Recalbox 10.1 ships several versions of MAME side by side. Each one expects its own romset: that is the first thing to sort out before looking any further into why a game will not start. This page is the practical MAME cheat sheet; to understand what a romset, a CHD or a split/merged set actually is, read Arcade in Recalbox first.
Emulator / core (RUN WITH) |
Expected romset version | Available on |
|---|---|---|
LIBRETRO MAME0278 |
MAME 0.278 (June 2025) | Raspberry Pi 4/400, Pi 5/500, x86_64 PC |
LIBRETRO MAME0258 |
MAME 0.258 (August 2023) | Raspberry Pi 4/400, Pi 5/500, x86_64 PC |
LIBRETRO MAME2003_PLUS |
MAME 2003-Plus romset (0.78 based) | every board |
LIBRETRO MAME2003 |
MAME 0.78 | every board except Pi 5/500 |
LIBRETRO MAME2010 |
MAME 0.139 | every board except Pi 5/500 |
LIBRETRO MAME2015 |
MAME 0.160 | every board except Pi 5/500 |
LIBRETRO MAME2000 |
MAME 0.37b5 | Raspberry Pi 3, Pi Zero 2 |
ADVANCEMAME |
MAME 0.106u13 | Raspberry Pi 3, Pi Zero 2, Pi 4/400, RG351x, RG353x |
On the Raspberry Pi 5 / 500, the intermediate versions have been dropped: only MAME 0.278, MAME 0.258 and MAME 2003-Plus remain. The board is powerful enough to run everything on a recent MAME.
The reference romset in 10.1 is therefore 0.278. If you are starting from scratch, that is the one to aim for.
.dat files are already on your RecalboxThere is no need to hunt for a reference file online: Recalbox ships the .dat of every arcade core, straight from the network share:
/recalbox/share/arcade/libretro/mame0278.dat
/recalbox/share/arcade/libretro/mame0258.dat
/recalbox/share/arcade/libretro/mame2003-plus.dat
/recalbox/share/arcade/libretro/mame2003.dat
/recalbox/share/arcade/libretro/mame2000.dat
/recalbox/share/arcade/libretro/mame2010.dat
/recalbox/share/arcade/libretro/mame2015.dat
/recalbox/share/arcade/libretro/fbneo.dat
/recalbox/share/arcade/advancemame/advancemame.dat
Grab the file matching your core and feed it to clrMamePro or Romulus to audit your romset. This is by far the most reliable way to find out what is missing.
There are two ways to tell Recalbox which core to use:
START → EDIT GAME → RUN WITH, then pick the emulator/core pair./recalbox/share/roms/mame, create a sub-folder named after a core — everything inside it will run with that core, with no further setup.The recognised sub-folder names are:
mame0278 mame0258 mame2003plus mame2003
mame2000 mame2010 mame2015 advancemame
That lets several romsets live together without mixing them up:
┣ 📁 roms
┃ ┣ 📁 mame
┃ ┃ ┣ 📁 mame0278
┃ ┃ ┃ ┣ 🗒 sfiii3.zip
┃ ┃ ┣ 📁 mame2003plus
┃ ┃ ┃ ┣ 🗒 pacman.zip
For arbitrary folder names, use a configuration override instead.
MAME has its own internal menu (machine settings, dip switches, cheats, input remapping). The shortcut depends on the version:
| Version | Shortcut |
|---|---|
| MAME 0.258 / 0.278 | SELECT + Y |
| MAME 2010 | R3 |
| MAME 2003-Plus and MAME 2015 | L3 |
On controllers where
SELECTandHOTKEYare the same button, save states are not available with MAME 0.258/0.278. Prefer a controller that keeps the two buttons separate if you care about them.
Some older games use samples: recorded sounds MAME cannot synthesise. Without them the game runs, but stays silent on certain effects. Drop the sample archives here:
/recalbox/share/bios/mame/samples/
MAME also looks for its dependencies in the BIOS folder, on top of your games folder:
/recalbox/share/bios/mame/bios/
/recalbox/share/bios/mame/roms/
This is the ideal place for a neogeo.zip or a qsound_hle.zip you would rather not copy into every game sub-folder.