Front-Ends

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A frontend is a menu system that allows players to select from a list of games. Once a game is selected from the list, the game is launched using an appropriate emulator. Here is a list of the varioius emulators and a brief description. If needed, further information will be found on the individual page for that emulator.

Many frontends make use of a collection of screenshots, photo's of cabinet and scans of flyers. These additional files can add extra information on the history or appearance of the original arcade cabinet or console game.

AdvanceMenu

AdvanceMENU is a GNU/Linux, DOS and Windows front-end for AdvanceMAME, MAME, MESS, RAINE and any other emulator.

The main features are:

  • Simply download and run. Copy the executable and run it.
  • Auto update of the rom info.
  • Vertical and horizontal orientation.
  • Support for any TV/Arcade Monitor like AdvanceMAME but it's good also for a normal PC monitor.
  • Static and Animated image preview (PNG/PCX/ICO/MNG). Up to 192 images at the same time!
  • Sound preview. (MP3/WAV). You can select a special sound for every game played when the cursor move on it.
  • Sound backgrounds (MP3/WAV). Play your favourite songs or radio records in background.
  • Sound effects (MP3/WAV) for key press, program start, game start, program exit...
  • Support for zipped images and sounds archives.
  • Screensaver. A slide show of the game images

Download AdvanceMenu from http://advancemame.sourceforge.net/menu-download.html

ArcadeFE

Current Features:

  • Currently only supports M.A.M.E.
  • Currently only supports 1024x768.
  • Gathers game information from MAME.EXE.
  • Genre information can be entered manually or by importing GENRE.INI.
  • Game button information can be entered or by importing CONTROLS.INI.
  • All front ends share the same data.
  • Most information about the game can be edited (Ex: buttons, title, manufacturer...
  • Each ROM can contain its own command line switches.
  • A global command line switch can be set.

Download ArcadeFE from http://www.arcadefe.com/fe_sewergears.htm

ArcadeFX

NOT UNDER ACTIVE DEVELOPMENT

About ArcadeFX

ArcadeFX is my interpretation of almost everything I want in a MAME front-end that runs under Windows with a PC monitor. I wanted something that looked as good, if not better, than any game. I did not want it to look like a standard Windows application develped with C++ or VB. I wanted it to be very eye pleasing. It must also lock the user out of the window environment as much as possible. I wanted the UI to be skinable so I can change the interface when I got bored with it. I wanted it to be almost entirely controlled with a joystick or trackball and only the ESC and ENTER buttons. For the most part, these are the requirements when I started this project in July of 2001. Was I asking too much? I did not think so. So with a good friend of mine we began the path of creating our perfect MAME front-end that runs under Windows.

Download ArcadeFX from http://www.move360media.com/mame/arcadefx/download.php

ArcadeOS

Part of the PC2Jamma project. Some of ArcadeOS' Features are as follows:

  • Can output video directly to an arcade monitor
  • Can be orientated vertically or horizontally
  • up to 30 emulators
  • 6000 games per emulator
  • 7 custom lists per emulator
  • Filter per custom list
  • Mouse and Joystick support
  • Real DOS GUI (not a CUI)
  • Uses screen shots as backdrops
  • Built in file manager
  • Sound support
  • Can support most emulators/apps

Download ArcadeOS from http://www.mameworld.net/pc2jamma/downarc.html

AtomicFE

Atomic FE is a Front-End for Multi-emulators. It’s been made mainly to be used with games of arcade MAME. Furthermore, it would be possible to utilize Atomic FE with any other emulator as a result of small configuration efforts. Eventually, Atomic FE can be used to launch any application, as well as simply as a menu control! This front end is optimized for MAME and its derivatives (ADVMAME, FASTMAME, etc...). The main objective of Atomic FE is to function within a real arcade cabinet, and to be driven using joysticks as well as the buttons. In other words, it can work perfectly well with a keyboard or arcade controls. And last but not least, this Front End is completely configurable: it supports all the resolutions, all graphic cards (including ArcadeVGA), and is capable of functioning with the majority of emulators that accept command lines.

Download AtomicFE from http://www.atomicfe.com/EN2/download.php (English) Download AtomicFE from http://www.atomicfe.com/FR2/download.php (French)

Dragon King

Dragon King has not been updated since June of 2004, but the author is working on a new release.

Download Dragon King from http://www.oscarcontrols.com/lazarus

Emulaxian/3D Arcade

Emulaxian/fe-3darcade is a very complete and fully skinnable frontend that can launch just about anything. It features powerful and fully customizable search and filter functions to find games fast. What makes it unique besides the sheer number of media that it supports to make your skins are the menu styles it can use. Besides the normal listbox with screenshots/cab layout you have a game like menu were you shoot at sprites to select menu items. And then there are the two virtual arcade interfaces were you can walk around in rooms filled with 3d models of cabs, select mp3's on a working jukebox and watch some movies on a movie screen. These arcades are also fully customizable...create your own personal arcade!

