NINTENDO JOYSTICKS FROM DONKEY KONG.....

[GroovyTuesdaY]

Howdy!
I Have a question that been bugging me a little here.  
Does anyone know what if any differences there were from the original joysticks for donkey kong and dk jr and say the joysticks used in hte VS games or the old SUPER MARIO BROS. arcade panels?

My kids love playing the old MARIO bros and SUPER MARIO BROS. and i would love to get ahold of a couple of the old joysticks, but i didnt  know if they were all 4 way or if the super mario one were 8 way. I have never really heard anyone talk about the nintendo joysticks in the forums before.    
In a way i kind of liked those joysticks as they has a nice short movement to them.  I tried playing super mario bros. and the regular mario bros. and man playing those with a HAPPS SUPER just doesn't feel quite the same lol.  
If anyone knows where i might be able to pic up a couple of those joysticks please let me know.    Were those sticks leaf or micro switch? Just curious.   Thanks , as always for the help!

Groovy~  

[Gideon]

The Donkey Kong joysticks are 4-way and the Vs. ones are 8-way.  However, they are identical in all other superficial respects, so in actuality all that is required from the Donkey Kong setup is the restrictor plate.

... As for the connectors, I'd say microswitches.

Good luck to you!

[spidermonkey]

I personally never liked Nintendo joysticks. The balltops were too small and the shafts too short. The joysticks always felt loose and sloppy like they were worn out. I'm sure some of them were worn out but I remember playing a brand new DK 3 at my local arcade and the stick felt loose. I don't know if they used a spring or a grommet for centering but they were too weak in my opinion.  If you like them you should be able to find some on Ebay. I see all three of the DK. series populated control panels on Ebay all the time however I don't see just the individual sticks themselves up for bid very often so you might have to buy a couple complete control panels and eat the extra cost if you really want them.  They are in fact microswitch joysticks which is probably another reason I don't like them. Nintendo was one of (if not the first) to use microswitches instead of leaf switches.

[spidermonkey]

http://cgi.aol.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3267210723&category=13718

[spidermonkey]

http://cgi.aol.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3267210723&category=13718

This is a "must read"

[spidermonkey]

http://www.arcadeobsession.com/dkjrjoystick.html

Dammit I screwed up. Here ya go.

[GroovyTuesdaY]

Thank you for the link!
I will have to keep my eye on it and hope no else wants it.  I don't often hear to many people asking for nintendo sticks lol.
My kids would crap if i got this for them. LOL.  Maybe they would get off of the TV NES for a while lmao.
Thanks again!!!
g~

[GroovyTuesdaY]

http://www.arcadeobsession.com/dkjrjoystick.html

Dammit I screwed up. Here ya go.

Wow, thats a nifty article!  I'll have to keep that in mind and try to find one of each type on ebay hehe.
thanks again for doing the leg work on this one!
g~

[GroovyTuesdaY]

UGG. one bad thing is that the panel is in canada  

He only takes money orders and God only knows what it would cost to ship from there. Could end up taking a month to get it, which sucks.  i have done enough ebaying to know to avoid out of U.S. auctions. Plus, sometimes they slap you with some screwed up import taxes (or so they claim)
I will have to keep my eye out though on ebay now that i know what to look for.

thanks again.
g~

[paigeoliver]

Both leaf switches and microswitches were both used from the very beginning. Leaf switch buttons WERE the most common, but even many early-mid 70s games had microswitches.

The most common early microswitch using games tended to either have 2-way microswitch joysticks, or to have leaf style buttons that instead hit microswitches with actuator arms. Microswitch based start buttons were also extremely common. In general microswitch based stuff was common in games from Atari, Nintendo, Sega, ATW, Midway, and others.

If you don't believe me, then come into my gameroom and let me show you stuff from 1976, 1978, and 1980 (3 different titles from that year) that all have factory microswitch controls installed.

Also, I am an ex owner of a Nintendo Vs. cabinet, and my neighbor currently has a Playchoice. Those Nintendo 8-way joys are terrible. They were designed to be compact and to be long lasting, not to have a good feel. I would pick almost ANY other stick over one of them.

[Harakiri]

It's funny, in my country, the games weren't played in dedicated cabs so there was no choice between arcade parts! We had to accept all kinda stupid stuff that arcade vendors had to display the games! I never played with 4 way joysticks, rarely played with a trackball, never touched a spinner but i'm still very curious about those kinda speciffic parts!