Rotary joysticks...

[Dazz]

I really want to play some Ikari Warriors and looking into getting a rotary joystick like the original game used.  What is the preferred rotary joysticks and who is the best place to purchase?  What is required to hook one up to a MAME cabinet using an I-PAC4 and Opti-PAC? 

Thanks in advance!
Dazz

[divemaster127]

the happ rotarys are what I carry these are from happ & 29.99 each pm if you need a shipping quote
thanks
dm

[TPB]

Dazz,

There are two types of rotary joysticks - Mechanical and Optical.

The interface you plan to use (Opti-PAC) can only be used with the Optical rotaries.

However, Ikari Warriors used the Mechanical rotaries, so if you want the controls to be game authentic, you may wish to go for these.

With the mechanical rotaries, in addition to your I-PAC4, you'll need an interface such as this :

http://www.ultimarc.com/rotary.html


Or alternatively, this GGG interface (while lacking the "plug and play" simplicity of the Ultimarc product) will also do the job :

http://groovygamegear.com/webstore/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=76_81&products_id=304


Divemaster,

I presume your pricing of 29.99 relates to the mechanical rotaries ?

[TPB]

Here's some info. on the sticks themselves ...

From the Happ website :

http://www.happcontrols.com/joysticks/50561800.htm

http://www.happcontrols.com/joysticks/50561800_exploded.htm


Some excellent photos taken by kowal, who owns a set of each :

Mechanical:  http://s59.photobucket.com/albums/g308/k-kowal/Joystick/Rotary%20Joystick/

Optical:  http://s59.photobucket.com/albums/g308/k-kowal/Joystick/Optical%20Rotary%20Joystick/

[divemaster127]

yes, the 29.99 is for mechanical, 39.99 for the optical I also have these
dm

[isucamper]

With the mechanical rotaries, in addition to your I-PAC4, you'll need an interface such as this :

http://www.ultimarc.com/rotary.html

Hi.  Question from a confused noob here (1st post!!)

Why do you need to use this interface "in addition to your I-PAC4"?  The description on ultimarc says that the rotary interface connects directly to USB.

Sorry if this is a dumb question.  I'm at the breadth of taking in the massive amount of information on this site in an effort to learn how to build my own CP.  Thanks in advance. 

[CheffoJeffo]

Why do you need to use this interface "in addition to your I-PAC4"?  The description on ultimarc says that the rotary interface connects directly to USB.

First -- welcome.

To answer your question, the rotary interface is, for lack of better terminology, a rotary interface. I know that sounds smart-assed, but what I am saying is that the rotary interface only handles the rotation aspect (e.g. Twist Left, Twist Right) of the sticks -- the actual directional movement (e.g. Up, Down, Left, Right) of the sticks needs to be handled by something else (e.g. the IPac).

[isucamper]

ah ha!

makes sense.  thank you

[DrFrag]

I'm building one to be able to play Ikari and Midnight Resistance, so I did a bunch of research on this too. 

I ended up choosing an IPAC4 with an OptiPAC for the rotary part.  I haven't assembled my control panel yet, but I laid out a test setup and it worked very well.  Really easy to set up once you've got the parts in your hands.

For the joysticks, I went with Optical Rotary Joysticks.  Although the Mechanical Rotary Joysticks seemed to be more true to the original (softly clicking into position as you turn your character), I read some posts that the emulation in MAME isn't too accurate on this.  That is, you turn the joystick one click and your character might turn two, or none at all.  Not wanting to go through any problems with this, I went with the Optical ones.  As a bonus, I should be able to use them as spinners, and maybe even as X+Y mouse controls for any frontend work provided I boost the sensitivity.

The pin outs on the joysticks weren't labelled properly, but it didn't seem to do any damage connecting them the wrong way.

Good luck!

[Minwah]

Although the Mechanical Rotary Joysticks seemed to be more true to the original (softly clicking into position as you turn your character), I read some posts that the emulation in MAME isn't too accurate on this.  That is, you turn the joystick one click and your character might turn two, or none at all.

This is worth repeating I feel...

[TPB]

This is worth repeating I feel...

