New Arcade ROM site opened - Perfectly legal

Help Me · Post by **Help Me** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 10:57 am

http://www.starroms.com

Pay per ROM, completely legal, and non pirated like most of you are probably using.

You want to put up the good fight against warez, but most of you probably emulate older systems/MAME with ROM's avaliable for purchase on the market today, which in my book is piracy. I see all kinds of MAME packs out there supporting the games at the site above, so you should buy the game and download the pack. If you own any of the games in the site above, you should buy them LEGALLY there, and not pirate them. There's food for thought. Put your money where your anti-piracy mouths are. And they are pretty cheap too, only $1-$6 per game.

erise · Post by **erise** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 3:20 pm

I got a free Super Breakout ROM just for signing up!

It's a cool site and I'm glad to see alternatives to piracy.

Phantom · Post by **Phantom** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 4:52 pm

erise wrote:I got a free Super Breakout ROM just for signing up! It's a cool site and I'm glad to see alternatives to piracy.

Yeah, I agree. It looks like they've only closed a deal with Atari so far. I've always wondered why game companies keep fighting emulation. They should accept the fact that emulation is here to stay and use it to their advantage by offering roms of their older games at a cheap price.

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 5:15 pm

Phantom wrote:
erise wrote:I got a free Super Breakout ROM just for signing up! It's a cool site and I'm glad to see alternatives to piracy.
Yeah, I agree. It looks like they've only closed a deal with Atari so far. I've always wondered why game companies keep fighting emulation. They should accept the fact that emulation is here to stay and use it to their advantage by offering roms of their older games at a cheap price.

Like Sega

.

Phantom · Post by **Phantom** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 5:36 pm

az_bont wrote:Like Sega .

I don't mean like the Smash Pack etc. I think they should sell individual rom files from their website.

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 5:40 pm

Phantom wrote:
az_bont wrote:Like Sega .
I don't mean like the Smash Pack etc. I think they should sell individual rom files from their website.

That's what Sega do. You can get old Genesis titles for around $6, and Sega of Japan is doing it with Saturn games.

Phantom · Post by **Phantom** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 6:00 pm

az_bont wrote:That's what Sega do. You can get old Genesis titles for around $6, and Sega of Japan is doing it with Saturn games.

I didn't know that. I just checked sega.com and it appears that it uses some kind of Windows-only 'RealOne Arcade' program. I couldn't even go to the download site because I wasn't using IE6. In other words, this isn't any good.

farrell2k · Post by **farrell2k** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 7:24 pm

erise wrote:I got a free Super Breakout ROM just for signing up! It's a cool site and I'm glad to see alternatives to piracy.

If you still have to pay for the games, then this is not an alternative to piracy

impetus · Post by **impetus** » Sun Oct 12, 2003 8:24 pm

"nyuck nyuck"

nice news! I'll check it out...

OneThirty8 · Post by **OneThirty8** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 7:36 am

This sounds cool. I wish Nintendo would do this. I'd pay a reasonable amount of money for games. In fact, I think the companies ought to offer the emulators for download also in order to get more people to buy roms off of them.

Phantom · Post by **Phantom** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 7:59 am

OneThirty8 wrote:This sounds cool. I wish Nintendo would do this. I'd pay a reasonable amount of money for games.

Yeah, I agree. They could even include a pdf manual with the rom.

This atari rom site might be a significant first step in that direction. As az_bont pointed out, Sega is already doing something like that. But I don't want to be forced to use one particular emulator on one machine. If I buy an 'electronic' copy of a game, I want to get the actual rom file.

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 10:03 am

If the company can offer something piracy cannot, then it's a good idea. Like Sega; they're Saturn emulator was fully playable, which no other free emulator could claim. But then it was leaked.

But if Nitendo could come up with a really good N64 emulator and sell the games for the same price as they're selling those ones in Chine (around $6), then it'd be worth it.

Phantom · Post by **Phantom** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 11:03 am

az_bont wrote:If the company can offer something piracy cannot, then it's a good idea.

What it offers is the opportunity to legally purchase a game. I'm sure there are quite a few people out there who are willing to pay for roms if the price is right.

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 11:09 am

Phantom wrote:
az_bont wrote:If the company can offer something piracy cannot, then it's a good idea.
What it offers is the opportunity to legally purchase a game. I'm sure there are quite a few people out there who are willing to pay for roms if the price is right.

The problem lies with the fact that I only ever seem to emulate games I own, so the idea of paying to legally own something when I already legally own it isn't much of an incentive.

Phantom · Post by **Phantom** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 11:16 am

az_bont wrote:The problem lies with the fact that I only ever seem to emulate games I own, so the idea of paying to legally own something when I already legally own it isn't much of an incentive.

If you already own the game, there's no reason to pay for a rom file in the first place. I wouldn't buy the same game twice.

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 11:52 am

Phantom wrote:
az_bont wrote:The problem lies with the fact that I only ever seem to emulate games I own, so the idea of paying to legally own something when I already legally own it isn't much of an incentive.
If you already own the game, there's no reason to pay for a rom file in the first place. I wouldn't buy the same game twice.

I would and have bought the same game twice, so that I can use the game on something else. For instance, I own two copies of Sonic, Sonic 2, Sonic 3 and Sonic & Knuckles. One set is the original PAL set I bought years ago, and the other is the US set for playing on my Genesis Nomad. Neither is emulation-related, but the point I'm making is that I'd be willing to a buy the same game twice for convinience's sake. Like I own Final Fantasies I-X (minus III), but if there were ever any ports to handheld systems, I'd be the first to get them. I'd be willing to pay if it meant I could play it another, easier way, like on a handheld for instance.

Phantom · Post by **Phantom** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 12:20 pm

az_bont wrote:I'd be willing to pay if it meant I could play it another, easier way, like on a handheld for instance.

So you'd buy a game, finish it, and then buy it again on a different system? Hmm, not me.

I do have multiple (up to 7) copies of some games in my collection though, but those are mainly trading material.

Veggita2099 · Post by **Veggita2099** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 2:42 pm

You can get thsoe legal Genesis rom through that realarcade, but there like $15 each there, which is too much. Considering I can buy a Genesis game for about $5 anywhere, the roms should be about half that price.

Phantom · Post by **Phantom** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 2:48 pm

Veggita2099 wrote:You can get thsoe legal Genesis rom through that realarcade, but there like $15 each there, which is too much. Considering I can buy a Genesis game for about $5 anywhere, the roms should be about half that price.

They don't even offer the actual rom file for download as far as I can tell. They seem to force you to use RealOne Arcade (but I might be mistaken).

As far as prices are concerned, the ones at starroms are quite reasonably priced IMO. Especially if you take the prices of arcade pcb's into consideration.

az_bont · Post by **az_bont** » Mon Oct 13, 2003 2:57 pm

It's a modified version of Gens, so I wouldn't be surprised if you could find the ROM somewhere on your system, same as the Smash Packs.