Number of buttons?

[usedelectronics]

I have a suspicion this has been covered, but I was unable to find it after a great deal of browsing/searching.

I have a 19" vertical orientation cocktail, and want to dedicate it to a 4 way joystick machine.

How many buttons should I put on the CP to maximize the number of playable games?

Thanks in advance.

[REBIRTH]

Normally people put 6 (or sometimes 7) buttons for each player.  Normally it is only the "fighting" games that use all of these buttons, other games you can usually get away with 2-4 buttons.  I put 6 buttons myself.

[usedelectronics]

Seeing how the cocktail is only going to have a 4 way stick, that pretty much eliminates most "fighter style" games. (Not to mention the vertical monitor orientation.)

[whammoed]

I used 3 buttons but put them on both sides of the stick to make it ambidextrous...really nice for galaga when the one hand gets tired of hitting the button, just switch.  I wired them to 6 seperate inputs though for pinball games.  I just tab into the menu for input and set it up so both left and right buttons have the same functions for games besides pinball.
very few 4way joy games use more that 3 buttons
look here:
http://link.mywwwserver.com/~jstookey/arcade/sortinfo/index.php?num_switches=2&do_search=1&switch0=control&operator0=%3D&switchvalue0=joy4way&boolean0=AND&switch1=buttons&operator1=%3E&switchvalue1=3

[NoOne=NBA=]

I personally would go with T-stik Pluses to bring 8-ways into the picture as well, and would go with a 3button/stick/3button setup if you have the room.

That would let you play some games that don't truly fit the vertical format, but would be playable, like Asteroids and Space Duel.

It would also let the player choose "stick-left/stick-right" for themselves, as well as "use the stick/buttons for left and right".

The only 4-way game I can think of off-hand that uses more than 3 buttons is Mousetrap.
I'm sure there are more, but that's the only one I can think of.

[abrannan]

If you're not going to run any Horizontal games in it, then 2 buttons will do for you.  Use SortInfo, then delete all non-vertical games, then delete all non 4way joy games.  Sort the remaining list by number of buttons.  There are only 4 games that use more than 2 buttons.  Tutankham uses 3, Chinese Hero, KO Punch, and Street Heat use 4.  There is one other game that might make a difference, Toobin'.  No joystick, but it needs 5 buttons.

If you up it to an 8 way, then things change a good bit.