Spinner right-handed or left?

[epetti]

Random question: typically arcade control panels are setup assuming you use the joystick with your left hand and press buttons with your right.  For the trackball it's the opposite -- it's assumed you use it with your right hand and press the buttons with your left.

So what about the spinner?  All of the original arcade games with a spinner that I've seen have had the buttons on both sides so you could choose to use it with either hand.  So I'm curious what hand people here tend to use it with?

This is also to help inform how I setup the mappings on my control panel.  There are available buttons on either side the way I have it laid out currently, just have to choose which to map -- I suppose I could map both sets for ambidextrous use.

[drventure]

I'd mock it up and see what feels best for you.

For my CP, I went with the spinner on the left, but I do have a few buttons to the left of the spinner that I +could+ map if I felt like it'd work better. But I haven't had to yet.

If you mount the spinner centrally, more or less between P1 and p2, then you could easily just map both p1 and p2 buttons as applicable for spinner games.

[Gray_Area]

Depends on the game. I think Arkanoid had a button on either side, like some joystick games of the early 80s had. Tempest, being 1980, was a near-last vestige of the 'righty is mighty' era, and hence had the spinner to the right. Given I have a 2P frankenpanel, and I'm of the later-ish mode, mine is to the left. But, like d said, make a playland version.....

[RandyT]

I'd say put it on the side you favor for writing, etc.  Unlike joysticks, spinners require digital dexterity (i.e. the fine motor control of fingers).  If right-handed, this is usually better on that hand.

My panel is too small for a trackball, so the spinner went right in the middle.  Always end up using the spinner with my right hand, as it just feels more natural to me.

[TheOne]

I set mine up in the middle.  I'm right handed and my brother is left.  We both don't have a problem.  In the classic spinner games like Tempest and Centipede you can set your control buttons  for left and right handed play.

[Dawgz Rule]

I mirrored the buttons on either side of the spinner. 

[Louis Tully]

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[jimmer]

Unless you have been using the control frequently and trained yourself to one hand which it doesn't sound like you have. I don't think it will make much diference.

I'm fully right handed for everything, but learnt to use my mouse left handed for ergonomic reasons and to protect against rsi. It was surprisingly easy, and I would say I am more proficient left handed now because that's where it normally sits.

[danny_galaga]

If you are right handed, you'll probably want it on the right. But as some have said, you could centre-mount it unless you already have a trackball there...

[epetti]

Thanks for all the feedback, everyone.  It's been helpful.  My spinner isn't center mounted the way I currently have it planned, but it will have buttons on either side that can be co-opted from the Player 3 controls.  I wasn't aware that for some of the older spinner games MAME actually had keys you could map to for buttons on either side.

[Steve248]

I'd say put it on the side you favor for writing, etc.  Unlike joysticks, spinners require digital dexterity (i.e. the fine motor control of fingers).  If right-handed, this is usually better on that hand.

I have thought about this many times and could never understand it. I am left handed and have always found it bizarre and really annoying when I have been unable to play certain games in arcades with trackballs or spinners.

You say that "Unlike joysticks, spinners require digital dexterity (i.e. the fine motor control of fingers)." I do not understand this, surely controlling the player with whatever controller requires digital dexterity?

Ok, I understand that this has happened because it works for people so the main question is how did the Joystick end up on the left? Good news for me, if it was on the right I would never have been able to play.

[Le Chuck]

I stick with a TRON style setup, spinner on left joystick on right.  Games that don't use a joystick with the spinner just get played with the left like it's a joystick.  Works for me.  I'm a righty. 

[Gray_Area]

Ok, I understand that this has happened because it works for people so the main question is how did the Joystick end up on the left? Good news for me, if it was on the right I would never have been able to play.

Games through about '79 weren't very fast, and didn't fire repetitively. But, like leading with your left foot when you kick righty, people have tended to do better overall controlling with left and shooting with right. Also, some games move left to right (at least for a board, like DK/girders), particulary side scrollers, and it's just abso weird moving 'against your shoulder'. Unless you're left-handed, in which case you'd be leading with your right.

Sidearms Hyperdyne was an odd duck in having one of the control sets being reversed, I think P2, forcing them to play righty.

[DeLuSioNal29]

Mine is set up to be used by my right hand (I'm a righty) and the buttons to the left.  However, I also have a Tron joystick to the right of the spinner so that when I play tron, I use the spinner with my left hand.  But that's an exception to the rule.  Again, I prefer my spinner on the right.

D

[paigeoliver]

You will want your spinner right or center unless you are a lefty who also mouses left handed as well AND don't care if the other 85 percent of the population won't be able to control your game.

Right handed people usually have extremely poor fine control in their off hand and will find left handed spinners hard to control. Left handed people live in a right handed world and thus usually do quite a bit better with their off hand. They have been playing on controls designed for righties since they picked up their first gamepad.

Tron had it wrong, the controls should have been the other way around. I have a Cabal with lefty trackballs and right handed people find it extremely difficult to play.

[RyoriNoTetsujin]

You will want your spinner right or center unless you are a lefty who also mouses left handed as well AND don't care if the other 85 percent of the population won't be able to control your game.

Right handed people usually have extremely poor fine control in their off hand and will find left handed spinners hard to control. Left handed people live in a right handed world and thus usually do quite a bit better with their off hand. They have been playing on controls designed for righties since they picked up their first gamepad.

Tron had it wrong, the controls should have been the other way around. I have a Cabal with lefty trackballs and right handed people find it extremely difficult to play.

I'm not going to push on this argument very hard, but ultimately, it doesn't matter which side you put it on.

Neurologically speaking; your brain, and your hands, will adjust to whatever position you put it in after a couple of weeks of practice.  Yes, of course, you may still have a "preferred" hand/side to play from, but you won't feel nearly as uncomfortable.  Case in point; I have a trackball that is centered, with buttons on either side, and I am equally proficient with either hand.   Granted, I'm not setting records with either hand but neither position feels "off."

This was proven to me back in school for massage therapy (a profession in which overt single-hand dominance is a disadvantage) when our Neuro instructor tasked us with learning to brush our teeth with our non-dominant hands.  It took about 2 weeks for it to become facile, and yeah I still "preferred" to do it right handed - but I can still do it leftie.  I've been thinking about learning how to play Street Fighter with a right-hand joystick, just for fun.

Personally, I prefer the Tron layout; spinner on left, buttons and/or joy to the right - but that's just because I like Tron, and remember the layout. That said, I plan on having my spinner as close to center (along with the trackball) as possible, so that other folks can conceivably play with either hand.

[paigeoliver]

I'm not going to push on this argument very hard, but ultimately, it doesn't matter which side you put it on.

Right you can PERSONALLY adjust. I am getting used to the lefty trackballs on my Cabal machine, however guests can barely work the thing and they won't be there often enough to learn to adjust.

[PL1]

I'm side-stepping this whole question by using a modular panel.

More work to get it wired, but very versatile once you get it done and it's easy to add different controller options.


Scott

[epetti]

I think I'm going to leave mine where I currently have it planned -- between Player 1 and Player 3.  So it's to the left of the Player 1 joystick, but I can program both the Player 1 and Player 3 buttons to fire, so people can use it with either hand even though physically it's more on the left side of the panel.