arcade-rom-3d-remaster

Arcade ROM 3D Remaster — a Claude skill

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Give Claude a classic arcade ROM set that you legally own (a MAME .zip such as galaga.zip), and this skill guides it to build a browser remaster where:

• the original program ROMs run unmodified on an emulated arcade board — enemy patterns, timing, scoring and music behave exactly like the cabinet;
• only the picture is replaced by a Three.js voxel renderer (3D models, lighting, bloom, volumetric effects, adjustable board tilt);
• the original sound chip's performance is re-rendered in high quality (band-limited wavetables, de-clicking, stereo, room reverb), with a one-key switch back to the raw cabinet sound.

Developer GPT PARK · YouTube · Official site

⚠️ No ROMs are included in this repository, and none will be downloaded by the skill. Read ROM usage notice and Disclaimer before use.

Screenshots

The same frozen frame of a real game (a Boss Galaga's tractor beam capturing the fighter), shown in the original 2D view and in 3D at three board-tilt presets:

Galaga © Bandai Namco Entertainment Inc. Screenshots were captured from the program running on the author's own ROM set and are shown only to document what the skill produces. The game's graphics are not part of this repository's license, and no ROM data is included.

Why emulate instead of re-creating?

A hand-made look-alike always plays slightly differently, and players notice. Running the real code guarantees the feel of the original, while the 3D layer can be as ambitious as you like — it only reads the board's video RAM, sprite RAM and latches, so it cannot break the game.

user's ROM zip ──► emulated board (CPU cores + custom chips, original code) ──► video RAM / sprite RAM ──► Three.js voxel renderer
                                                                     └──────► sound-chip registers ──► remaster synth ──► Web Audio

What the skill makes Claude do

1. Identify the ROM set and its hardware (scripts/rom_inspect.py), then read the MAME driver source for the memory map, interrupts, video and sound hardware.
2. Check the graphics decode visually (scripts/gfx_sheet.py renders tile/sprite sheets).
3. Bring up the board in 2D first — boot to the game's own attract screen, verified by a text dump of the tilemap and a 2D reference renderer; then coin → start → score rises.
4. Remaster the audio — exact register emulation + high-quality synth + original-mode toggle, paced by the audio clock; verified numerically (levels, aliasing energy, stereo, stability).
5. Build the Three.js renderer — voxel models, pre-rotated sprite frames replaced by one model + heading (verified with a pixel-overlap test), tilemap text plane, effects triggered by board state, boot fast-forward, tilt presets with auto-fit, V key to compare with 2D.
6. Verify live with real key input and report honestly what is original, what is approximated, and what was not verified.

Repository layout

SKILL.md                         the skill (workflow, ground rules, controls)
references/
  hardware-bringup.md            reading a MAME driver, scheduler, custom-chip HLE, verification ladder
  renderer-3d.md                 sprite→voxel, heading mapping + check, text plane, effects, camera fit
  audio-remaster.md              register emulation, remaster techniques, AudioWorklet, pacing, checks
  pitfalls.md                    real bugs hit while building the reference and how they were found
scripts/
  rom_inspect.py                 list a ROM zip (size, CRC32) and guess the game/board
  gfx_sheet.py                   decode graphics ROMs with a MAME-style layout into a PNG sheet
assets/galaga-reference/         complete working example (Galaga): index.html + js/ (no ROM data)
docs/screenshots/                README images (not covered by the MIT license)
THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md           MAME (BSD-3-Clause), three.js, screenshot/trademark notices

The reference implementation contains a verified Z80 core, a ZIP reader, the Galaga board (3× Z80, Namco 06XX/51XX/54XX high-level emulation, WSG sound), the WSG remaster synth and the full Three.js front end. Scripts need only Python 3 (no packages).

Install

Claude Code (personal skill):

git clone https://github.com/muzbox1973/arcade-rom-3d-remaster ~/.claude/skills/arcade-rom-3d-remaster

On Windows the folder is %USERPROFILE%\.claude\skills\arcade-rom-3d-remaster. Start a new session and the skill is available.

Claude.ai: download arcade-rom-3d-remaster.skill from the Releases page and add it in Settings → Capabilities → Skills.

Use

Put your ROM zip somewhere Claude can read it and ask, for example:

• "Here is my pacman.zip — remaster it in 3D but keep the gameplay identical."
• "이 고전 MAME 롬파일을 3D 기술을 활용하여 리뉴얼해"

The result is a folder with index.html, js/, rom/<set>.zip (your file, not to be shared), serve.py and start.bat / start.sh. Run start.bat (Windows) or start.sh (macOS/Linux): it serves the folder on a free local port reserved for that game and opens the browser. Several remasters can run side by side without opening the wrong game.

Default controls of generated remasters:

Limitations

• Bundled CPU core: Z80. Boards with 6502 / 6809 / 68000 etc. need a new core (the skill explains the interface), which takes considerably longer.
• Some boards use custom chips whose internal ROMs are not part of the game's ROM set (e.g. Namco 54XX explosion noise). Those parts are approximated from their command protocol, and the skill tells you so.
• Building a remaster for a new board is a long, multi-step task. Results depend on the game, and the skill reports what could not be verified (e.g. stages not reached in automated play, sound that was measured but not listened to).
• Only the Galaga reference has been built end to end so far.

ROM usage notice

• This repository contains no ROM images, and the skill instructs Claude never to download, embed or redistribute ROM data. Generated remasters decode graphics, palettes and sound waveforms at runtime from the zip you supply.
• Arcade ROMs are copyrighted works of their respective owners. Use only ROM images you are legally entitled to use — for example dumps of boards you own, or sets obtained from a licensed distribution. Whether a backup/dump is lawful depends on the laws of your country.
• Do not publish or distribute a generated remaster together with ROM files or any ROM-derived assets (sprite sheets, extracted images, palettes, audio recordings).
• Game titles, logos and characters (e.g. Galaga, Pac-Man) are trademarks of their owners. If you share your own work publicly, do not present it as an official product, and consider removing trademarked names.

Disclaimer

• This project is an independent, non-commercial tool. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by Bandai Namco Entertainment, any other game publisher, Anthropic, or the MAME team.
• Hardware behaviour follows the MAME project's driver sources. The code here is an independent implementation, but its logic closely follows several BSD-3-Clause MAME files, whose copyright notices and license are retained in THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md. MAME® is a registered trademark of Gregory Ember. Thanks to the MAME developers for decades of preservation work.
• The software is provided "as is", without warranty of any kind (see LICENSE). You are solely responsible for how you obtain and use ROM images and for complying with copyright, trademark and other laws that apply to you. The author accepts no liability for any damage, legal claim or loss arising from the use or misuse of this skill or of anything generated with it.
• Three.js (MIT) is loaded from a CDN by generated pages and is not redistributed here.

License

MIT © 2026 muzbox (GPT PARK), except the third-party material listed in THIRD_PARTY_NOTICES.md. The license covers the code and documents in this repository only; it grants no rights to any game, ROM, trademark or artwork (including the game graphics visible in the screenshots).

Developer GPT PARK

• YouTube — https://www.youtube.com/@AIFACT-GPTPARK
• Official site — https://gptparkai.com/