Off Road Mame

[diplo]

Hey,  I recently got an Ivan Stewart's Off Road cabinet with the wheels and the pedals.  I have searched the forum and the other usual locations trying to find out if it is possible to mame this machine for 3 steering wheels and 3 pedals only.  I just want to play the off road type games on this machine.  Any help is appreciated.  I really need a plan of attack on this project!

Thanks, Diplo

[NoOne=NBA=]

It shouldn't be that hard to rig this up for all 360 driving games that don't require shifters.


Items you will need are:

1) Optic cards to replace the existing ones on the wheels.
(Hint: use foam tape to hold them in place on the existing mounting brackets--it works PERFECTLY).
2) Mouse hacks or an Opti-pac to connect the wheels.

3) An encoder (I-pac/KeyWiz/etc...) to connect the coin doors and nitro buttons.
You MIGHT be able to get away with a gamepad hack depending on how you want to wire everything.
4) An AKI from Dave, to hook up the pedals (they are analog, IIRC).
If they are digital, you could just use the encoder above.

5) An ArcadeVGA to hook the monitor to the computer.

Can anyone think of anything else I missed?


This should all be connectable without mangling the existing connectors, boards, etc... so that you could put it all back together easily at such time as you decide to sell it.

[crashwg]

How many 3 player 360 racing games are there?

[RayB]

Super Sprint
Championship Sprint
Off Road
Super Off Road
Sprint 4 (just won't be able to have the 4th player)
Demolition Derby (again, 4 players)
Hot Rod (4 player)

[Hoagie_one]

love demolition derby

[NoOne=NBA=]

A couple 3-P games that were missed are Grudge Match and Danny Sullivan's Indy Heat.

Championship Sprint is actually a two player game.
There are other two player games as well, like Badlands, Fire Truck and American Speedway.

You will also have all the 1-P games to play, so there should be a good selection to choose from.

I am currently planning a 3-P Driving/2-P Shooting cab, based off an Off-Road CP.
The perfect game for that is Lucky and Wild.
That's not really a two player driving game, in that only one person drives, but both get to shoot.

[Kremmit]

I can confirm the pedals are analog.

You can add Super Off Road: Track Pack to the list.  (same game, different tracks)
Also, how 'bout Sprint 4- is it emulated yet?
And then there are a horde of more modern games that could be networked up to like 8 players.  No MAME support there yet, but mabye someday...

NoOne=NBA=, are you sure the existing optic cards on those wheels can't be interfaced with the Opti-Pac?

[NoOne=NBA=]

I'm fairly sure they CAN be interfaced, but you would have to bypass all the "extra" stuff that comes on the cards.

I've seen a tutorial on how to modify/connect an OEM spinner to a PC, and figured it was much easier, and more reliable, to just buy the optic cards from Oscar.

[diplo]

It shouldn't be that hard to rig this up for all 360 driving games that don't require shifters.


Items you will need are:

1) Optic cards to replace the existing ones on the wheels.
(Hint: use foam tape to hold them in place on the existing mounting brackets--it works PERFECTLY).
2) Mouse hacks or an Opti-pac to connect the wheels.

3) An encoder (I-pac/KeyWiz/etc...) to connect the coin doors and nitro buttons.
You MIGHT be able to get away with a gamepad hack depending on how you want to wire everything.
4) An AKI from Dave, to hook up the pedals (they are analog, IIRC).
If they are digital, you could just use the encoder above.

5) An ArcadeVGA to hook the monitor to the computer.

Can anyone think of anything else I missed?


This should all be connectable without mangling the existing connectors, boards, etc... so that you could put it all back together easily at such time as you decide to sell it.

Thanks for the great info on this.  Can mame handle the 3 mouse inputs now?  I remeber this being a problem, requiring Analog+ as the fix/work around.  Also, would I only need 1 optipac and 1 AKI for all 3 wheels?  Thanks again for the great info!

[NoOne=NBA=]

Actually, you would only have TWO mouse inputs.
You can map wheel 1&2 to one mouse, and wheel 3 to the other.
You will need Analog+ to read the mice separately.

I am actually planning to use two of Oscar's mouse hacks, rather than an Optipac for my cab.
From what I remember reading, one Optipac may not let you use all three wheels at once.
You might want to email Andy at Ultimarc to check before buying one.

[diplo]

Actually, you would only have TWO mouse inputs.
You can map wheel 1&2 to one mouse, and wheel 3 to the other.
You will need Analog+ to read the mice separately.

I am actually planning to use two of Oscar's mouse hacks, rather than an Optipac for my cab.
From what I remember reading, one Optipac may not let you use all three wheels at once.
You might want to email Andy at Ultimarc to check before buying one.

Sounds like I should go with Oscar too.  I have an Optipac on my first mame.  I did try to hook up to wheels to it using the Optipac and Analog+ with no success.  I was able to use the original optic board though.  Will I need to replace them for the Oscar solution?  

