Build Your Own Arcade Controls Forum
Main => Main Forum => Topic started by: bigleechild on February 15, 2003, 08:56:04 am
-
Will a joystick from the 720 degrees arcade game work with a mame system?
-
Not without a special compile being made. The 720 joystick has 2 optical discs.. 1 is used for movement and 1 is used for calibration.. the calibration disc wouldn't be recognized by MAME and the skater would quickly become out of sync with the joystick.
Too bad, I'd really like to see a solution to this someday.
-
Has anyone modified the source to make it work with a joystick better?
What exactly is the other encoder for? does it just click when it's north or something (ie, something that we might be able to fake?)
I would love to hear it. But even then, I haven't seen a single analog controller that would really work. I wrote a program that would convert a rotating mouse motion into a joystick directional motion that worked very well.. (it kept track of the angles you are moving and what quad you where in to see where you are going.... it really ended up working pretty good). Anyway, I wanted to add it to mame at some point... just never finished it (like all my other projects)
-
Has anyone modified the source to make it work with a joystick better?
SmitDogg had a build somewhere in the 0.5x's that did a digital joystick hack (eight directions to skate). It is possible to do an analog hack. Need to convert an (x,y) pair into an angle (well, delta angle), and it seems you got something like that a while ago.
What exactly is the other encoder for? does it just click when it's north or something (ie, something that we might be able to fake?)
The other encoder has two holes next to each other. It looks like it is an error correction wheel to fix if one or two holes were missed on the normal wheel. AFAIK, it isn't needed in the real game, as long as you don't mind having to recalibrate often. ;)
I would love to hear it. But even then, I haven't seen a single analog controller that would really work. I wrote a program that would convert a rotating mouse motion into a joystick directional motion that worked very well.. (it kept track of the angles you are moving and what quad you where in to see where you are going.... it really ended up working pretty good). Anyway, I wanted to add it to mame at some point... just never finished it (like all my other projects)
Do you still have the code? Maybe I could tool with it and add it to analog+.
Here's the data I have:
The normal encoder wheel has 72 wholes, meaning each hole = 5 degrees.
The other encoder wheel has two holes off sync'd with the normal encoder's holes and spaced 10 degrees apart.
If you ever ran into a 720 machine in the arcades that would get off sync sometimes, this usually meant the non-standard encoder wheel sensor was dead. If it was really bad at keeping sync, that usually meant the normal sensor was on the blink.
Also, directX directInput does not seem to use the mouse accelleration setting in windows. At least on my winMe & mouse drivers. So it may be possible to get a real 720 controller to work on mame.
Which reminds me. Anyone know where I can a replacement pivot ball for a 720 controller?
-
I love 720 and spent some time trying to modify Mame to have better controls. I hacked some changes to enable me to use a joystick and control it so that the skateboarder's direction will match the direction you are pointing the 8-way joystick. If you point north, the skateboarder will immediately point north and if you point southwest, the skateboarder will immediately jump to the southwest. This is how it worked on the commodore 64 and nintendo versions (maybe that's why I'm so comfortable playing it that way). I find that it works a lot better than the way Mame controls it now with a joystick.
Just now I quickly updated the changes I made to Mame version 6.4. I think it's kind of a sloppy job that I did - I'm guessing that it probably breaks a lot of other games, but it works pretty nicely (in my opinion) for 720.
You can download my mame64 source files here:
http://www26.brinkster.com/jstookey/joystick/720mame.html
I also own an original 720 joystick, but I haven't gotten so far as to make it work properly.
I remember playing the regular build of mame with it at one point, and it seemed to work properly for the most part using only the primary analog spinner disc on the joystick, but I didn't play it for long (I get so easily distracted - Mame's a little too awesome).
If only I had the time, it couldn't possibly be terribly difficult to get Mame to work perfectly with the 720' joystick.
No joke, there WILL be a solution SOMEDAY, but I have so many Mame projects that most of them lose priority really easily.
-
I would love to help with this. I have a real 720 arcade game and an extra conroller. once this works in mame I can sell the game!!! I also have schematics and know how to read them. What i do not have is programming skills!
Any programmers want to give this a try?