With the initial version of Ultimarc's rotary interface (for mechanical rotary sticks), there were timing issues in Mame, which resulted in the above described abnormal behaviour.

Andy subsequently adjusted the interface, to resolve these timing issues.  Afterwards, he provided an assurance that the problem has been resolved.

Therefore, the Ultimarc rotary interface, in its current form, should work OK.

[isucamper]

Therefore, the Ultimarc rotary interface, in its current form, should work OK.

This would be good to know.  Can anyone confirm this?

[Teknique]

Old info but worth repeating for those using LS-30's...

http://mame.hower.us/rotary/

[Minwah]

With the initial version of Ultimarc's rotary interface (for mechanical rotary sticks), there were timing issues in Mame, which resulted in the above described abnormal behaviour.

Andy subsequently adjusted the interface, to resolve these timing issues.  Afterwards, he provided an assurance that the problem has been resolved.

Therefore, the Ultimarc rotary interface, in its current form, should work OK.

That's good to know. I know the problem really was down to Mame (handling the rotation as an ananlog input IIRC) rather than hardware, so I am guessing Andy came up with a clever way of getting round this?

[RandyT]

There seems to be some confusion on this topic.

Any rotary interface which does not properly take into account the minimum pulse width required by the application will have issues.  This is separate from the MAME issue (early versions) which apparently relied on time based counters rolling over to indicate a new rotational index.

I don't have the specific starting MAME rev in front of me, but later versions allowed for a perfect "1-click, 1 index" movement scheme.  IIRC, this mode of operation could be selected by setting the "positional digital speed" to 0 and the "positional sensitivity" to 100%.  Both under Analog Control Settings.

This may or may not still be true under the latest versions using RAW input.  Some of the earlier changes were lost in the transition.  Hopefully this one wasn't as well.

RandyT

[XtraSmiley]

Therefore, the Ultimarc rotary interface, in its current form, should work OK.

This would be good to know.  Can anyone confirm this?

Well, I had Andy send me the newest chip and I'm still having trouble.  It could be the version of MAME I'm using (.123) but I might still be doing something wrong.  Some games seem to work OK (Ikari) but others not at all (Time Solders).  Not sure what the problem is, but I haven't worked it to much yet.

I'd say if the non mechanical work 100%, go with it.

[u_rebelscum]

Well, I had Andy send me the newest chip and I'm still having trouble.  It could be the version of MAME I'm using (.123) but I might still be doing something wrong.  Some games seem to work OK (Ikari) but others not at all (Time Solders).  Not sure what the problem is, but I haven't worked it to much yet.

I'd say if the non mechanical work 100%, go with it.

edit: my info on TS is wrong, see later post.
Well, that's actually good to hear.  (emulation-wise)

Timesolders originally had an optical rotary joystick, while ikari originally had mechanical.  So for ikari, mame is using the "positional" input type, the way mame did what Randy talked about as the "1-click, 1 index" scheme.  So from what you're saying, the new method works fine.  But for Timesolders, mame is still (and correctly) using the "dial" input type, which is what Randy was referring to as the old, rely on time, method.

IMO:
Trying to find a perfect-for-all joystick is just 
Mechanical rotary joysticks is best for games that originally had mechanicals, but sucks for game that had opticals.
Optical rotary joystick, OTOH, is best for games that originally had opticals, and is only okay for games that had mechanicals.


Since I played mechanicals when I was younger, mechanicals are for me, but what's best for other people?

[isucamper]

Timesolders originally had an optical rotary joystick, while ikari originally had mechanical. 

How do you know this?  Maybe you just remember from actually playing the real games, but is there a database somewhere that lists the types of controls used for different games?

Also, about the optical rotary sticks:  How loose or tight is the spinning mechanism?  Does it then to slip when playing non-rotary games?  This is one of the reasons I wanted mechanicals since they lock into place it seems like they'd be less likely to slip.

[DrFrag]

I have Happ optical rotaries and they don't spin freely at all.  They're not hard to spin, but even if you spin them really fast and then let go, they will stop instantly.  I'm pretty sure no one playing a game would know they were rotaries if I didn't tell them.

