Main > Everything Else
History of the keyboard hack
Tiger-Heli:
--- Quote from: spystyle on April 26, 2005, 03:03:39 pm ---I can dig it,
Next time I go out to his neck of the woods I'll bring that prog on CD and see what it has to say.
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Thanks! BTW, a thumbdrive or a floppy will fit both of them with room to spare.
--- Quote ---But the bottom line is it works well, cost about $5, and was simple to make.
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I suspect the bottom line is it works okay but could have worked better, would have required more time, but no more money or complexity to make. But I'll wait on the program test results.
saint:
Yep :)
--- Quote from: screaming on April 26, 2005, 01:59:34 pm ---
--- Quote from: saint on April 26, 2005, 01:44:58 pm ---(IANAK)
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I Am Not A Keyboard?
--- End quote ---
RandyT:
--- Quote from: spystyle on April 26, 2005, 03:03:39 pm ---But the bottom line is it works well, cost about $5, and was simple to make.
--- End quote ---
Craig,
The point of all of this negativity toward the keyboard hack is that you really can't just haphazardly select which keys you connect to your buttons, as the possibility of gameplay crippling problems is not only probable, but perhaps even guranteed.
The biggest issues will be seen with a 2-player fighting game, which is a pretty common thing to use with the panels built by a good percentage of this group. You might not know that the keyboard hack blocked that punch on you and chalk it up to a screwup on your part, but you just won't know for sure. Sooner or later, you are going see how the hack is affecting the gameplay and get frustrated and remove it. If you stick to single player games with 3 or less buttons that are likely to be pressed at once, you'll probably never notice.
The point that myself and others here are trying to make is that the expectations placed on the encoder by a large group of others that frequent this site are far more demanding than perhaps yours is, and encouraging the use of a keyboard hack to these folks would do them a great disservice.
Like Tiger-Heli said, all you need is to run GhostKey and start mashing buttons to see what kind of problems you will run into. No degree required :)
RandyT
Tiger-Heli:
--- Quote from: RandyT on April 27, 2005, 09:34:54 am ---The point of all of this negativity toward the keyboard hack is that you really can't just haphazardly select which keys you connect to your buttons, as the possibility of gameplay crippling problems is not only probable, but perhaps even guranteed.
The biggest issues will be seen with a 2-player fighting game, which is a pretty common thing to use with the panels built by a good percentage of this group. You might not know that the keyboard hack blocked that punch on you and chalk it up to a screwup on your part, but you just won't know for sure. Sooner or later, you are going see how the hack is affecting the gameplay and get frustrated and remove it. If you stick to single player games with 3 or less buttons that are likely to be pressed at once, you'll probably never notice.
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For that matter, I'm not THAT negative on the keyboard hack. I show on my page how you can make it work for two-player fighting games with no problems, but you have to choose keys very carefully.
You probably can't say "I want P1's joystick to use the arrow keys, and most of the other buttons to follow the MAME defaults". And once you figure out the keys that work, you can't change them if you want to play a PC game that can't re-assign keys.
And when you can do all of the above and more with a KeyWiz Eco2 for less than $20 or without soldering with an Eco2 for less than $25, it really doesn't make a lot of sense for most people.
spystyle:
Thank you all for the replies, although I write I am still a student.
That chapter, like all the chapters in my tutorial, are still very much a "work in progress". As stated on the first page I appreciate suggestions and carefully consider them for future revisions.
I will run GhostKey on that cabinet and update this thread with my findings, then probably revise the tutorial.
Dig it?
Craig