Thanks
Todd
-
Wait wait wait.. Isn't the controller in 720 just a spinner with a joystick offset from the center?
-
I'm so glad this is being discussed. I'm going to try Jake's hack. I always loved 720 and it is just one of those games where mame doesn't cut it because of the controls. I thought a good joystick hack might be the solution. I'll try the changes.
Wade
-
Wait wait wait.. Isn't the controller in 720 just a spinner with a joystick offset from the center?
As stated above, spinner with a joystick (handle) offset from center and a second encoder wheel for calibration so that when the handle is pointing NW, the skater is travelling NW.
-
I had my 720 joystick hooked up to an Optipac for a little while (I don't have the Optipac anymore) and I remember that it seemed to work suprisingly well even without using the calibration wheel. I didn't play it for long enough to fully test it because the joystick is a little awkward when it's not mounted to a control panel. I just had to make sure that the joystick was in the correct position when I started the game.
I suspect that Mame handles the joystick just like the arcade only without the calibration spinner hooked up. According to u_rebelscum, it worked ok with occasional recalibration, so maybe it would work pretty much Ok as it is.
u_rebelscum - could you play a full game without having to recalibrate? Also, is there a way to recalibrate in the middle of a game?
-
I suspect that Mame handles the joystick just like the arcade only without the calibration spinner hooked up. According to u_rebelscum, it worked ok with occasional recalibration, so maybe it would work pretty much Ok as it is.
I was talking about in arcade preformance, not mame. But you are right about mame only hooks up the one action wheel and not the calibration wheel. Since mame just feeds the mouse data straight to the game in 720, I think any spinner with a 72 hole encoder wheel will work as well as a 720 controller, ATM. The hard thing needed to get the calibration wheel working is mostly adding support for it without screwing up using a mouse/trackball-as-a-spinner input. If we didn't have to worry about trackballs, I think it would be pretty easy.
u_rebelscum - could you play a full game without having to recalibrate? Also, is there a way to recalibrate in the middle of a game?
Like I said above, I was talking arcade playing. My 720 controller is in need of some fixin' before I can play with it. :'(
For a in-game hack calibration in mame, you can pause the game, possition the controller the same as the paused skater, and unpause the game, I think. You have ~ 4.5 holes per direction, so calibration will be hard to get perfect.
Wait wait wait.. Isn't the controller in 720 just a spinner with a joystick offset from the center?
That's how mame is treating it, but it was a little more complicated than that.
The real controller had two encoder wheels on the one axis. The "action" wheel has 72 holes evenly spaced and is for small movements, like a normal spinner. The "calibration" wheel has 2 holes next to each other so the game knows when one full rotation occurs; this is to designed to makeup for any "missed" holes on the action wheel, which happens sometimes on all optical hardware. Mame ignores the calibration wheel, and acts like a real machine with broken optics for just the calibration wheel, except more so; ie: it works but is hard to stay calibrated.
-
Has anyone modified the source to make it work with a joystick better?
Do you still have the code? Maybe I could tool with it and add it to analog+.
Somewhere... But if not I can rewrite it... The trouble is that it was for java.. I never converted it to C to then add to mame. But it was cool. It would watch your motions and I could tell what part of the circle you where on no matter how big/small your circles where... even if they changed or moved. But I never figured out how to hack it into mame at the end.
So I could easily convert the mouse motion into an angle that you are pointing in. (ie mousemotion -> 35degrees)
Any know how hard that will be to add to mame? It seemed like that should be ultra easy.
-
quick question about hacking a real 720 joystick.
Whats the chance that we can capture the single recalibration trigger into a mouse press? If so, then the driver could probably be hacked to have a recalibration in it. Then running a real 720 stick (I want one bad... no cash though) it would work and auto update every turn.
-
Hey, I think I got it!!!
Aaron Giles' code always passes a 0 for the value of the calibration spinner disc. In order to find out if the code for the spinner disc COULD register, I added a looping integer variable that pretended to spin the second spinner disc really really fast. Each time my fake calibration spinner registered a change, the skateboarder would turn a minute (my-noot) notch towards 12 o'clock. (requiring 128 'notches' to actually turn the skateboarder from south all the way to north).