Download Emulaxian from http://www.i-modernist.com/emulaxian/frontend.html

Emuloader

Emuloader has a support forum on MAMEWorld.

EmuLoader has been described as "MAME32 on Steroids".

EmuLoader features:

  • Support for MAME, Daphne, Zinc, AgeMAME (MAGE), and PinMAME.
  • Games list with all features from MAME's -listinfo command and added support for catver, nplayers, and hi-score.dat files. List can be sorted on any category, categories can be hidden or shown in any order.
  • Games List has five views, including a tree view which shows clones under the parent game.
  • Ability to filter list on Parent/Clone, System, Available/Not Available or a combination of settings.
  • Ability to change background color and font of gameslist and color of Master, Clone, and Non-Working Games.
  • Ability to use a custom command line to launch games.
  • Ability to add games to a Favorites List for each user.
  • Ability to Parental Lock objectionable games.
  • Support for 14 image types per game (ten images per type), Image types can have any name, so typically, you might display Title Screens, Snapshots, Cabinets, Marquees, Control Panels, Flyers, Instruction Cards, PCB's, Control Panel Layouts, and five other categories. Each image type can have a different background color. Transparency is supported. PNG, GIF and JPG files are supported. Images can be scaled and several filtering (smoothing) effects are selectable.
  • Support for sound clips from each game, in either an intro or a continuous loop.
  • New version adds support for launching batch files instead of launching MAME directly (for launching Johnny5). Each game can have a different batch file if desired.
  • Random Game Preview feature plays a short sample of each game directly through MAME.*


Download EmuLoader from http://www.mameworld.net/emuloader/

GameLauncher

NOT UNDER ACTIVE DEVELOPMENT

Game Launcher is a cross platform, universal front end for emulators. The main goal is to provide a user interface that is easy to use and attractive, yet does not look like a traditional user interface with windows and such. Game Launcher should work with any emulator. It has been known to work with MAME, Nesticle, RockNES, zSNES, snes9x, Callus, Stella, z26, and Genecyst. Game Launcher will run on DOS, Windows, and Unix. Version 0.9.8 is the current version.

Download GameLauncher from http://www.dribin.org/dave/game_launcher/downloads.shtml

GameEx

GameEx is a graphical DirectX based front-end for MAME (screenshot), Zinc, Daphne, PC Games, and all command line based emulators, along with being a complete Home Theatre PC solution, especially when gaming is a priority or important.

GameEs under very active development and has a support forum at http://www.gameex.info/forums/index.php?showforum=2

Download GameEx from http://www.tomspeirs.com/gameex/download.htm

Kymaera

Kymaera is a open-source Front End for many applications. It was originally designed as a FrontEnd for MAME and other EMU's for use on Arcade Cabinets. The current version of Kymaera 2.0.2 is for Windows and DOS. Linux version coming soon

This front end is probably the most advance of the few front end applications that are open source. It is not under active development.

The Kymaera home page is at http://sourceforge.net/projects/kymaera

MaLa

What is MaLa?

MaLa is a M.A.M.E. and more launcher for 32bit Windows operating systems like Win98, WinME, Win2000 and WinXP. It supports the windows command line version of mame with xml rom info and other emulators like Winvice, Kega Fusion, FCE Ultra - NES, VisualBoy Advance and Zinc to name a few.

The MaLa home page is at http://mala.arcadezentrum.com/

MAME32

Mame32 is the Win32 GUI version of the M.ultiple A.rcade M.achine E.mulator, a program which seeks to document the internal hardware and code of arcade games. Originally authored in 1997 by Chris Kirmse, Mame32 was the first port of Mame™ to the Windows platform. It is currently maintained by longtime team members: Kirmse, Mike Haaland, and John Hardy IV.

MAME32 has a support forum at http://groups.msn.com/mame32qa/messageboard.msnw?pgmarket=en-us

MAME32 can be downloaded at http://mame32qa.classicgaming.gamespy.com/

MameWah

MameWah is a front-end capable of running nearly every emulator for any system. It's highly customizable back-end makes it an ideal front-end for integrating many different systems with highly flexible layouts.

The interface to MameWah is meant to be controled by actual arcade controls which makes it a non-point-n-click non-windows-GUI front-end. MameWah also does an excellent job of hiding the Windows environment.

The flexibility comes for customizing INI files. Some examples and explainations of MameWah 1.61 INI files can be found here.

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