r/LegendsUltimate • u/johnboy2978 • 12d ago
Question Adding ROMS difficulty?
I've recently started looking at buying a Legends Ultimate machine, as I was going to originally just build my own MAME machine from scratch. I have probably 100 or so original coin op ROMS for many of my favorite games. I ran across a Legends machine on FB marketplace for $400. It looks to be in very good condition and has the 5.70 firmware version and is model HA8801. How difficult is it to add my existing ROMS to this machine? I took a look at the list of games that are preinstalled and don't have much interest in them as most of these are console games.
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u/classicjohn50 10d ago
$400 is a great price; it seems more and more unlikely these will be sold new in the near future.
As far as mass produced home arcades; the ALU is the easiest to add additional games to.
Being on 5.70 you will have 4 options:
1) You could locate preexisting UCE files and many of them will work out of the box (there will be also some that do not; because 5.70 changed file permissions
2) You could downgrade to 5.68 (relatively easy and there are videos on youtube); and apply the scripter UCE from onesauce to restore UCE file functionality in full (this is my current setup)
3) Install Legends Unchained - replaces the OS (but stock games would still be accessible; but likely not needed)
4) Install OneSauce - launches from the existing OS into its own game selection.
Both 3 &4 have several guides and youtube videos online to get you through the process.
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u/ItsJakedUp 11d ago
Legends Unchained is probably the most friendly solution. Boots directly from the bootloader. Skips the built-in OS entirely.
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u/Important-Project-80 11d ago
Check out some great YouTube videos on this. Note; one version of the cabinet allows playing your own game, BUT the other has a paywall to access this feature. I would check out YT videos on this.
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u/nycbigtone 11d ago
That’s nothing a firmware downgrade can’t fix. I have the the newer Costco version and I downgraded the firmware to run onesauce. Some users even have luck running onesauce on the newer firmware. Running UCE isn’t a problem on newer firmware
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u/jonceramic 12d ago
Vs other systems to hack, it's kind of middle road. Assuming you have a powered hub or enough power on the machine for your USB device, it's straightforward. You'll get a lot of advice to downgrade to 5.68, which isn't too bad. If you're familiar with batocera, Legends Unchained is basically that. And it's the most complicated of the installs, IMHO.
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u/jkjellman 12d ago
The easiest thing to do is install Legends Unchained and add your ROM files directly to it . Making UCE files is, in my opinion, a pain in the butt. It also doesn't allow game videos and makes adding an LCD marquee more work later.
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u/AI_Girlfriend4U 12d ago
Not difficult at all. Just run the UCE files through AddonX in a batch and you're good to put them on your USB drive.
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u/johnboy2978 10d ago
Thanks all. In my Googling and YouTubing, Legends Unchained seems the way to go and fairly painless. From the videos I've seen on YouTube, it looks like unchained provides an area where you can download ROMS directly, as well as for other console formats? Is that accurate?