What this tells me is that the calibration spinner with it's two notches will only account for up to two missed notches per complete turn of the main spinner disc assuming that the track x and track y sensitivities are the same.
When I first start 720 in Mame with these changes, the FIRST time that I register movement on the calibration spinner, the skateboarder immediately jumps to 12 o'clock, thus initially calibrating it when you spin it the first time.
I set the default sensitivity for the calibration stick to 1% (darnitall, a value of 0 caused a divide by 0) and the key/joy speed to 0. This is so that it's affect on spinner/mouse users is minimal - it will do the initial calibration and jump the skateboarder to the 12 o'clock position, but besides that I don't think it has much of a noticeable affect (avid 720' mouse users may beg to differ with me on that statement).
If you use it with the 720 joystick, then you will have to boost up the track_y sensitivity for the calibration spinner. Also, it's likely that the track_x sensitivity will need to be adjusted (I am unable to try it with the 720 arcade joystick right now).
I changed the dial control to IPT_TRACKBALL_X and added another input port for IPT_TRACKBALL_Y and processed it as the calibration spinner, and I think it would work like the arcade machine with the 720 joystick. You'd just have to make sure that the sensors for the spinner discs were in the 12 o'clock position and the main spinner disc was mapped to the x mouse axis and the calibration spinner disc was mapped to the y mouse axis.
The only code that I changed was 720 specific code for atarisy2.c, so it shouldn't affect any other games. (That makes me very happy!)
Somebody with an optipac (or some kind of hack that involves both spinner discs) and a 720 controller, please try it out! I can't wait to play it myself!
I also modified my source code for using an 8 way joystick. It's a little bit more complicated to set up, but it will not affect any other games anymore.
Get both modified files at:
http://www26.brinkster.com/jstookey/joystick/720mame.html
Please try them out and let me know what you think!
-
If you will compile one for me in mame 32 i will give it a try. i have a 720 controller and a working game. the controller is is mounted on an ad on panel and i can have it hooked up in five minutes. What you describe on start up is correct though.
Later
Todd
-
Ok, I uploaded it to http://host.mywwwserver.com/~bethand/temp/mame.zip
However, I'll have to remove it soon because I shouldn't be using up the bandwidth on my mom's web site. I'll get myself a real web server soon, I think so I don't have to worry about it anymore.
I tried compiling Mame32, but I've never compiled it before and it didn't work. It compiled fine, but wouldn't run any games(?). This file is the standard build of Mame for Windows. You would run something like this from the command line:
mame 720 -mouse
I can't wait to hear how it works... That's awesome that you've got the control panel ready to go. You can email me at:
jstookey
at
yahoo.com
if there's anything you need changed, or just post messages here.
-
I know this may sound hard to believe but i have never used regular mame!! I downloaded it and will give it a try. I built the add on panel last summer thinking that someday 720 would work with the regular controller. I havn't finished the panel (formica) but it mounts to my cab and works. It also has 2 steering wheels on the front! had to have them!I will let you know what i find out. When i get it running i will set it up side by side to my 720 cab and see how it plays!
Thanks
Todd
-
Time to start looking at ebay again....
have to come up with excuses for my wife on why my paypal bill is so high.... ;D
-
I got a USB mouse hack to work with the 720 joystick's optic sensor! I more or less followed the instructions from
http://www.members.shaw.ca/bakaye/tballhack.htm
It's preliminary - I didn't get the calibration disc to work (I don't know what the problem is yet). I had to pull the 5v & ground separately from a keyboard hack to the 720' joystick. I removed the IR receivers from my mouse. Then I soldered the other wires (x1/x2, y1/y2) from the 720' optic card directly to the holes from where I pulled the IR receivers, and it worked perfectly, with no backspin or anything.
I'll post a complete writeup eventually.
However, I played 720 with it for a bit, and with a sensitivity setting of 50%, it seemed to work fine without the calibration disc, so I think that the current standard build of Mame (without my changes) would work at least acceptably. I really need to have the joystick mounted and with buttons, also, to really play on the thing.