[fjl]

If they can make U360's have rotary and have a lighted joystick, I'd be in heaven and set for just about any game.

[u_rebelscum]

Timesolders originally had an optical rotary joystick, while ikari originally had mechanical. 

How do you know this?  Maybe you just remember from actually playing the real games, but is there a database somewhere that lists the types of controls used for different games?

D'oh, I'm wrong about this.   From control.dat TS has a mechanical rotary (posted by me even, with ref to the original user manual).  I should have checked controls.dat in the first place; it's one of the best DBs on arcade inputs as it requires more than just memory to add the inputs, just not complete yet.

I was guessing TS had opticals from mame still using the dial input and the graphics are better than what I played, which proved wrong.  I used mame's -listxml output for if the game used dial type.  (Looks like -listxml isn't outputing positional type, though.)  Romlister is good at querying -listxml.

Thanks for making me check my info.

[isucamper]

Thanks for making me check my info.

No problem.  Thanks for pointing me towards controls.dat.  This looks great... I just wish it was searchable by input (type of joystick, number of buttons).

Thinking some more on the rotaries... it's really weird if MAME is able to play Ikari correctly with mechanical rotaries but not Timesoldiers.  I did some messing around with Ikari (MAME version .123) just using my keyboard, and it definitely didn't behave like I would expect it to.  I'd think that one press of the [ or ] key would equate to one turn click, but it doesn't.  It's definitely mapping some kind of analog spin to it based on how long you hold the button.  That being the case, I don't see how anyone could build a mechanical rotary stick that works correctly with MAME. 
-edit  messing with the analog settings got this to work with ikari... see my below post

Disappointing, but from the sounds of DrFrag's above impressions, the optical sticks might do the trick for me.  Someone above linked a site where you can download a patch for older versions of MAME to that apparently allows the mechanical sticks to work properly... I wonder why the MAME team doesn't incorporate these into their build so we wouldn't have to have the patches get updated for each new version of MAME. 

[XtraSmiley]

Thanks for making me check my info.

No problem.  Thanks for pointing me towards controls.dat.  This looks great... I just wish it was searchable by input (type of joystick, number of buttons).

Thinking some more on the rotaries... it's really weird if MAME is able to play Ikari correctly with mechanical rotaries but not Timesoldiers.  I did some messing around with Ikari (MAME version .123) just using my keyboard, and it definitely didn't behave like I would expect it to.  I'd think that one press of the [ or ] key would equate to one turn click, but it doesn't.  It's definitely mapping some kind of analog spin to it based on how long you hold the button.  That being the case, I don't see how anyone could build a mechanical rotary stick that works correctly with MAME. 

Disappointing, but from the sounds of DrFrag's above impressions, the optical sticks might do the trick for me.  Someone above linked a site where you can download a patch for older versions of MAME to that apparently allows the mechanical sticks to work properly... I wonder why the MAME team doesn't incorporate these into their build so we wouldn't have to have the patches get updated for each new version of MAME. 

When you tested using a keyboard, [ ] , did you set the analog to 100/0 like everyone has been saying?  Let us know if that works, I can't get to my cab at the moment.

[isucamper]

When you tested using a keyboard, [ ] , did you set the analog to 100/0 like everyone has been saying?  Let us know if that works, I can't get to my cab at the moment.

No, I hadn't.  I forgot all about it. 

But I just tried it.  Setting "Digital Speed" to 0 and "Digital Sensitivity" to 100 fixes Ikari Warriors.  Whether you hold [ or ] for a millisecond or a minute, you still get a 1 click, 1 turn reaction the way it should be.  If you move "Digital Speed" up to 1 or higher, holding the button will spin your character round and round.

However, I tried two other rotary games.  Time Soldiers and Downtown.  For both of these, setting "Digital Speed" to 0 and pressing (or holding) the [ or ] buttons results in 0 spins.  This is true even with "Digital Sensitivity" set to the maximum 255% (I think someone else above reported this as well).  Pressing the button several times will get the character to move though.

I do not understand why this works for some games and not others, but I did notice that Time Soldiers has more gun positions than Ikari Warriors (12 as opposed to 8 ) and that might be causing some kind of descrepancey.  Downtown however has 8 positions, just like Ikari... so I don't get it.

