LS30 Rotary Joysticks

[jerryjanis]

Woohoo!  I got the rotary joysticks rocking and rolling in my arcade controller (Druin made me a nice little card, and I upgraded my keyboard hack to the I-Pac)...

Oh, dear, I guess this is going to be a long 2-part question.

************** 1) **************
The shafts on the LS-30's are extremely short.  I have my control panel routered out so as to sink the joystick base a little bit (I followed the lead of the HotRodSE).  However, the joystick is still a little bit too stubby.  I'm really curious as to other people's experience with this - using fiberboard as a base for the LS-30, or how it's set up in the actual arcade machine.

Here are a few pictures that demonstrate the problem:

http://www.jstookey.com/joystick/LS30.html

************** 2) **************

Is there any detailed information out there about the speed/sensitivity settings associated with analog controls in MAME?  I've been playing around with those settings, but I'm just making shots in the dark.  It would be a lot easier if I had some idea of what each setting (speed/sensitivity) is actually doing.

Also, any recommended settings for a game like Ikari Warriors would be useful, so that I'd have a starting point.

I've gotten Ikari Warriors to maybe 95% correctness, but it it's gotta be perfect, right?  Or else what's the point?

(I was suprised to find out that the rotary is considered analog...  It makes sense, but it's a little bit too bad that you can't opt to make it 'dumb', and just make 1 key press produce one 'click' in the right direction...  There must be a known setting for speed/sensitivity that will do that.)

[SirPoonga]

If you are hooking up through the ipac how can it be analog?

[jerryjanis]

Sorry...  Bad wording...  MAME treats the L/R twist movement for a game like Ikari Warriors as an analog control...  ??...  I think..  ??  I'm guessing that it's set up that way because it treats Ikari Warriors L/R twists the same as an Arkanoid spinner.

If you're trying to use a digital joystick or the keyboard for  Arkanoid, the MAME settings (Speed/Sensitivity) allow you to choose how much 'spin' a single keypress will make in the game.

This could also be useful for using the Ikari Warriors rotary joystick to control Arkanoid (or driving games or many other analog games).  But then, you need to have separate Speed/Sensitivity settings for each game.

The problem this is giving me for Ikari Warriors is that Ikari Warriors is controlled in a digital way, and MAME controls it in an analog way (sort of), in that the Speed/Sensitivity settings apply to the 'dial' type of controls (like Ikari Warriors).  So right now, if I twist the rotary joystick one 'click' to the right, the settings affect how much ooomph that turns my little man on the screen.

I'm explaining this the best I can, but obviously I don't understand it 100%, or else my problem would be solved!

I'll poke around in MAME and see if there's a way I can tell it not to treat the dial as an analog device...  Hmmm...

[JustMichael]

How were you planning on interfacing it to your pc?  Currently, only Durin's interface provides a way to hook them to your pc.  Here is a link to his site: http://connect.to/rotary

[Lilwolf]

I have a few myself and hoping to hack them soon.  

I figured out the connections (there are 12 buttons for the rotation.  the hard part is that ground is the MIDDLE pin, not on of the outsides... )

I'm ocnsidering doing my own mame build that will allow me to just use the buttons as buttons

btw, to do this, you need 16 buttons per joystick (not including 4 buttons).  So you will end up needing 20 inputs per joystick.  So if you want a 2 player setup, you will need a MK64, multiple ipacs or the converter board from connect.to/rotary

[jerryjanis]

I'm using Druin's interface.

Hmmm...  Setting each direction to a different direction and editing mame to handle it...  That would fix my problem with the analog settings...

But I still think you're nuts, when druin's interface is available.

[u_rebelscum]

[snip]
Is there any detailed information out there about the speed/sensitivity settings associated with analog controls in MAME?  I've been playing around with those settings, but I'm just making shots in the dark.  It would be a lot easier if I had some idea of what each setting (speed/sensitivity) is actually doing.

The Key/joy speed setting is designed set how fast an analog value changes if you input data with a digital device, like with a keyboard or d-pad (but also effects analog input devices some how).  Sensitively adjusts a multiplier for analog devices to set how much a value changes compared to how much the spinner/trackball was turned, and does not effect digital devices inputs to the same port.

Also, any recommended settings for a game like Ikari Warriors would be useful, so that I'd have a starting point.

For trackball, mouse and spinner devices, this depends on the system settings and which brand & model trackball/mouse/spinner you are using, so varies from system to system.

But for Ikari Warriors and keyboard/d-pad inputs (which the rotatary joysticks are), I agree that most should use about the same values.  I think I saw some numbers somewhere, but can't remember where.  Anybody else?

I've gotten Ikari Warriors to maybe 95% correctness, but it it's gotta be perfect, right?  Or else what's the point?

Agree!

(I was suprised to find out that the rotary is considered analog...  It makes sense, but it's a little bit too bad that you can't opt to make it 'dumb', and just make 1 key press produce one 'click' in the right direction...  There must be a known setting for speed/sensitivity that will do that.)

The rotary can be thought of as either: 12 different switches, or as a analog input with 12 different possible vaules.  With the limits of the PC keyboard, I think mame went with the latter, since spinner support was already there, and game play would be easier with a spinner than 12 different keys.  So mame's default speed/sensitivity is set to close to what most spinners would need.  Again, I don't remember where to find approximate settings values for keyboards, but I think I saw a page with them a while ago.s

[Tiger-Heli]

First off, the originals were mounted to a metal control panel, so that's your height problem.  You could attach some sheet metal to the top of the panel and cut a hole beneath for the joystick to stick through.  (Just an idea!!!)

But for Ikari Warriors and keyboard/d-pad inputs (which the rotatary joysticks are), I agree that most should use about the same values.

[Frobozz]

How / why is it handled like an analog control?  I thought it behaved like a pair of buttons if you got 12-switch sticks and Druin's card.  

I guess, if it did behave like analog, I'd set the sensitivity very high and the key speed very low.  Does this seem similar to your settings?