-
I got both discs working with my mouse hack, and played with my version of Mame for 720
-
Now I REALLY need to get one (anyone have one for sale??)
I was able to play the arcade with full gold in one quarter (by the time I was that good, it was only one quarter)....
my hands would get soars from the joysticks (really... from playing 720... not that joystick... you sick minds!)
-
Just thought I'd mention that www.oscarcontrols.com is selling a pre-hacked USB mouse interface for $9.00 that would probably work for this. (Shameless plug for the soldering challenged).
Crawling back under my rock
-
Play as it should on my cab. I compared it to my 720 and it works like a charm. The brilliant author needs to send it to one of the mame devs (I think Aron Giles wrote that driver) So that it can be in the official release so all can enjo 720 the way it was intended! This was the fix I was waiting for since i discovered mame!!! Anyone want to buy an original 720 game???????
Thanks
Todd
-
I dont' think you will see it in the main mame distribution..
but it's a perfect add to analog mame!
-
Thats fine. Thats the one i use!!!!
I am curious, why don't you think it would be in the main distribution? It makes the emulation more accurate.
Todd
-
I dont' think you will see it in the main mame distribution..
but it's a perfect add to analog mame!
Analog Mame is perfect because you have the option to disable the calibration spinner if you're trying to use a trackball or a mouse. Am I on the right track?
I would love to hear it. But even then, I haven't seen a single analog controller that would really work. I wrote a program that would convert a rotating mouse motion into a joystick directional motion that worked very well.. (it kept track of the angles you are moving and what quad you where in to see where you are going.... it really ended up working pretty good). Anyway, I wanted to add it to mame at some point... just never finished it (like all my other projects)
Yeah, if you could dig up the code, I'd like to check it out. Porting it to C would be easy enough.
Ideally, we'd have all of these options for control methods for the game (thinking out loud):
1) Arcade Controller
2) 8-Way Joystick
3) Trackball (with calibration axis disabled)
4) Spinner (with calibration axis disabled)
5) Analog Joystick (joystick position->angle)
6) Lilwolf's wacky mouse->angle hack
At least in the way that Mame currently works, most of these rule out the other ones... For example, if Lilwolf's hack was put into the code, then that build wouldn't play with the arcade controller, trackball, or spinner properly. I guess I could try adding separate drivers for different control types (don't know if that would be the way to go or not):
1) 720arcjoy
2) 7208way
3, 4) 720 (tracball/spinner - uses original settings)
5) 720anjoy (analog joy)
6) 720anglm (angle mouse)
Possibly, some of these could be combined, but that might make it confusing to work with.
Which reminds me. Anyone know where I can a replacement pivot ball for a 720 controller?
Me too... The 2 white balls and the black rubbery slider that goes between them are in rough shape... I think my pivot ball is Ok, though. I'm thinking I'm gonna have to go to Home Depot and examine every item looking for something that is shaped like the parts I need.
-
I haven't seen a 720 controller on ebay in about 6 months. And before then they were always really expensive
could someone with a real one post the real dimensions (how tall the stick is... What angles it comes out at... The radius of the circle it makes. Ect.
I'm wondering if there would be any possible hacks to get it working (yes... now I'm getting a real jonze for some 720... and nowhere to fix it)
and I will take a look for the code.
-
I haven't seen a 720 controller on ebay in about 6 months. And before then they were always really expensive
could someone with a real one post the real dimensions (how tall the stick is... What angles it comes out at... The radius of the circle it makes. Ect.
I'm wondering if there would be any possible hacks to get it working (yes... now I'm getting a real jonze for some 720... and nowhere to fix it)
and I will take a look for the code.
I have one that I would sell.
-
I haven't seen a 720 controller on ebay in about 6 months. And before then they were always really expensive
could someone with a real one post the real dimensions (how tall the stick is... What angles it comes out at... The radius of the circle it makes. Ect.
I'm wondering if there would be any possible hacks to get it working (yes... now I'm getting a real jonze for some 720... and nowhere to fix it)
and I will take a look for the code.
I have one that I would sell.
Do you all with 720 controls have picture I could see? How hard would it be for Kelsey to modify one of his spinners into a 720 controller? It;d still be useful in other games?
