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| Functional Diagrams of 4/8/49-way Sticks |
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| NoOne=NBA=:
I wanted to post pictures of how the different sticks function because some people are still questioning why 8-ways don't work well in 4-way games. Here is a functional diagram of the signals sent by the different sticks in a 4-way game. ---- 4-way Sticks ---- Notice that a properly adjusted 4-way stick, with a 4-way actuator will NEVER send a bad signal to the game at any time while it is held to the edge of the restrictor. Likewise, the 49-way in 4-way mode will not send bad signals. The dead spots on both controllers are small enough that they are passed through quickly, and produce no noticable lag while travelling through them. The 4-way base with the 8-way actuator is actually capable of sending 8-way signals, but only in a small portion of the diagonals. This is why people have complained about the performance of the Chinese "Wico-STYLE" sticks. They have the 4-way base, but use the 8-way actuator, and DO hit diagonals in a 4-way game; but do not have large enough diagonals to function properly in an 8-way game. ---- How Diagonals Are Handled In 4-way Games---- The problem with the diagonals is that they are an "unknown" signal to a 4-way game. How the game handles this information varies from "guessing" which direction you wanted to go (as is the case with Pacman), to just flat stopping until it gets a signal it can process (as is the case with Donkey Kong). Pacman If the dead spaces are small enough, you may not notice them in slower levels of a game because you will be into the right area by the time the game needs to make a decision on which way to go at the next intersection. This is not the case on higher levels though. If you need to do a quick right/up/right on Pacman for example, the game may read the first right, and the up, but miss the second right because you hadn't gotten out of the up-right zone yet, and it "guessed" that you wanted to keep going up. These deadspots are a coinflip each time, and you can't afford to lose ANY of them--if you want to be successful. Donkey Kong Donkey Kong is the ultimate test to see why an 8-way doesn't work in a 4-way game. Mario should NEVER stop moving while the stick is away from center--unless you push sideways while on a ladder, or up/down while on a girder. To test this, rotate slowly from Right to Up, and then back through Right to Down, while Mario is running on the first girder. That will show you exactly where the deadspots on your particular stick start. For the up/down directions, you will need to be on a ladder to test them, but the procedure is the same. ---- 8-way Sticks ---- The reason that 8-way sticks do not work well on 4-way games is that the size of the dead spots are exaggerated by the way the sticks are designed to work. Here is a functional diagram of the different 8-way sticks. Round 8-ways If you look at the diagram for the round 8-way with 8-way actuator, the diagonals are designed so that the arcs that send the diagonal signals are approximately the same size as the arcs that send the cardinal signals. In a game such as Robotron, this will result in approximately the same number of shots in each direction on a sweeping movement. Notice how much larger the deadspace is on the inside of the 8-way base with 4-way actuator. That is because the 4-way actuator is smaller to prevent the 4-way sticks from hitting the diagonals in a 4-way base. One result of this is that the 4-way actuator has to travel farther to hit the switches than the 8-way actuator. The other result is that the 4-way actuator will have larger cardinal areas, and smaller diagonals, than the same stick with an 8-way actuator. Also notice that there is virtually NO difference between the 49-way in 8-way mode, and an actual round-restricted 8-way. There may be some difference in the size of the deadspot in the middle, and the actual size of travel however--depending on which round 8-way you are comparing it to. Functionally though, both sticks have eight almost even arcs defining their directional signals, causing their operation to be identical. Square 8-ways The amount of diagonal signal sent by the square 8-ways is even greater than that of the round 8-ways when measured as distance of stick travel around the perimeter. This is because the stick is allowed to travel a little farther into the corner. This makes them good for games that require quick, and precise, hits to the corner (some fighters); but makes them harder to control than round 8-ways in games that require large sweeping movements (Robotron, Time Pilot, other fighters). |
| FractalWalk:
Excellent descriptions! Looking at the 8-way pictures, it should also become apparent why making a DIY 4-way physical restrictor would be difficult to do. The restrictor must "just miss" the dead zones, which takes extreme precision. |
| Tiger-Heli:
Great write-up!!! |
| daywane:
--- Quote from: FractalWalk on March 22, 2005, 09:51:53 pm ---Excellent descriptions! Looking at the 8-way pictures, it should also become apparent why making a DIY 4-way physical restrictor would be difficult to do. The restrictor must "just miss" the dead zones, which takes extreme precision. --- End quote --- well.... wish me luck. I am trying just this on a tron stick and a xyenaphobe. well, I am having a machinest do it... so I see you are right it is not a DIY. |
| NoOne=NBA=:
It shouldn't be too hard for you. You have a Tron one to use as a baseline, and there is some room for error on a Tron stick. The reason for this is that a properly adjusted Tron stick will function like the diagram of the 4-way base with 8-way actuator. It needs to be ABLE to hit the diagonals, for the Spider/Cone stages. But it must not be PRONE to hitting them (like a true 8-way) to avoid the zig-zags on the Light Cycle stage. As long as the restrictor gets you out of the "bad" zone quickly, it should function properly. |
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