When I hook up the wheels and pedals is it just a matter of changing the controller config for the few games I want to play so they map the pedals and wheels properly?

I also see that the AKI has 14 button inputs.  Could I use these instead of using the ipac?  6 nitros, 3 coin buttons, 2 or 3 admin buttons = 14

-Diplo

[NoOne=NBA=]

Sounds like I should go with Oscar too.  I have an Optipac on my first mame.  I did try to hook up to wheels to it using the Optipac and Analog+ with no success.  I was able to use the original optic board though.  Will I need to replace them for the Oscar solution?  

When I hook up the wheels and pedals is it just a matter of changing the controller config for the few games I want to play so they map the pedals and wheels properly?

I also see that the AKI has 14 button inputs.  Could I use these instead of using the ipac?  6 nitros, 3 coin buttons, 2 or 3 admin buttons = 14

-Diplo

As far as I know you need to either modify the optics, or replace them, to use Oscar's mouse hack with them.
You might want to email Oscar for specifics.

I haven't actually had all my wheels/pedals connected at once yet, so I'm not SURE what problems you may run into there.
You should be able to remap everything to work on most games though.
Some games may need to be mapped "funny" to work properly.
An example would be Stocker, which really had no gas pedal on it.
You can either map the Nitro button to be high gear when held down, or map the gas pedal so that it holds the "high gear" button when depressed.
You may also need to do individual game remapping to get the wheels into the proper order.
IIRC, some of the 3-p games are mapped 1-2-3- from left-right, and some have the P-1 controls in the center, with P-2 left, and P-3 right.

The AKI button inputs should work fine for connecting the buttons.
I forgot that they had them on there in my original posts.

[Kremmit]

Quote from: diplo on 10-16-2004 at 10:41:35am

Sounds like I should go with Oscar too.  I have an Optipac on my first mame.  I did try to hook up to wheels to it using the Optipac and Analog+ with no success.  I was able to use the original optic board though.  

The Opti-Pac FAQ claims two mice (4 wheels/spinners) in USB mode with MAME Analog+ or in serial mode with two serial ports and MAME Emu+
http://www.ultimarc.com/optipac5.html

Was the Opti you were using USB or serial?  If it's serial, mabye you should check out MAME Emu+.  If it's USB, mabye Andy or URebel can help you pin down why it wouldn't work for you.  Could save you buying a batch of optic boards and mouse hacks, since you've already got the Opti and the original boards.  I'm very interested in your problem, since my own project is going to be using Off-Road wheels, and I already have a (serial) Opti-Pac too.

BTW- Even if you decide to just go with the Oscar solution, could you post info on how you hooked up those original optic boards?  My 3 Off Road wheels all have the original optics, and I'd like to use 'em if I can.

Thanks!

[IncrdblHulk7]

I recently purchased a SuperOffroad Panel and Pedals (with the original optics).  I havent gotten around to interfacing them - but was hoping to hook them up as 3 axes of the OptiPac I have.  You guys seemed to have covered that solution already.
 
I have a ways to go on building my own Cab - so it will be a while before I get to the point of trying it - keep us posted of your progress.

[Byte Knight]

I have a Super Off Road cabinet as well and have considered this conversion.  I understand how the steering wheel and gas pedals are physically hooked up but how would you configure MAME to recognize all of these inputs?  If someone is able to do this, please post how you were able to configure all of this...

Also, would Super Sprint work on the Off Road's monitor since Super Sprint's monitor resolution is higher?  That's the other game I'd like to be able to play on the cabinet..

[pocketbikez]

I have a Super Off Road cabinet as well and have considered this conversion.  I understand how the steering wheel and gas pedals are physically hooked up but how would you configure MAME to recognize all of these inputs?  If someone is able to do this, please post how you were able to configure all of this...

each gas pedal input would be mapped to a + or - side of the X and Y joystick axis. So the 1st gas pedal would be mapped to Joystick X-, the 2nd pedal to Joystick X+, and the 3rd pedal to Joystick Y-.

2 steering wheels would be mapped to the x and y axis of an optical mouse hack. and the 3rd wheel would be hacked to a second mouse X or Y axis.

you would need MameAnalog+ and Windows 98 to recognize multiple mice.

*i havent actually tried this method but i think it should work for 3 optical wheels and 3 potentiometer based gas pedals.

[pocketbikez]

each gas pedal input would be mapped to a + or - side of the X and Y joystick axis. So the 1st gas pedal would be mapped to Joystick X-, the 2nd pedal to Joystick X+, and the 3rd pedal to Joystick Y-.

after thinking about this some more my previous setup might not work. if two potentiometers are hooked up to the same joystick axis they might conflict with each other when used at the same time even though they are turning in opposite directions.

the solution would be to have 2 joysticks.

Gas pedal 1 is connected to the X- axis of Joystick1.
Gas pedal 2 is connected to the Y- axis of Joystick1.
Gas pedal 3 is connected to the X- axis of Joystick2.