Also, reading through this thread, I'm suprised it doesn't sound like the calibration wheel just triggers an optical swith to automatically make the skateboarder in the direction it needs.
-
Here are some pictures, let me know if you want more specific ones.
http://66.78.4.185/~jstookey/arcade/720/720-pictures.php
The actual joystick is rather complicated. It has a lot of doohickies that allow it to handle abuse and still work nicely.
I would be really easy to add the calibration spinner disc to an existing spinner. The hard part would be to figure out how to make a joystick out of it. For starters, it would probably require the same caution that a steering wheel/spinner needs to prevent damage caused by the extra force applied to it.
I can't seem to envision a simple way to make an acceptable joystick handle for a spinner, but I would LOVE to hear ideas on it. It would be awesome to have an option for a homemade/Kelsey-bought 720
-
Ok, I might have got lost on this but is there a hack to use an analog joystick? Which would have been the best way!
could you explain something, maybe a little differently. How does 720 use the calibration wheel? Where in mame is that wheel handled or should have been handled? (I know some drivers have code commented out like afterburner where special hardware should be handled)
-
Sorry for the delay -- Too busy playing 720
-
So there would be no way to have a switch automatically point the skater north?
Or a switch to act like the calibration wheel? metal contact brushed place correctly on the encoder wheel could complete the circuit for a switch that acts like a button.
So the calibration disc is extremely over complicated. I suppose if calibration got too far off it would be weird to have the skater just pop to north though.
-
So there would be no way to have a switch automatically point the skater north?
Or a switch to act like the calibration wheel? metal contact brushed place correctly on the encoder wheel could complete the circuit for a switch that acts like a button.
Use a switch and configure my 720 Mame build to use that switch as the both Track_Y (up and/or down)... That would probably work just fine.
So the calibration disc is extremely over complicated.
I don't think the calibration disc is very complicated since the 720 rom software does all of the work.
I suppose if calibration got too far off it would be weird to have the skater just pop to north though.
Calibration shouldn't get too far off in the first place, so hopefully that would't be such a problem.
-
So there would be no way to have a switch automatically point the skater north?
Or a switch to act like the calibration wheel? metal contact brushed place correctly on the encoder wheel could complete the circuit for a switch that acts like a button.
Use a switch and configure my 720 Mame build to use that switch as the both Track_Y (up and/or down)... That would probably work just fine.
Ok, I haven't run your mame yet, but is that done in the menus?
-
Config menu(tab key)->Controls(this game):
1) set Track_y to the button/switch you want to use for calibrating
Config menu->Analog controls:
1) Play with the track_x sensitivity (for my joystick I set it to 50%) for your spinner (assuming you have one) - try to set it up so that when you spin the spinner once, the skateboarder spins exactly once.
2) Set the track_y sensitivity for the calibration spinner (I don't think it can hurt to put it to the maximum) and set the key/joy speed (I don't know what values would work best).
-
Config menu(tab key)->Controls(this game):
1) set Track_y to the button/switch you want to use for calibrating
Config menu->Analog controls:
1) Play with the track_x sensitivity (for my joystick I set it to 50%) for your spinner (assuming you have one) - try to set it up so that when you spin the spinner once, the skateboarder spins exactly once.
2) Set the track_y sensitivity for the calibration spinner (I don't think it can hurt to put it to the maximum) and set the key/joy speed (I don't know what values would work best).
Ok, downloaded your exe. Let me get this straight, if my character isn;t pointing straight north, and I assaign a key to track_y, when I press track_y he should slowly calibrate north? Hmmm, not working for me.
-
BTW, I included jerryjanis code in Mame:Analog+ 0.65.2. Thanks jerryjanis!
-
Ok, downloaded your exe. Let me get this straight, if my character isn;t pointing straight north, and I assaign a key to track_y, when I press track_y he should slowly calibrate north? Hmmm, not working for me.
You need to go into the analog settings (by pressing tab and selecting 'analog controls') and juice up the track y sensitivity (I set mine to the max: 255%) and the track y key/joy speed (I set mine to 10). I made the default setting for track y to the minimum in order to minimize the effect it has on somebody who is using a regular mouse. If you are the rare person who actually has a working joystick of some kind then you need to increase the values manually.
