You Can Finally Play Classic Arcade Games on Your iPhone and iPad
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It’s been a long and winding road, but you can finally play classic arcade games like Donkey Kong and Zaxxon on your iPhone and iPad. A new emulator app is now available in the App Store that allows you to play MAME ROMS on your Apple devices.
As reported by Mactrast, it’s been a year since Apple decided to allow game emulators in the App Store, but one glaring omission in the emulator lineup has been a MAME-like emulator. We’ve seen previous attempts, such as MAME4iOS, although the developers of such apps were faced with complying with various restrictions in the App Store. While a Mac version of MAME has been available for some time, it lacks an Apple silicon version.
However, everything has changed now that ArcadeMania is finally available on the App Store. A free emulator that uses version 0.269 of MAME as its emulation core, ArcadeMania allows you to enjoy more than 5,000 MAME-compatible arcade game ROMS on your iPhone and iPad. The iPad version can also be installed on your Mac, although it hasn’t been fully tested for use on the Mac.
The app offers support for game controllers, including those compatible with the Xbox One, PS5, and Switch, as well as keyboard support. Believe me when I say that while the app also offers on-screen touch controls, you definitely want to use a physical controller, unless you want to quickly go through all of your lives in just a few moments. Light gun games can be played, with the player tapping the screen instead of using a gun.
Classic MAME features like cheats and save states are also supported, and the iOS version even offers HDR content support, thanks to custom shaders and a native Metal graphics renderer.
About ROMs
ArcadeMania doesn’t ship with any of the 5,000+ ROMS it can play, although the app does include a custom ROM to allow users to test it. Using arcade ROMS has long been a legal gray area, as ROMs are copyrighted works created by a company for use in the machines you see at your local arcade. Sharing copyrighted materials is generally frowned upon legally, so including them along with the app could cause legal issues for the developer (and Apple).
The app also doesn’t offer a way to download the arcade ROMs, even though they’re available from multiple sources on the Internet. This means you’ll need to track them down on your own, but luckily, there are several places on the web that make them available. Google is your friend in this case, as it will point you to “archive” sites where they can be downloaded. I’ve said too much already.
You can download some legal ROMs from the MAME website, which offers ROMs that have been approved for download by the copyright holders. Don’t expect to find Street Fighter among the available games, but some of them are still quite fun and will serve nicely when you need to kill some time. I recommend Circus, Fire One, Fax, and Star Fire.
Emulating Arcade Games in ArcadeMania on Your iPhone or iPad
Once you’ve downloaded ArcadeMania from the App Store for iPhone and iPad, here’s how to get started:
- Open the app and tap the Menu button, then Settings. This will bring up a list of options.
- Tap Import, then navigate to where your ROMs are located.
- Select the ROMs you want to import into the app, then tap Open.
- You will then see the list of games that you have imported. Tap the game you want to play, and the fun begins.
You now have the option of using the on-screen controls in the bottom half of the screen, which include a virtual joystick and buttons, or you can add a real controller in the Settings menu.
Tap the Coin button to “insert a coin,” then tap the Start button to begin playing. The Exit button takes you out of the current game, allowing you to select a new one.
Have fun!
