WOW New LightGUN Info !!! Woot!!! :)

[Silver]

RandyT - thanks for printing pics of the camera. Any chance you could read off the info on the chip on the back (and any on the pcb, if there is any).

I suspect the camera chosen is a balance of price/performance. It would be intersting to know the exact specs of the camera used, and how swappable it may or may not be. I consider $29.95 pretty cheap for whole package. Also I have access to a few ccd style mini-cameras and might take a look.......

[patrickmaher]

Are there any import type fees when ordering from Play Asia to the US? I'm going to be ordering 4 guns.

[MKChamp]

I realized if you want to play games like T2 or RevolutionX with 2 players and you dont want to use analogue+ or advancemame, just put the switch in the middle(the switch on the gun for normal/auto/etc.). Since these games you basically hold the trigger down the entire time anyway, it makes it "track".

Also, anyone else having the gun 'lost power' while playing? Every now and then it just stops working. I have to hold the start/select and recalibrat it and then it start working again. I don't know is this is due to the recoil/gun taking too much power from the pc or what. Any ideas?

[RandyT]

Also, anyone else having the gun 'lost power' while playing? Every now and then it just stops working. I have to hold the start/select and recalibrat it and then it start working again. I don't know is this is due to the recoil/gun taking too much power from the pc or what. Any ideas?

I think I recall seeing that the recoil is rated at 600ma and "everything else" was rated at 600ma.  Both of these are really pushing the USB limit of 500ma per port.  Technically, the port should be able to deliver more, but that it all they are required to source.  Depending on the implementation on your motherboard/add-on card, this may be over the limit and be causing the bus to reset.

RandyT

[NIVO]

quote "Dear Steve,

Q ) These guns you sell seem to use a different technology.  Can you explain
roughly how they work? How accurate they are?

A : There are 5 sets of infrared LEDs on the two LED stand, which would be
place beside the screen. There is a mini camera at the gun. When you shoot,
the camera would recognize the co-responding distance of the 5 sets of
infrared LEDs, and the LCD TopGun system would then calculate the position
where you are aiming at. As this technology is total independent of what
screens you are using, therefore the LCD TopGun system could support every
types of screens. The accuracy of the LCD TopGun is 1024 X 768 pixel, which
is much higher then that of the traditional CRT light gun (around 3xx X 2xx
pixel).

Best Regards
Melody"

ok now for my thoughts on this:
obviously the leds are relative to how it determines your shot. So how about taking the led boards out of the stands? You would more than likely need to legthen the wires that join them together for your larger screen areas. Let me try and explain through a  diagram. As your display gets larger, in theory wouldnt you want to tend to move the leds out the farthest reaches of each corner?

image 1 shows a 19" with the led stands on either side. image 2 shows a much larger display with the leds boards lengthed to accomodate the larger display, therefore canvasing entire area for tracking.

[ChodTheWacko]

in theory wouldnt you want to tend to move the leds out the farthest reaches of each corner?

Basically, no, because the two biggest restrictions of this gun appear to be:
1)  viewing angle from gun to the leds
2)  range of the leds

The further apart the led bars (or leds, if you take themout), then the further you have to stand back in order for the gun to see all of them.   If you spread them out too far, you have to stand so far back that you're out of range.

In the 'duh' category,  the hole I keep staring at isn't the camera at all, it's the laser pointer.  The camera is in the middle of the gun barrel, and isn't recessed, which makes sense.

[evh347]

Hasn't anyone else experienced a gun that won't function at all?  As I stated earlier in a posting, the first gun I tried to test worked (laser/recoil) for a little bit and then it just stopped working.

The second gun works fine, but the first one I tried does nothing all all. 

WinXP Pro
ATI Radeon 9700Pro
Mame32/Mame32Plus+
Acorn's WINGUN drivers

[Silver]

Hmm no. I have 2 guns and neither have ever stopped working....

When you say not working, do you mean not detected when you plug in?
Is the laser site turned off on the gun?
Try not using the recoil function (unplug it). I don't use it all, but on 1 pc it caused USB errors reported by windows as a current overload on that port.

[ErikRuud]

ErikRuud,
You are right because as we discussed some messages ag

[ErikRuud]

OK,  with Smog's drivers installed I am seeing very good tracking on both guns.

Under windows.
When I point Gun1 at the screen the mouse will track it.  If I then point Gun2 at the screen, the mouse jumps to that one and tracks it.  If I point Gun2 away from the screen the pointer jumps back to Gun1.  I can fire with both guns.  If they are both pointed the the screen and I fire Gun1, the pointer quickly snaps back to Gun1 and then snaps back to Gun2.  This behavior should work for most games, except the continous tracking games as noted before.

One odd thing I can do with both guns in windows is do a double mouse area select.  Gun1 is the Upper left coner and Gun2 is the bottom right.