-
BTW, I included jerryjanis code in Mame:Analog+ 0.65.2. Thanks jerryjanis!
Hey, that's great (1 less special version of Mame to worry about!). Thanks!
-
urebel, but you have it as dials not tracks?
-
Yeah, that makes more sense. I think it's no different as far as the way Mame deals with it.
-
Yeah, that makes more sense. I think it's no different as far as the way Mame deals with it.
Can you still answer my quesiton. In analog mame I have keys for dial_v. I hit the keys nothing happens, I thought the skater calibrated?
-
Can you still answer my quesiton. In analog mame I have keys for dial_v. I hit the keys nothing happens, I thought the skater calibrated?
Check the previous page - the second message from the bottom. (Except that now, with AnalogMame, subsititute track y with dial v).
-
Ahhh, I missed it in the clutter.
So, I think a hack to an oscar spinner is possible
Making a 720 joystick would be difficult, but I;d be happy with a large spinner knob with a small knob to grab ad rotate. Like those large truck steering wheels.
-
I left it as dials so any 720 ctrlr file will work on both mame and analog+. In mame, dial & trackball_X are treated exactly the same (& dial_V == trackball_Y). Dial V is even partially right name for that spinner; you spin that dial enough and the skater faces North (vertical) ;D
BTW, 720 encoder wheels vs the oscar encoder wheels:
720 has 72 gaps (5 degrees each), 720 calibration wheel has 2 gaps (@ 10 degrees)
oscar Pro wheel has 66 gaps (@ 5 5/11 degrees each), oscar model 3 has 36 gaps (10 degrees)
720 wheels have a little larger diameter than the pro, while the model 3 is much smaller than the other two.
-
Sorry for the delay -- Too busy playing 720
-
On my tests, I find that the calibration is a little different (Analog+0.65.2, mouse 1 = Dial, mouse 2 (trackball) = Dial V):
If skater is facing East to NorthEast to North, the calibration wheel turns the skater counter clockwise.
But if the skater is facing any other direction, including SouthEast, the skater turns clockwise.
Is this the same with you? Anybody know how about on the real thing?
Yes, that's how it worked for me as well (when I used the trackball - there is nothing different that I noticed in Mame Analog+.
I assume "tick" == 22.5 degrees, since that's the minimum you can see the skater turn. But since you sometimes need to turn ~50 rotations, I guess one rotation "fixes" one missed action encoder gap (1/72th of a circle).
By tick I meant that some unknown amount - I assume one missed action encoder gap also, but since I have the dial's sensitivity setting maxed out, I'm not working with exact numbers so I don't know exactly how much the skater is turning, although I know that it takes a few full rotations to get the skater to change his angle visible on the screen.
Just an aside, have you tried going back and forth past North in these cases, instead of full rotations? With the trackball mapped as the calibration wheel, it doesn't matter which direction I spin it, in regards to which direction the skater turns to "re-calibrate". Just wondering.
I tried it and when I went back and forth across north, the skater calibrated as though I had done full rotations... Hmmm - is there something strange going on here? Hey, wait a minute... Maybe there IS something strange about the optic board for the calibration wheel... I never thought much of it before, but in Windows when I spin the 720 joystick and watch as the mouse cursor moves accross the screen, the mouse doesn't act the way I would expect it to.
The primary spinner disc sends the mouse side to side across the screen like I would expect. When one of the notches on the calibration disc is passed, the mouse moves up a pixel, then back down again. Then the second gap is passed and the mouse moves up a pixel then back down again. If I spin the joystick a bunch of times, the mouse doesn't continuously move up or down. Each gap that is passed moves the mouse a pixel and returns it to it's original place again. I don't know what the significance is there, frankly.
-
The primary spinner disc sends the mouse side to side across the screen like I would expect. When one of the notches on the calibration disc is passed, the mouse moves up a pixel, then back down again. Then the second gap is passed and the mouse moves up a pixel then back down again. If I spin the joystick a bunch of times, the mouse doesn't continuously move up or down. Each gap that is passed moves the mouse a pixel and returns it to it's original place again. I don't know what the significance is there, frankly.
