Fightcade is an online gaming community platform that handles retro game emulation for online games. Retro games appear as channels in the application and you can join multiple channels related to the games of your choice. The most important part of the platform is that you will need to download the retro game ROMs yourself. This shouldn’t be hard as Archive.org has many retro game ROMs for free download.
Online Multiplayer Gaming
After you join channel of your choice, the names of the game channel will appear on the sidebar of the application window. In a game channel, you can interact with other people who have the same game or are interested in the game. If you want to play with your friend, he will have to join the same channel and have the game ROM ready. You can challenge someone to play against you or vice-versa. You can also choose to watch other people playing on the channel.
Offline Gaming
If you are new and don’t prefer to play against other players. You can use the “Test Game” button at the top right corner which allows you to play the game on your local computer. The game emulator opens up a new window, loads the game and you are ready to play. If the game supports two players you can play with an friend offline. But using a single keyboard with two players can be fun and irritating at the same time.
Customizing your keyboard
Fightcade supports customizing your keys. On the input options window, you can select “Map Game Inputs” to customize what keys press the relative retro game button. You can make them as comfortable for you as possible for two players.
Limitations
As a free user, the application allows users to join three channels at a time. You can join and leave game channels as you please. Patreon donator can join up to 10 channels. The project is open source but the developers need some incentive to continue with the development of the project. This serves as a good way to help the developers without taking features form the game.
Although the application is in beta and hasn’t been updated in a while, it works pretty well and popular games have many users in their channels. It does have some bugs, but getting everything to work is a delight and nostalgic.