[paraziteking]

Hello all, I am a newbie MAME player. I have just received my LCD TopGun. I have a few questions here :

1. Which MAME games supports 2 guns ?

2. Does Virtual Cop 1&2, House of the Dead 1,2,3 support two guns ?

3. Does WinGun and Guncon2PC driver support two guns ?

4. Finally, which version of MAME are you using ? I am using the EXTRAMAME, but I can't run the AREA51. Is it the problem of the rom ? Where do you download roms ?

Help help !! Hope you guys could kindly help me. Thank you very much !!

[Smog]

1 ) Basically all two player working lightgun games, but reading this thread you can find more specific infos.
2 ) Yes they do but you should install the troubleshooter (refer to its site for more infos)
3 ) Yes they do
4 ) The best mame build under XP for 2 guns is AdvanceMame in my opinion. Analog Mame has good 2 guns support too. The worst is the default mame (and mame32 and mame32 plus) build ... but it is easier to configure. Mame32 has unsolved issues with wingun but you can use mame32  plus instead).


Regarding area51 : I don't think this thread is the right place to solve those kind of problems however you probably miss the chd for it. Try to find help for that in a more specific MAME board.

[darthbane2k]

okay, my gun finally arrived today, but im at work and wont get a chance to play with it until later tonight.

So I have a quesion I want to clear up - does the wingun driver definately NOT work with mame32.
I use mamewah to launch games via mame 32 command line. I do NOT want to use command line only mame, as mame32 lets me reconfig options with ease over my wireless network.

Can someone please test this for me as I dont want to clog my system up with a driver that is useless.

If Wingun does not work, what is the alternative? The EMS driver? I am only using ONE gun but want to be able to shoot outside of the screen to reload.
I also want to run games via fce ultra (nes emu) and PC gun games

[Minwah]

Also, anyone else having the gun 'lost power' while playing? Every now and then it just stops working. I have to hold the start/select and recalibrat it and then it start working again. I don't know is this is due to the recoil/gun taking too much power from the pc or what. Any ideas?

Yes I believe I have the same problem (see my earlier posts).  One solution is to disconnect the recoil, and another (although I haven't tested it) is to use an external transformer or USB hub to supply power to the recoil.

Silver: good work on the mame gun build

[roylazarovich]

Damn, I was so hoping to open my mailbox today and find a notice from the local mail office that I have a package waiting for me... but alas...

Anyway, just wanted you guys to know that I've e-mailed the manufactorer about thier drivers and they said there will be an updated driver released within the month.

Also, I've e-mailed the author of The Troubleshooter, and he expressed interest in the TopGun and said he will probably add support for it once\if he finds the time, I know several users have found the TopGun already compatible with The Troubleshooter but I believe if the author adds specific support to it there will probably be better performance and support for TopGun specific features such as the D-Pad for instance, which is something the ACT Labs guns don't have AFAIK.

Off topic: has anyone had any success with Point Blank 3 on ePSXe, regarding the problem where you can track with the mouse but not shoot?

[darthbane2k]

one thing no one has mentioned is znes support.

Am I going to be able to play Yoshi's Safari with these guns?

[Silver]

Off topic: has anyone had any success with Point Blank 3 on ePSXe, regarding the problem where you can track with the mouse but not shoot?

I wanted to try psx emu support, but I realise I don't own a single psx game. Can I take it from your post that it works in several games ok using ePSXe?

one thing no one has mentioned is znes support.

Am I going to be able to play Yoshi's Safari with these guns?

I gave this a test a week or so back, and I played Yoshi's Safari with Snes9x with the gun and it was fine. I got nowhere with zsnes but did not try hard, and with Snes9x I had to hit 9 a fine times to emulate the superscope. No idea if you can do this with a cfg file or not, I am clueless with snes emulators.

[roylazarovich]

I wanted to try psx emu support, but I realise I don't own a single psx game. Can I take it from your post that it works in several games ok using ePSXe?

I do not have the TopGun yet so I can't comment on whether or not it works with the gun, however, I am able to control the below games with the mouse and shoot with the mouse button, this is done using the new Digital\Gun option in ePSXe and hitting F5 once the game starts, so in theory there should be no problem in using any device that emulates a mouse.

Games tested:

Point Blank 1 - works great
Point Blank 2 - works great
Point Blank 3 - able to track but no mouse button is registered as fire, there is also no way of using the keyboard when in Gun mode in ePSXe so I am not able to bind the mouse button to a keyboard key.
Time Crisis - works great
Time Crisis: Project Titan - works great

[Howard_Casto]

Just thought I'd chime in with another suggestion.

