Joystick Diagonal Issue

[jman]

Hi, first post here - I've looked around for a similar issue, but can't seem to find anything - just wanted opinions really.

I built my first arcade cabinet around 4 months ago but am having issues where my joystick diagonals do work, but they don't seem to work when you go from a straight position (up/down/left/right) and roll it around to a diagonal position.  I tested this by trying a few games where a character is walking right and rolling it into down/right and the character just stops walking - if I continue rolling it to a straight downwards position, the character walks down.  If the joystick is in neutral position and I go straight to diagonal right/down - it works just fine.  This is affecting pretty much every game - but unsure as to where to start to fix this as its making a lot of games hard to play.

My joysticks are Zippy Ball Top LED joysticks, I'm using a Raspberry Pi Model B and a Zero Delay USB Encoder - I don't really know what could be wrong, whether I've wired something up incorrectly, whether the encoder or joysticks are faulty and wondered if anyone else had seen a similar issue which they fixed?

[meyer980]

Those zero delay encoders act as joysticks, right? If so, you could connect it to a Windows machine and then use the game controller menu. It shows a little diagram of all the axis and moves a cursor around as you move the joystick.

That'd at least give you a better indicator if it's hardware or software.

[Crowquill]

Before you do the Windows test, If you can, try a game that has an input test. Most JAMMA games after about 1989 have a Test menu that will display an input as you're triggering it. CPS-2 and Neo-Geo games have nice screens for this.

Sounds like it may not apply if you were getting diagonals to work at all, but the behavior you mentioned is also what happens when you use an 8-way in a game that expects a 4-way. Once you hit two switches at once the game gets confused and your character comes to a dead stop.

[Mr. Peabody]

Before you do the Windows test, If you can, try a game that has an input test. Most JAMMA games after about 1989 have a Test menu that will display an input as you're triggering it. CPS-2 and Neo-Geo games have nice screens for this.

Sounds like it may not apply if you were getting diagonals to work at all, but the behavior you mentioned is also what happens when you use an 8-way in a game that expects a 4-way. Once you hit two switches at once the game gets confused and your character comes to a dead stop.

Keystrokes do not cancel unless set to (not left not up, for example), which is why using an 8-way on a 4-way results in many incorrect movements and deaths, so it's an analog joystick controller thing.

[jman]

Thanks for taking time to post.

I tried connecting to my laptop as I thought this would be the easiest thing to see what was happening and tried both joysticks. 

Each joystick test came out exactly the same - it does hit all 8 parts of the box, but the diagonals seem to be very hard to hit - rolling the joysticks sometimes hits them, but only for a brief millisecond before moving on (the Down/Right diagonal on both joysticks is definitely harder to hit than the rest and pretty much never gets hit on rolling).  So, I can hit the diagonals and hold them there from a neutral position - although the movement of the joystick is not exactly diagonal, If it doesn't hit the diagonal corner straight away (even though I think I'm holding it diagonal), I have to slightly move the joystick till it hits that sweet spot - that spot seems to be very small (probably only covers about 5 degrees of the total 360 you could move the joystick).

I take it this isn't normal for a joystick and the diagonals should be far easier to hit.  I guess the question is, are my joysticks a load of old pants, or is this something I can change as both joysticks seem to be exactly the same?  Bitcade the company I bought my cab shell from recommended I buy Zippy joysticks from ExtremeHardware - because that is what they use for a lot of their builds - and this is what I did.  If I have to buy new joysticks, has anyone got any recommendations on ones that are definitely going to work, not break the bank, are available in blue & red, preferably ball-top.

[processedmeat]

I not super familiar with the zippy joystick but does the actuator (the plastic part that hits the microswitches) flip around to make the diameter bigger or smaller?  Sometimes that could make it easier or harder to hit the diagonals.  If you have access to a 3d printer maybe you can print yourself a smaller or larger actuator.

I would also check the plastic restrictor plate, make sure it is in 8 way mode, and maybe even shave off the edges of the gate (opening) to make it little bigger so that the diagonals can be registered.

Also, if it has the microswitches that have the little levers on them, I think you can bend them a little to adjust the senstitivity of when they connect.

[jman]

The restrictor plates, that was it, I discovered just after I posted last.  It was in 8 way mode.. but I tried just removing one plate completely and I could see a massive difference in the diagonals but the down/right was still having issues.  After I removed the second one, everything was hitting a lot more smoother, the joystick seemed a bit more sensitive and the down/right is still a bit harder to hit than the rest - but ultimately I think I can certainly live with that.  Would be interested if anyone had recommendations on a really good set of joysticks if I did ever upgrade.

Anyway, thanks ever so much everyone, I can finally play Windjammers properly now, I even managed to bust out a few spin shots finally! lol 

[PL1]

You may want to "tune" (slightly bend) the lever arms on the microswitches.

The quote below was for someone trying to avoid diagonals with a 4-way restrictor, but the same advice applies in reverse (bend up instead of down) to hit a direction easier.

By slightly bending the lever arm, you change the distance that you have to move the joystick handle to make the actuator press the lever arm into the nub on the microswitch.

By bending the green zone down by just a bit on all the switches, you can tune the stick so that the diagonals are just out of reach.



Green zone = OK to bend
Red zone = Avoid bending

Related thread here.

Scott

[lilshawn]

zippyy sticks have a restrictor like the semitsu ls-32 (being that they are a clone of them). you place it in the  middle hole for 8 way and in the clover shaped one for 4way (slot for 2way)

depending on how trashy the zippyy is... or how good/bad of a semitsu clone it is, it may need the switch levers tweaked and/or/ plastic actuator on the shaft smoothed out.