Front End

November 24th, 2007

Beta u27 Released

 

- When using M1, the gamelist speed has greatly improved (gathers from M1.xml DATA directly rather than the M1.exe program output).

 

- M1 Sets should be detected more accurately now. Before, there were problems with some sets which had all it's roms in the parent (swtrilgy, swtmpeg, scud, scudscsp, etc).

 

- Support for M1's command lines triggers. Please note: The one letter codes can be a bit cryptic, so be sure to check your documentation for M1 before using.

 

- RESOURCE.ML fixes: A Duplicate mame command entry removed as well as updates with new information to support the M1 additions.

 

- Fixed some elements of display, hopefully eliminating overlap of info because of font sizes. This needed to be redone due to M1 and PinMAME needing more than 8 character sourcefile names.

 

- Added a new sort method (selectable with F1) - Parent/Clone. It should mirror MAME32UI's results. Thanks to John IV for suggesting it.

>> Get it HERE.

Front End

24th November, 2007 - GameEx 8.97

 

* Fixes for when display rotated

>> Get it HERE.

GAMES OF THE YEAR?

Super Mario Galaxy (pictured) - 97.3%

The Orange Box - 96.1%

Bioshock - 95.3%

Call of Duty 4 - 95.1%

CPS

Halo 3 - 93.2%

God of War 2 - 93%

Mass Effect - 93%

Crysis - 91%

Drake's Progress - 89%

Project Gotham Racing 4 - 87%

Assassin's Creed - 84.5%

Edge magazine is notoriously parsimonious when it comes to handing out 10 out of 10 review scores for video games but in the past three issues there have been three of them.

Halo 3, The Orange Box and Super Mario Galaxy have all been awarded one of the highest accolades in gaming - a perfect score from Edge. And plenty of other games have been given near perfect scores also - from Bioshock to Crysis, Drake's Progress and Call of Duty 4.

The Edge scores are just one of a number of signs that reinforce a growing feeling that videogames are enjoying a golden age.

It is not just that the interactive experiences are getting ever more immersive, or the industry is being taken ever more seriously, but hardware and software sales are up significantly on last year - buoyed by a new generation of consoles and the work of developers who are beginning to exploit the tools they have at their disposal.

[...]

"There are now more ways than ever to spend money on video games - from consoles to handhelds, supplementary purchases online via Live Arcade, Virtual Console and the PlayStation Network to games on your iPod.

"The evidence of what Nintendo has done to attract people to games for the first time with the DS and the Wii is unmistakably clear."

This year will be remembered as the year the Wii took centre stage as the console of choice for families, the year PlayStation 3 finally showed its promise in real terms and the Xbox 360 hit its stride with the 5th anniversary of online service Xbox Live.

It is also the year of the handheld with Nintendo DS and PSP continuing to sell explosively, the year PC gaming began its renaissance and developers got to grips with tools that allowed them to tell stories in new, dynamic ways.

»» http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7107144.stm

lxdream, the Sega Dreamcast emulator for Linux, was ported to x86-64 and Mac OS X.

From the official page:

It must be porting week - both the x86-64 and mac ports should (fingers crossed) work out of the box now. (Note that the mac port is intel only, and still requires X11+GTK 2.0 to build). Real native mac support will probably follow slowly as time permits - I’m getting something of a crash course in mac programming at the moment .

 

Changes

 

* Added x86-64 support to the translator

* Initial Mac OS X support (configuration and translator ABI changes)

* Fix buggy TRAPA instruction (translator only - fixes several homebrew games)

* Improve error handling of a few situations (can’t connect to display, etc)

* Esound is now optional (but without it you’re not getting any audio)

* Re-add the “Load Binary” menu entry that somehow got lost in the GUI revamp.