To you guys that are havig power issues simply by a cheap 10 dollar usb hub and the optional 5v powersupply.  You may need to even get one for each gun, but it should help with the power drain.  My arcade cab has a bunch of usb accesories and it kept "losing" some of my devices.  Once I put in a 5v hub all was well.

[Santoro]

Or get one of these:

[Minwah]

To you guys that are havig power issues simply by a cheap 10 dollar usb hub and the optional 5v powersupply.  You may need to even get one for each gun, but it should help with the power drain.  My arcade cab has a bunch of usb accesories and it kept "losing" some of my devices.  Once I put in a 5v hub all was well.

Just FWIW (I've said it before), I tried one gun with both LED stands and vibration plugged into one USB2 hub with 5v power supply and problems still occur for me.  So based on this I would say some people will either need a hub per FUNCTION (led stand/recoil) or use a transformer for the recoil function.

[Silver]

It's possible some of the light gun fixes in mamegun.exe build will be taken in normal mame.

In light of this I thought I may as well scan all the games. I'm not at home so can't test for a day or so, but could someone try:

golgo13
critcrsh

as I suspect the tracking/aim in these will be off but fixable.

[bill55]

Or get one of these:

Can you post a link where to buy one of these?
Thanks!

[Santoro]

Googling 'USB Wall Charger' yields a lot, here is one:

http://www.mobiledriven.com/usbtracwacha.html

[ErikRuud]

Max Output: 12 VDC, 400 mA, 3.6W 

I don't think you want to use that for a 5 volt USB device!

[Santoro]

ooo

missed that.

[Lilwolf]

Boy these drivers down right SUCK...

Finally got mine... hours later and barely have it kinda working... but yet I've seen a blue screen of death / reboot for the first time on my computer...

Anyway, the question...

To get wincon drivers to SEE the gun, do I have any EMS drivers installed?

I haven't been able to use anything but the v1 driver running... then it worked (but only 1 button ?? )

So I tried getting both wingun and Smog's guncon2 driver running... neither see a gun plugged in.  I tried it with the EMS stuff both installed and uninstalled.. 

urg...  man the drivers suck.

[Santoro]

I got my gun a few days ago and I am waiting patiently while all you guys figure it out,  I don't have the stomach for this.

[Farmboy90]

Boy these drivers down right SUCK...

Finally got mine... hours later and barely have it kinda working... but yet I've seen a blue screen of death / reboot for the first time on my computer...

Anyway, the question...

To get wincon drivers to SEE the gun, do I have any EMS drivers installed?

I haven't been able to use anything but the v1 driver running... then it worked (but only 1 button ?? )

So I tried getting both wingun and Smog's guncon2 driver running... neither see a gun plugged in.  I tried it with the EMS stuff both installed and uninstalled.. 

urg...  man the drivers suck.

What OS do you have?  Don't use any software from EMS.  The only thing I used was Acorn's driver and things are fine.  I use XP.

Assumming you have XP...

I would uninstall and delete all EMS crap.  Install Acorn's stuff.  Then plug in one gun.  Calibrate using the built-in method.  Then calibrate using Acorn's guncon utility.  Then do the same for gun#2.

Then blast away.

[Smog]

So I tried getting both wingun and Smog's guncon2 driver running... neither see a gun plugged in

your windows is messed up. Unisntall anything and "maybe" you will be back to a clean situation.

[panya]

Max Output: 12 VDC, 400 mA, 3.6W 

I don't think you want to use that for a 5 volt USB device!

http://www.thepdamart.com/inc/pdetail?v=1&pid=3099

here's one that spits out 5VDC 
I'm going to check my local Fry's to see if they have them, I swear I've seen them there before.

Has anyone tested the acceptable angles on these LED strips?  My monitor is at maybe a 20-30 degree angle from vertical, I'm wondering if they will still work at those angles...

Or if not that, how about horizontally-mounted, but staggered?  Since the top of the monitor is further away from the gun (because of the angle), like the attached pic.

I want to conceal my strips behind the bezel, so vertically-angled or horizontally-staggered would be the only options.

[Hudson187]

I seem to have an issue with both smogs and wingun driver where the mouse stays to one side of my screen; i cant get it to move with the lightgun. I have calibraited the gun adn the driver.. always this issue.. and this is what I do:

1. Install WinGun
2. Plug in the gun
3. Make sure no gun programs are running
4. Calibrate gun itself
5. Start Wingun
6. Attempt to cailbrate in wingun.

I dont get it.. the towers see the gun fine; the red light goes off when I point outside of the area; I can get the gun installed fine but cailbrating it in wingun or smogs just doesnt work. Any solutions? Im running windows xp and have a ati 8500 aiw pro going to a 27" tv via s-video. Thanks to all and anyone that can help!

[Silver]

@Hudson187

I would suggest most likely cause of this is, when calibrating the gun itself (holding down a+b to get to calibrate mode) - make sure EVERY shot is registered. You will see the laser blink off on each shot, if not it can not see all the led's clearly.

