Important Notice: Our web hosting provider recently started charging us for additional visits, which was unexpected. In response, we're seeking donations. Depending on the situation, we may explore different monetization options for our Community and Expert Contributors. It's crucial to provide more returns for their expertise and offer more Expert Validated Answers or AI Validated Answers. Learn more about our hosting issue here.

What are split/merged/parent ROMs?

April 26, 2017merged parent ROMs Split

0

Posted

What are split/merged/parent ROMs?

1 Answer

0

Posted

“Parent” version is simply the most final bug-free / widest released version of a given game, other versions of that game are then said to be clones of the parent version. As MAME will often emulate several different version of the same game, and as these different ROM-sets often have many files in common, MAME allows you to save space by first searching for the required files in the parent ROM-file. This allows you to either throw all parts from all the different versions together in the parent zip-file (“merged”) or to keep just those parts of a clone that are not duplicated in the parent file in their own zip-file (“split”) or simply to have all necessary parts in each and every zip-file (“un-merged”).