I want to play games like "Front Line", "Wild West", and of course "Ikari Warriors". What do you recommend for a controller?
You're talking about two very different controllers for those games.
The wiki's
Joystick Database has pictures of the Taito Aim-n-Fire and a similar controller used on some Nintendo games.
Taito:
Nintendo (?):
There are six games that used this type of controller:
- Front Line
- The Tin Star
- Wild Western
- Sheriff (Nintendo)
- Bandido (Exidy -- licensed re-release of Sheriff)
- Western Gun Part II (Taito -- licensed re-release of Sheriff)
The controller acts like a joystick that is always pressed in the direction that the knob points.
- Twist to aim.
- Press to fire.
The originals are very expensive, but there's a guy selling several repro versions of this control on e-bay.
- Some are not original size and they're not cheap, but they might be an option.
https://www.ebay.com/itm/FRONT-LINE-ARCADE-ROTARY-SWITCH-IN-MINIATURE/164148979716Another option is to play these games on a Robotron-style dual-stick setup.
- Left stick for movement.
- Right stick for aim
and map all four directions to fire in MAME.
Any keyboard or gamepad encoder will work for this setup.
List of dual-stick games:
http://wiki.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/Joysticks#Games_with_Dual_Joysticks--------------
Ikari Warriors uses a mechanical rotary joystick -- an 8-way stick with a 12-position rotary switch on the bottom.
LS-30:
Happ mechanical rotary stick: (Part # 50-5618-00)
There are about two dozen games that use this type of controller.
http://wiki.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/Joysticks#Mechanical_Rotary_Joystick_Games_.28LS-30.2C_Happ_Mechanical_Rotary_Sticks.29*** Scroll down on that page for important MAME settings for these games. ***
For this type of stick, you'll need either a
rotary encoder or Ultimarc has a diagram showing how to use diodes to convert the rotary switch connections into a quadrature waveform readable by an
optical (mouse) encoder.
Scott