One thing I did discover for sure over the last hour... the music in Ikari Warriors is 1000% cooler than the music in Downtown.

[jono]

is time soldiers the only optical rotary game? sorry disregard my question found list earlier posts

[Bluedeath]

mechanical SNK LS-30

[TPB]

is time soldiers the only optical rotary game?

Time Soldiers is Mechanical Rotary ... refer to the discussion above.

[u_rebelscum]

However, I tried two other rotary games.  Time Soldiers and Downtown.  For both of these, setting "Digital Speed" to 0 and pressing (or holding) the [ or ] buttons results in 0 spins.  This is true even with "Digital Sensitivity" set to the maximum 255% (I think someone else above reported this as well).  Pressing the button several times will get the character to move though.

I do not understand why this works for some games and not others, but I did notice that Time Soldiers has more gun positions than Ikari Warriors (12 as opposed to 8 ) and that might be causing some kind of descrepancey.  Downtown however has 8 positions, just like Ikari... so I don't get it.

It has nothing to do with number of positions.  It's how mame is simulating the inputs.

Mame still uses the old dial input type for both Time Soldiers and Downtown.  Ikari was upgraded to the positional input type.  Positional = works great with 0 digital speed; Dial doesn't.

[isucamper]

So I went through and tested all the rotary games to see which ones supported the 1-click/1-turn functionality by setting digital speed to 0 and the sensitivity to 100%.  Maybe this is old news, but I couldn't find it anywhere else.

Using version .123 of MAME and my keyboard, it looks like all of the SNK games work properly, but none of the other games support it.

So it works in:
  Bermuda Triangle 
  Guerilla War 
  Ikari III - The Rescue 
  Ikari Warriors 
  SAR - Search and Rescue
  T.N.K. III 
  Victory Road 

It does NOT work in:
  Caliber 50 
  Down Town 
  Exterminator 
  Gondomania 
  Heavy Barrel 
  Midnight Resistance 
  Time Soldier 

Being a software engineer (but knowing nothing about emulation) I'm tempted to look at the MAME source code to see if I can figure out what they changed to the SNK driver to get this to work, and see if I could add it to the other games.  This is the main thing keeping me from ordering parts for my first control panel as I want the mechanical rotarys, but it seems like the optical ones would work better for more games, and unfortunatly, picking between the two also changes which Ultimarc interfaces I use to wire stuff up. 

[XtraSmiley]

Maybe you should post this at the MAME forums to see if you get a response from the devs, then again, maybe not...

[Bluedeath]

If you want simply play on mame rotary games you must use optical rotarys (you will have to calibrate them correctlly for mechanical games) . If you want perfect gameplay you must use mechanical (LS-30) for mechanical games a and optical in mouse mode for others.

[Minwah]

  Caliber 50 

This one used an optical rotary stick, not sure about the others.

[isucamper]

really?  looks mechanical to me... but I wouldnt' know for sure, I haven't played it since I was 8

http://www.westcontrols.com/files/pictures.php?snap=../pictures/cpanel/calibr50.jpg

[u_rebelscum]

really?  looks mechanical to me... but I wouldnt' know for sure, I haven't played it since I was 8

Short answer: They looked the same.


Long answer: both the mechanical and the optical had different models, and many of them looked the same (the handles), and some didn't.  However, it is known that Cal50 used optical.

[jasonbar]

Howdy-

I'm moving over from my other thread into this one, since this thread has a great collection of some technical & practical info.


Let me attempt to summarize the issue to make sure I have this all straight:


1 - My mechanical rotary sticks with the Ultimarc Rotary Joystick Interface (http://ultimarc.com/rotary.html) will work only on SNK games & no other company's games.  (I'm running MAME 115, 115u2, 108, & 82).

2 - The the Happ Rotary Optical sticks (2nd item on this page: http://www.happcontrols.com/joysticks/rotary_optical_joy.htm, or also discussed here: http://arcadecontrols.com/arcade_controls.shtml#joystick_optical), is essentially a joystick with a spinner or 1-axis trackball (LED emitter & collector w/ windowed wheel between them) stuck to the bottom, right?