[Silver]

Quick update.

The problem also exists (and is fixable) in golgo13. I suspect it also exists in critcrsh, however the game does not currently work.

I have also updated a patch for all the games to mamedev, as I have had feedback suggesting the fix could be accepted. So hopefully, all these games will work fine in normal mame sometime soon.

Other feedback suggests that the behaviour of jurassic park and opwolf3 could be trickier, as they used analog joysticks not lightguns in real life, and its quite likely that there odd tracking is part of the game to compensate for the mechanical controls (I suspect this is defintately the case for jpark). Its quite likely that only a hack would make them playable with any lightgun, although I'd love someone to prove me wrong. Anyone tried these with a analog joystick?

[Lilwolf]

Thanks for the help... I was getting blue screen of death whenever I plugged the gun in... I had to uninstall all EMS stuff... Then clean out the registry (because it was looking for the EMS driver when I plugged it in...

Uninstall the wingun, reinstall it... and its working great.

JUST START with the wingun driver and everything should be fine...

Also, it works better to have the lcd on top and bottom of the screen then it does to have it left and right (assuming its horizontal).  You want them as close together as you can...  And it works great.   Just calibrate it as normal but still point to the left top (now top right after rotating them).   

Now I can be a half foot closer (and that seems to make a big difference.

Tomorrow.... second gun

[Hudson187]

Silver: the gun did calibrate correctly: shot at the top left LED and teh light goes off, then the center, top left, top right, lower left and lastly lower right. I got into calibration by pointing the gun away from teh screen (light goes off) then hold a+b until light comes on, then go forth with the directions as stated above. Im really stumped! I also reinstalled every driver that had to do with wingun, smogs and EMS... installed only wingun and still get the same problem. My desktop res is set at 640x480. HLPE!!!!

[cobey]

that is the wrong order for calibration. Your last two are switched. It finishes with bottom right, then lastly bottom left. Basically after the center you work around the screen in a square.

cobey

[cobey]

now for my problem.

I hooked up both guns today with a powered usb hub. Acorns driver and followed silvers instructions. Everything worked great. For some reason one of my guns resisted going into calibration mode, but eventually it did. Played some HOTD3 and area 51.
  The first problem is that with both guns and the leds on the powered usb hub, gun 1 keeps on dropping out and then re-registering with windows. To solve the problem i moved gun 2 to one off the powered usb hub and into one of the open spots on the computer. OK everything is working great ...
  Until i re-powered up the computer. Now area 51 and HOTD are unbearably SLOW. After alot of changing stuff and re-powering, it appears that gun 2 (plugged into the computer) is causing the problem. If i power up the system with gun 2 plugged in, slow games. If i power up the computer, then plug in gun 2, everything is great.
  I guess i am going to get another powered usb hub tomorrow, any other suggestions? I do NOT have the recoil plugged in.

My other question is if i can tell mamewah to run mamegun on the lightgun list only. I am trying to avoid treating it like a completely different emulator. I have seen references to this being possible, but can not find where there is an example or instructions on how to do it.

thanks

[Silver]

I've updated the builds to 0.104, and included the golgo13 fix. I've added a Mame32 build as it was requested.

These are full builds supporting all games, not just gun games. Not bothering with that as I hope by 0.105 the fixes will be in mame.

Mame:

http://www.silverfoxy.f2s.com/mamegun104.zip

Mame32:

http://www.silverfoxy.f2s.com/mame32gun104.zip

[JODY]

Received 2 today.  Installed the latest version of WinGun and played Egg Venture in Mame.

The gun, being a Beretta copy is very nice in the hands.  Couldn't ask for a better feeling and looking gun...   Turned off the laser pointer.  Didn't try the vibration feature.  The sights are nice...with white dots.

I did notice a little lag when moving the gun fast across the screen but in actual play I pay attention to the sights on the gun and not the cursor on the screen.  Did notice a couple of times that I squeezed the trigger but a shot did not register and a few times think the lag didn't allow it to be on target when I squeezed the trigger.  Found I had the "Enhance Pointer Precision" option enabled under Control Panel / Mouse.  Turning it off seemed to get rid of the cursor lag...but I noticed a little lag between squeezing the trigger and it registering the shot on the screen.  Game couldn't keep up sometimes.  Assume it is Mame running a little slow and / or the driver.  Was running on a 2.26GHz Pentium 4 with 512MB of RAM.  Have a lot of AntiVirus / SpyWare software running on the machine too that can slow it down.

First time I've played Egg Venture and was able to complete several of the levels on the first try...

I'm not disappointed...assuming some of the trigger lag is fixable it is extremely playable...

BTW I was using a standard build of .104.