LOL. Is Atari taking advantage of what some people run into when trying to use a different encoder wheel with sensors than the sensors were designed for? You know, the "I hacked a spinner with a mouse, and now the mouse cursor just moves a little back and forth" problem posted once in a while here. :o Sounds like old school Atari.
It even sort of makes sense, since the two wheels use the same sensors & sensor spacing, but the calibration wheel gaps are spaced twice as far apart as the primary wheel.
-
So...uh, what's the verdict on this hack..etc? I used to rule this game! One qaurter to complete the whole bastard, all GOLD!
I want to try and play this again with a real joystick feel....but it looks like we are screwed due to lack of 720 sticks out there. What other alternatives do we have?
man, this has to be the ONLY game with this joystick, which makes it even more rare/hard to find!
I guess i could try to play it with happs optical sticks..still not as good as the original.
anyone have ideas to "emulate" the original gameplay?
8)
-
I've been working on a mouse -> rotation algorythm. It works well, but there are a few different ways to do it and I haven't come up with the best one yet. But I think this might work for the masses and make it fun.
Also, I considered purchasing an analog controller (have one, but not hacking it) and putting a round restricter plate around it (no corners) and removing the springs completely.... Then adding a ball stick instead of a real ball.
Then using the analog settings... but hack it so that if you are looking in a direction just a little, its full in that direction (ie, you don't have to be all the way at the outside to be pointing in that direction).
this might be the best solution because analog controllers are easy to hack, and they are pretty cheap (got one for 10 bucks on ebay in great shape).
but my current trouble is work... I can't spend to much more time on playing
-
Wow, awesome idea... Man, that would probably work really well, huh?
-
I've been thinking of hacking a oscar spinner.
I just need to find the right type of knob
____
/ \
/ \
| ( )|
\ /
\----/
The ( ) is a swivel knob. Like what is used on large truck steering wheels but alot smaller.
-
Sirp, those are often referred to as "Suicide knobs"
they are also used by some people with 1 arm to drive a car.
*Shrug*
rampy
-
So...uh, what's the verdict on this hack..etc? I used to rule this game! One qaurter to complete the whole bastard, all GOLD!
I dreamed of being that good. Used to about get 3 silvers each with one quarter on a good day.
I want to try and play this again with a real joystick feel....but it looks like we are screwed due to lack of 720 sticks out there. What other alternatives do we have?
1) Spinner hacked to have two encoder wheels, one with only 1 or 2 gaps one one side :p
2) spinner hacked to have a switch that closes once a rotation
3) spinner with 72 gaps in the encoder wheel and the correct analog sensitivity setting, and hope they don't get out of sinc*
4) spinner with some fraction of 72 gaps and the correct sensitivity settings (ie: 36 gaps sensitivity = 2 * that of one with 72 gaps), and hope they don't get out of sinc*
* also, you'll need winmame (directX doesn't accel the mouse) or if other OS (dmame) the mouse acceleration set to none. To semi re-sinc: pause game, turn spinner to correct position, and unpause game, or press dial_V button for a long time.
man, this has to be the ONLY game with this joystick, which makes it even more rare/hard to find!
It's not a joystick. Just looks like one. Think: spinner with angled handle instead of a round puck.
-
LOL.. here's a thought.. take an Oscar spinner and somehow rig in a calibration plate.. then hot glue a finger skateboard to the top 8)
-
http://www.boteco.it/english/prodotti/prodotti.asp?categoria=Volantini%20di%20manovra&cat-eng=Control%20handweel
article 779. That;s probably big, but something like that is what I'd be looking for then to make a hack.
-
hehe, I was thinking of the suicide wheel also. But then thinking of those small steering wheels (Oscar had??).. But I thought those might be to big.
btw, anyone with a real 720 stick. Could we get some real dimensions? (stick hieight from the wood, diameter of spin, angle of stick, ect).
But after thinking about it, I think the analog joystick would work the best with the hack. Why? You dont' have to worry about the reset/going out of sync.