3 - The Happ Rotary Optical sticks will run *all* rotary stick games.  I could confirm this by setting all the rotary stick games to look at one of my current spinners & testing that way.  If it works with a spinner, it will work w/ the Happ Rotary Optical sticks too, right?

4 - The Happy Rotary Optical Sticks can be set up to be either USB or serial, correct?  Any preference?  Any extra hardware needed beyond what's ordered from Happ?  (like an Opti-Pac: http://ultimarc.com/optipac1.html or looks as if I need a Happ's Trackball Interface Kit: http://www.happcontrols.com/trackballs/56011300k.htm)

5 - The Happ Rotary Optical Sticks don't have a detent to quantize the rotation into discrete angles of rotation, right?  Has anybody hacked in a detent?  Doesn't sound toooooo hard...but I guess the trick is "tuning in" the detent so that the angle of rotation between clicks corresponds translated to 1 index of rotation on your on-screen dude.  Is it awful trying to play these rotary stick games without the klik-klik-klik rotational detent?

6 - If 3 is true, what's the best/preferred vendor for a pair of the Happ Rotary Optical Sticks?  I used Tornado Terry to order Happ items at a discount before & was pleased with his business.


Thanks for your patience!!!
-Jason

[isucamper]

Hi, i'm still pretty much a noob on here... but I want to comment on some of your questions.  I did a bunch of research on the whole rotary joystick situation since it is pretty much a necessity for me... but I got distracted actually building my cab.  In another month or two, I'll have the cab built and be back in here trying to figure out my rotary needs. 

I'll only comment on the ones I have specific knowledge on... I haven't actually tried any rotary sticks 1st hand... so I'll leave that to others who have. 

1.  Yes.  This is exactly what I found in my testing with version .123.

2-4.  I believe you are correct, but I have no 1st hand experience. 

5.  From what people have said on here... it is not optimal to use a optical rotary for a mechanical game, but it is certainly playable if you are willing to give up the authenticity (which I don't think I am). 

6.  Not sure, I think divemaster says he has them for like 40 bucks.

I did a bit of tooling around in the MAME source, but like I said, I got distracted building my cab which was a much bigger unknown to me than fiddling with the software.  It would help me if anyone could tell me what version of MAME the whole 1-click, 1-turn feature was implemented in Ikari Warriors.  Then I could do a diff and see what they changed to enable it. 

[TPB]

With the Mechanical rotary sticks (LS-30 or Happ equivalent) with the Ultimarc rotary interface,

Has anyone tried using these in regular games that DON'T use rotary sticks ?

The stick rotation could be mapped to any 2 buttons in the games (1st button for left rotation, and a 2nd button for right rotation).

You wouldn't want to be CONSTANTLY rotating the stick, so the rotation would be best mapped to infrequently used buttons, such as "Smart Bomb and Hyperspace" in Defender, or Gear Change (up / down) in driving games.

Sure, these controls wouldn't be game authentic, but I'm interested to know whether they work ?  It's nice to have the option of different control mappings.


For any game, does "1 increment of stick rotation", whether left or right rotation, correctly register as 1 keypress within the game ?   

[jasonbar]

Howdy-

Using MAME 115, I got some pretty interesting results, using my mechanical rotary stick & my Ultimarc Rotary Joystick Interface (w/ new chip).

I agree that all the SNK games you list work, except TNK III is a bit flaky.  It seems to have trouble at first but then it works OK.  This is after just a few tests, nothing too rigorous or scientific, so don't take it as fact.  I thought it might be a case of going into the settings & tickling it & coming back out of the settings until it worked, but just playing with the joystick for several seconds seems to make it work perfectly after letting it glitch for a bit...

I tried setting up Ikari 1 to work with a spinner, which required enabling my mouse.  It works fine w/ a spinner, as long as you tune in the analog settings to your liking, but I don't like it.  Definitely weird.  I didn't go further with any other games--I don't know if I'd be OK w/ using an optical rotary stick, but using an optical rotary spinner knob is certainly whack.


