Fairchild Channel F - Controls in Mess?

[blind_dado]

I've been reading "The Ultimate History of Video Games" (which is great) and getting into emulating the really early game systems, like the Odyssey 1 and the Fairchild Channel F.  The Channel F seems to work fairly well on MESS, but I'm having trouble with the controls.

The original controller, which is amazing, was a joystick that had the standard up-down-left-right, but also twisted left-right and had two buttons via push-pull.  The console unit itself had a reset button and 4 buttons labeled  "Time," "Mode," "Hold," and "Start."

In the MESS config screen it lists buttons 1-6 for player one and buttons 1-4 for player 2.

Has anyone figured out the mapping from MESS to the original controller, or even if the MESS emulation is complete?

[gildahl]

This is kind of an old post, but I've been looking for an answer to this.  Anyone know?

I've been reading "The Ultimate History of Video Games" (which is great) and getting into emulating the really early game systems, like the Odyssey 1 and the Fairchild Channel F.  The Channel F seems to work fairly well on MESS, but I'm having trouble with the controls.

The original controller, which is amazing, was a joystick that had the standard up-down-left-right, but also twisted left-right and had two buttons via push-pull.  The console unit itself had a reset button and 4 buttons labeled  "Time," "Mode," "Hold," and "Start."

In the MESS config screen it lists buttons 1-6 for player one and buttons 1-4 for player 2.

Has anyone figured out the mapping from MESS to the original controller, or even if the MESS emulation is complete?

[blind_dado]

I ended up figuring this out myself.  First, you want to load a rom called  "Test Controls.bin"  It will show you all of the controls and change when the controls are activated.

You can see a video of the rom working here:


In mess, the mappings are weird.  Hit Tab to get the contoller mappings.  Here is what I figured out (using Mess UI 0.13)

P1Start - 1
P1 Up
P1 Down
P1 Left
P1 Right
P1 Button 1 - P2 Out ring (pull)
P1 Button 2 - P2 In ring (push)
P1 Button 3 - P2 twist right
P1 Button 4 - P2 twist left
P1 Button 5 - 2
P1 Button 6 - 3
P1 Button 7 - 4
P2 Up
P2 Down
P2 Left
P2 Right
P2 Button 1 - P1 Out ring (pull)
P2 Button 2 - P1 In ring (push)
P2 Button 3 - P1 twist right
P2 Button 4 - P1 twist left

Or, using the test controllers rom, here are the mess mappings:



Hope that helps!

[gildahl]

Thanks!  That's exactly what I was looking for (didn't know you'd be answering your own post huh )

[alfonzotan]

Hah... a friend of mine growing up actually had an Odyssey 1.  Thing came with all these plastic overlays you were supposed to stick to the TV screen to play any particular game.  It was such a PITA to set up, it just sat in the corner most of the time.