-
True, but also hard to perform the 720 spins in a fast way... as it would be like trying to stir cake batter really fast for a length of time. heh
The spinning motion is nearly effortless on a spinning device, because of the bearings and the correct angles of rotation.
I personally havnt had the pleasure of playing a real 720 sadly. Tho now Im pretty interested in trying to build or buy one : )
-
btw, anyone with a real 720 stick. Could we get some real dimensions? (stick hieight from the wood, diameter of spin, angle of stick, ect).
quick measurements:
1.5" ball diameter
25-30 degrees slant
2.75" disc cover to top of ball (slanted stick)
2" disc cover to center of ball (slanted sitck)
5" length shaft from pivot center to end of ball
~5.5" diameter spin (outside ball to outside ball)
~4" diameter spin (ball center)
Note: measurements taken from a disassembled controller & sighted by eye. +- 0.5" accuracy.
-
here is a 720 stick for sale on ebay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=13718&item=3212135839&rd=1
ends in 4 hours...
:o
-
And did you notice who won???
YES!
(of course, your message here might have cost me 10 bucks or so)
-
haha..sorry man, thought i'd share. Glad it went to someone here though.
Wow, it jumped form $10 to 60 in the last hours? You snipers!!! :P
-
And did you notice who won???
YES!
(of course, your message here might have cost me 10 bucks or so)
as long as you use it for good and come up with an idea to reproduce it!!!
-
And did you notice who won???
YES!
(of course, your message here might have cost me 10 bucks or so)
as long as you use it for good *snip*
I shudder at the thought of how a 720 stick could be used for evil
rampy
-
> I shudder at the thought of how a 720 stick could be used for evil
hahahahaha
-
Have you heard?
Mame Analog+ now supports a mouse, a 720
-
I can't wait to see SirPoonga's solution to making a spinner joystick... Or any others that people may attempt...
Actually, the idea is if someone can get me a knob like that on the spinner, and I can pick up an extra joystick somewhere (just the base abnd shaft is all I need) I will take my dremel and start working :)
-
I took another look at my algorythms. There where two
1) where I just keep track of the angle the mouse is moving... and go with that. It works great, but the resolution sucks for me when you move slowly. this is because it would move one pixel up and one to the left... and thats 45 degrees. IE, moving fast is great... moving slow the resolution of the screen effected it. It might not be a big deal when you can deal with mice movements without the screen resolution.
2) keep track of a center point. This is MUCH better... but keeping track of the center point sucks again. You have to make sure that you don't update the center location to often... when you are moving on one side of the rotation.
I will take another look at it soon. I will send the angle version first (since it will or wont work sooner)
-
Does anyone have a DOS build of mame for this?
Wade
-
On u_rebel's download page, it says, "ATM, only the win32 command line build", which I would guess means that it'll have to wait until he gets around to it.
-
Does this version run with mame32?
-
On u_rebel's download page, it says, "ATM, only the win32 command line build", which I would guess means that it'll have to wait until he gets around to it.
Which might not happen in urebel's case. Anyway, Where's the source changes, in the 720 driver? Or is there changes in the windows folder in the source?
-
Oh, yeah, that's a good point, making a separate yourself build should be easy enough. As far as I could tell from looking at it, all of the changes that he made were contained in the drivers\atarisy2.c source file.
-
So in theory a dos build could be made.
-
On u_rebel's download page, it says, "ATM, only the win32 command line build", which I would guess means that it'll have to wait until he gets around to it.
Which might not happen in urebel's case. Anyway, Where's the source changes, in the 720 driver? Or is there changes in the windows folder in the source?
All of the 720 hacks are in the src/drivers/atarisy2.c file and can be used in any version of mame. You can download the source and use any of the changes in the src/drivers files just fine, IIRC.
(Hmm, I guess the switch mouse axis & multiple mice features aren't in the drivers file, but they're only needed if you have the 720 encoder wheel and the 720 calibration wheel on different mice, or want to disable the calibration wheel feature.)
And yes, looks like my distributed dos and mame32 builds will have to wait for 0.67.2, sorry; taxes (BTW, I hate K-1 forms), busy weekends, mame32:analog+ bugs, and a few more additional changes I want are slowing me down.