Then I looked @ your "does NOT work" list:

Cal .50: my mechanical sticks work quite well w/ this game!!!  I set up dial dec & dial inc to correspond to the mechanical rotary keys ([ & ]).  Default settings are 15 & 15%.  This is really close to working fine.  Cal .50 guys seem to have 16 positions (verified by setting up the spinner & testing).  I'm having a little trouble dialing in for 1 "click" to be exactly 1 rotational increment for my Cal .50 guy, but it's close.  I either set it up so it occasionally doesn't index or occasionally moves 2 ticks when I rotate my stick.  After much trial & error, the best I can do is 14 & 15%, a far cry from the 0 & 100% settings on the SNK games.  Playable!  Not perfect, but playable!

Downtown: works also.  I found 38 & 38% to be a good setting that works pretty well.  I didn't spend a lot of time tuning this in.  I also learned that Downtown is lame & doesn't let you mess around for even a minute at the beginning to test your darn joysticks, as some of the other games do (Heavy Barrel is generous!).  :\

Exterminator: works fine w/ defaults of 10 & 50%.  This game is least affected by the inaccuracies of the sticks, because you can rotate only a limited angle before you hit a stop.  And it's the only one that's not a top-down view, so it's less obvious if you're getting a 1-to-1 correspondance between your stick rotation & your character rotation.  But, can I just say "WTF"!?!?   

Gondomania: 15 & 100% work OK.

Heavy Barrel: Tip: Don't pick "Heated Barrel" from your game list.  It's much less fun.  Read carefully before selecting!  14 & 100% works well enough (not perfect).

Midnight Resistance: 13 & 90% is pretty good.

Time Soldiers: 13 & 100% is decent.  This is a 12-position game, not 8, like most of the others.


General comments.  It seems that you have to enable mouse in MAME to be able to use keys to do your rotating...  Remember to deselect the analog input when you set up "Input (This Game)" (it's the entry right above the Dec & Inc in the list of commands for this game), so that you don't accidentally rotate your dude by tapping the trackball...hmmm, or this could be a planned sabotage tactic against your partner... 


So, all in all, this works well enough for me--I'm not going optical.  I've tried to make the settings a little "conservative" so that a rotational notch of the stick is more likely to *not* rotate your dude, rather than overrotate him.  However, it appears to be inconsistent--with the same settings, sometimes a rotation click doesn't produce an on-screen dude rotation, but sometimes he'll go 2 notches.  Close enough--just pretend you're playing on a beat up arcade machine!  Faithful emulation!

I don't really understand the 2 settings great, so I welcome anybody to tweak these settings & post their results!  SGT wrote up a nice summary of this in my previous thread on this topic: http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=81068.msg846063#msg846063


Thanks,
-Jason

So I went through and tested all the rotary games to see which ones supported the 1-click/1-turn functionality by setting digital speed to 0 and the sensitivity to 100%.  Maybe this is old news, but I couldn't find it anywhere else.

Using version .123 of MAME and my keyboard, it looks like all of the SNK games work properly, but none of the other games support it.

So it works in:
  Bermuda Triangle 
  Guerilla War 
  Ikari III - The Rescue 
  Ikari Warriors 
  SAR - Search and Rescue
  T.N.K. III 
  Victory Road 

It does NOT work in:
  Caliber 50 
  Down Town 
  Exterminator 
  Gondomania 
  Heavy Barrel 
  Midnight Resistance 
  Time Soldier 

[TPB]

Close enough--just pretend you're playing on a beat up arcade machine!  Faithful emulation!

LOL, that's true !   


Good stuff Jason !   

Thanks to your research, we can say that ALL of the rotary games, appear to be playable (with the LS-30 or Happs Mechanical rotary stick, together with the Ultimarc rotary interface).

Some will play with perfect accuracy, while the others are "good enough".

Each games just needs its own specific fine-tuning.

[TPB]

Hey Jason,

Would you be able to test, whether these sticks can be used in games that DON'T use rotary sticks.

Can they be used in ANY game at all, so that the stick rotation (to the left or right) can be mapped to a couple of buttons within the game ?

Sure, it's not game-authentic to "map the controls" in this manner.  But it'd be nice to know whether it works :


http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=76828.msg851449#msg851449