Playing Outrun in Mame (pedal problems)

[jerryjanis]

The controls for Outrun in Mame are kind of a mess, and I'm not allowed to whine to the Mame team because the System16 games "are being worked on" (and have been for a long time now).  The problem is that the pedals are treated as digital which makes the game a lot harder (when I push the gas, my tires squeal and I lose precious seconds.)  I went to the source code, and there's a macro definition that lets me change it to use analog pedals, however when I use it I lose the shifter!  

My question is, how are you guys playing Outrun?  Is there a hack available somewhere that uses the analog pedals and doesn't break the shifter?  I know that it worked fine in a really old version of Mame (with some graphical glitches), but I've forgotten what version it was.

Thanks!

[TheGatesofBill]

If there is a patch out there, let me know and I'll add it to No Name MAME. If not, I'll take a look at it asap and see if I can figure anything out.

[Howard_Casto]

I tried to submit a fixed driver for outrun but it wasn't accepted.  To be honest I was super busy at the time and I forgot to follow up on why it was rejected.  

How about this....  Lets start a "controls that need fixed"  thread on fe.donkeyfly.com and perhaps I can get saint to post a sticky on this forum that links to that thread.  

I have a working list of games that have controls issues and need reworked on my harddrive as we speak.  As soon as I get a free week or two I'll go down the whole lot and submit new drivers.  

This is part of the controls.dat project's goals btw, so I'm serious about finding these issues and fixing them.  I'm also willing to invest a great deal of my time getting it fixed.  


Of course I'm not a super good C programmer so help with this stuff is VERY welcome.  We could start a small programming collective soley to fix these types of issues.

[jerryjanis]

There are a ton of little errors - ones that make ListInfo/SortInfo display incorrect information...  I actually went through one driver and fixed a whole slew of games that had incorrect #'s of buttons listed, but the change wasn't accepted by MameDev...  I sort of understand why, I think, because I changed a ton of lines of code, and made the driver a lot larger.  Basically the problem was that generic macros were defined and used for all of the games, even when they weren't correct.

I would love to see --listinfo get to the point that it correctly identifies all the information about the controls for a game.

I like making input fixes - it's the one area of the Mame code that I sort of understand, so I'd be happy to work on some of the bugs you've found.

[McDughf]

Hi, just a quick tip, you're supposed to take your foot off the gas for a split second as you change gear.
Also when revving from a stop start ( ie at the start or when you've gone off the road ) to stop wheel spinning, try to keep the bar just under the red.  Doing this will give you the fast start but its quite tricky to do.  You can do this too using only digital controls.

The controls for Outrun in Mame are kind of a mess, and I'm not allowed to whine to the Mame team because the System16 games "are being worked on" (and have been for a long time now).  The problem is that the pedals are treated as digital which makes the game a lot harder (when I push the gas, my tires squeal and I lose precious seconds.)  I went to the source code, and there's a macro definition that lets me change it to use analog pedals, however when I use it I lose the shifter!  

My question is, how are you guys playing Outrun?  Is there a hack available somewhere that uses the analog pedals and doesn't break the shifter?  I know that it worked fine in a really old version of Mame (with some graphical glitches), but I've forgotten what version it was.

Thanks!

[Howard_Casto]

There are a ton of little errors - ones that make ListInfo/SortInfo display incorrect information...  I actually went through one driver and fixed a whole slew of games that had incorrect #'s of buttons listed, but the change wasn't accepted by MameDev...  I sort of understand why, I think, because I changed a ton of lines of code, and made the driver a lot larger.  Basically the problem was that generic macros were defined and used for all of the games, even when they weren't correct.

I would love to see --listinfo get to the point that it correctly identifies all the information about the controls for a game.

I like making input fixes - it's the one area of the Mame code that I sort of understand, so I'd be happy to work on some of the bugs you've found.

I've had similar issues.... when I did do the fixes only about 50% were actually used.  As I never got any feedback, I'm unsure why they considered some right and some wrong.  (They all worked.... I always test them a lot before I submit them)

Anyways.... start a list and we'll do them in batches.

[Minwah]

I just saw from the news at MameWorld that Charles MacDonald (http://cgfm2.emuviews.com/) is working on the Sega System 16 drivers, and asks for suggestions / bug reports.

Maybe we should ask him to take a look at the OutRun analog pedal stuff, and any other System 16 input problems if there are any...anyone know of any?

[Minwah]

I just saw from the news at MameWorld that Charles MacDonald (http://cgfm2.emuviews.com/) is working on the Sega System 16 drivers, and asks for suggestions / bug reports.

Maybe we should ask him to take a look at the OutRun analog pedal stuff, and any other System 16 input problems if there are any...anyone know of any?

I had a go at the OutRun driver and had the same problem (enabling analog throttle/brake caused loss of shifter).  I spent some time trying to fix it but to be honest it is over my head atm (must learn C)...

I just checked again and it seems Charles MacDonald isn't actually submitting any changes to the MAME dev's, but I have emailed him anyway with a request for a hand -  I'll post back when I hear from him

[Tiger-Heli]

I just saw from the news at MameWorld that Charles MacDonald (http://cgfm2.emuviews.com/) is working on the Sega System 16 drivers, and asks for suggestions / bug reports.

Maybe we should ask him to take a look at the OutRun analog pedal stuff, and any other System 16 input problems if there are any...anyone know of any?

I had a go at the OutRun driver and had the same problem (enabling analog throttle/brake caused loss of shifter).  I spent some time trying to fix it but to be honest it is over my head atm (must learn C)...

I just checked again and it seems Charles MacDonald isn't actually submitting any changes to the MAME dev's, but I have emailed him anyway with a request for a hand -  I'll post back when I hear from him

According to my records, R37B16 was the last working System 16 build.  FWIW.

[Lilwolf]

If you get the thread... I have a few..

Like tailgunner doesn't work with a joystick... the percents are all off (even setting the max % you only get about 10% motion on the screen)

[Jakobud]

slightly off topic, but I saw Outrun 2 today at Game Developer's Conference in San Jose.  It looks very fun and stays true to the original feel of Outrun.  I didn't get a chance to play it.  Hopefully tomorrow I will try to play if I have time.

[Howard_Casto]

If you get the thread... I have a few..

Like tailgunner doesn't work with a joystick... the percents are all off (even setting the max % you only get about 10% motion on the screen)

go ahead and start one on fe.donkeyfly.com..... I'll sticky it and add my list to it when you do.