Chase H.Q. / Mame Conversion - Progress Report and Help Request!

[Plashdaddy]

Hi All!
I am pleased to report that following the purchase of a U-HID interface, my son and I have been able to get ALL the microswitches functioning as they should!

We still need to work out why the shifter sometimes reverses during play, but I've seen some help topics on that and will dig further.

We also purchased an Opti-PAC to deal with the Active High 360 Spinner wheel (Thank you Scott for your advices on that!) and we set that up and last night we had a steerable game.

What is really really perplexing is that after playing it a few times, the steering started to fail: first right started slipping away, having less and less movement until it wouldn't go right anymore and then on pulling out the Opti-Pac and plugging it back in left had failed as well, leaving the wheel dead. When we opened the optipac software to set the Active High again, however this time we got an 'Unhandled exception has occurred with your application' and now nothing seems to fix it. We've restarted the pc, deleted the optiplex software and reinstalled it. Still giving the Unhandled Exception error.

When we first set it up, no grief whatsoever, so what has changed that it is now doing this? Any help is much appreciated. I was warned by Andy that you may have to set the active high every time you restart the pc on newer versions of Windows, but this won't even come to that.

Thanks for Reading,
Peter

[BadMouth]

Can't help with the Opti-PAC settings, but might be able to provide a small piece of the puzzle regarding the steering behavior.

In some games, such as Pole Position this happens with 270 degree wheels (with stops) because the game resets the steering wheel center position whenever you crash.  With a 360 degree wheel that spins endlessly, it doesn't matter because any point can be the new center and the wheel can travel endlessly in either direction.  An optical encoder doesn't know what position it is in.  It only knows whether it is moving in one direction or the other and how fast.  It works this way in MAME because that is how the original arcade game worked. 

If your wheel has an optical encoder, but also has end stops that physically prevent it from turning all the way around that is the issue.  You may look into whether the stops can be removed or if the hacks to make the game play nice with 270 degree wheel games work.  You might be able to do something with third party software that translates mouse input into a virtual gamepad Axis.

[BadMouth]

I see in your other thread that you were mainly concerned with running Chase HQ.
It appears that game had a second optical encoder that resets the steering center position.

It looks like it was just a long tab that passed through a second sensor below the wheel.  (tab is missing in this picture, but the sensor is there...picture is upside down)
If it is present on the original machine the input for it should be there in MAME.  You should be able to hook it up to the other Axis input on the Opti-Pac and map it in MAME.

This is the same way Atari 720 worked.  If you can't get it working as original, search BYOAC for workarounds for Atari 720. (or perhaps PL1 can weigh in on that, as his knowledge is probably more up to date.)

EDIT: If you want to test it out, you may be able to map a button to the axis direction for that input and just hit the button to reset the steering position.

[BadMouth]

OK, I see in the other thread that your controls look nothing like the picture I posted or the ones in the manual I found. 



If the controls in the cab are original, you might try to figure out if different versions of the game in MAME had different controls.  I've already invested too much time, lol.  Maybe PL1 can look into it further.

[BadMouth]

Ok, last reply.  According to a rom database, DIP switch 1 is for different cabinet settings.  Upright / Steering Lock | Upright / No Steering Lock | Full Throttle Convert, Cockpit | Full Throttle Convert, Deluxe

So changing the wheel type there (MAME's in game menu under DIP Switches) to Upright/No Steering Lock, might be the only thing needed.

[Plashdaddy]

Thank you for your advice, much appreciated.

I have since ordered a 'suzohapp red board' as I read somewhere it was an 'active low' board instead of 'active high' and therefore should be compatible with the U-HID interface, just waiting for it to show up!

Will post an update with the results!