getting-better homebrew games.
I think that person would be ill-advised to acquire and Xbox for $200, spend however much on a modchip, in the process voiding their warrenty, in order that they play MAME, when a console that can be picked up for $50 and under can do the same thing. i recommend anyone visit DC Emulation if they are interested.
Now think of what happens if someone MAMEs the XBox, mods it to be a cheap PC, or otherwise does something that causes the user to treat it as something other than a dedicated system for 'legal' gaming. In this case MS is just paying part of your equipment costs and not getting the return they expected. Modding the XBox to be a Linux machine just adds insult to injury in their eyes.
I think this answers some of the questions brought up in posts where people wonder why MS is fighting this kind of use. I'd expect MS to continue to fight this one tooth and nail, and with their history you know they will.
P.S. I did a (very cursory) google search to try to find the article outlining how the XBox business model works - if anyone knows where to find it and could post it in a reply it'd be cool.
I'm always sad to see that the excitement among hobbyist developers always seems to involve porting emulators for old arcade games. Yeah, I love those old games too, but I'd much rather see some kind of real grassroots game development movement emerge. The stuff posted to linuxgames.com is depressing for the most part. Here we have a powerful, free operating system and development tools, something thousands of times more powerful than what early game designers had in 1980, and yet all we can do is write emulators for those games.
A press release from Microsoft stated that game developers were flocking to XBox. Xbox now has 3802 games.
So does Anonymous Coward have good karma?
That model has been tried before.
Actually, other game consoles have used this business model to varying degrees. However, the difference today is that the consoles are much more powerful computing platforms, and therefore much more attractive for hacking. Hence the iOpener comparison.
The problem Microsoft is going to have in fighting this, is that it will now be fighting its customers directly, rather than competitors. The downsides of squashing (or acquiring) a competitor only become apparent when the U.S. Justice Department sues you. The downsides of fighting with your own customers are much more serious and direct; and the legal footing is much weaker.
Suing individual XBox owners in court isn't likely to happen, or have much effect if it does (unless the courts happen to rule against MS). Certainly, Adobe-style DMCA tactics against companies selling mod chips and the like may be possible, within the U.S. at least, but that's unlikely to act as much of a barrier against hacking.
The bottom line is that companies need to start taking the realities of this sort of thing into account. They can't just sit in their conference rooms surrounded by lawyers and wail and gnash their teeth. Their notion of intellectual property ownership and control is simply at odds with reality, and if they don't recognize that, reality will do it for them, in the form of profits and their stock price.
It's located at xbox.mame.net now. We can handle the slashdot effect. Bring it on.
There will be a new version and source code release shortly.
I wonder how long it will be before an unscrupulous arcade operator puts a JAMMA connector on a chipped X-BOX and runs it in his arcade
How would this differ from an unscrupulous arcade operator putting a computer into a cabinet and running regular MAME on it?
I've never seen one personally but I have seen many reports of the word "MAME" showing up on supposedly-genuine arcade machines in various bars and so on.
Many people use MAME in a stand-up arcade box for their own personal amusement (check here and here for information on how to build them and many examples of completed and in-progress projects. It's when folks put them into their businesses to collect quarters that things become a bit dodgy, in my opinion, but that has been going on long before the xbox was even thought of.
If you're a zombie and you know it, bite your friend!
Even if it's true that M$ loses $150 on every xbox sold, they won't care much. They've calculated losses of a few billion over the first four or so years of xbox business, so they're definitely in it for the long run.
/.'ers run out and buy one?
Now, what helps you most in the long run? Market share. What will hacking the xbox so that mame runs on it do? Hm, how about raise it's market share because a couple thousand
M$ lost money on windos piracy, too. They didn't give a damn until they had the monopoly, then they started cracking down on people with the BSA squad.
They won't attack the mod chips or the mame porters. Not just now and not for a while. Once there's an xbox in every house, then the gloves will come off.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org