Joystick/Buttons

fsa317

Hi, As I mentioned in the last post, I'm new to this all and wanted to verify my understanding before spending time re-creating the wheel. When connecting a joystick and buttons (not a controller) to PiPlay I still need software like 'retrograme' mentioned here, https://learn.adafruit.com/retro-gaming-with-raspberry-pi/buttons , correct? This software maps the joystick/button inputs from the gpio to keyboard clicks.

clocey

Yes this is what you need. Follow the instructions carefully that a on the Adafruit site for their Retrogame project.

fsa317

Thanks for the confirmatin, much appreciated!

fsa317

One other thing I just noticed, all of the examples use Raspberry Pi B, I have a B+ on the way, does anyone know if the B+ is compatible with the instructions at the end of the adafruit article?

mholgatem

They are, but your pin numbers will be different in the retrogame code (you have to change them anyway, so it's not a big deal).

fsa317

Thanks, so since I dont have my pi yet I've been doing lots of reading. One question I have is that if I want a 2 player setup with multiple buttons it appears that the GPIO pins aren't enough. From what I can see people then switch a USB approach with something like the url below. My understanding is the USB encoder makes the the joystick and buttons look like a keyboard inputs... but what I dont get is in a 2 player setup plugging two of these in will look like two keyboards wont it? Will that work?

http://www.ebay.com/itm/2x-Reyann-Zero-Delay-PC-Encoder-20x-Push-Button-2x-Joystick-For-Arcade-MAME-/181364654684?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a3a2d025c

mholgatem

nope, that's wrong. with the standard 'B' you have enough pins (if you also include the p5 pins) to do two 4-way joysticks, plus 6 buttons each, plus 2 general buttons

with the B+ you can do even more!

Remember, that each button/joystick direction only takes 1 pin. They can all share the same ground pin.

thak

Just check this thread, 1 member (ian57) show how to wire 2 player on a B+

Edit : with the link maybe... :-D
http://pimame.org/forum/discussion/850/what-about-encoders#Item_10

fsa317

Thanks guys, I was forgetting a common ground... it's been a while since I wired anything like this. Thanks again for the guidance!

fsa317

So i got my pi and setup piplay. So far so good a few minor issues. Right now I'm just setup on my computer screen with a usb keyboard. One thing that is confusing me a bit is that each emulator seems to have their own keyboard mapping. Is the general approach just to configure each emulator to use similar key mappings then map the joystick buttons to that? Or is there a global way to set the key mappings across emulators?

mholgatem

Unlike retropie, each of our emulators are independent of each other, so each one has to be configured individually. If you press 'tab' in the main menu in Piplay, you can then run the controller Config tool (it works for everything except mame4all)

bonesaw

Hi guys. I´m building a 2 Player arcade into a old telephone cabin and i have a short question. Will it work with a Joystick/Buttons Set with a USB Controller like this
http://www.ebay.de/itm/271542232552?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649
connected to the USB Port of the Pi, or ist it mandatory to connect to the GPIO.

ian57

It depends ;)... If it is a xin-mo, you will have trouble with the second player if piplay does not include some specific patch for this encoder. (raspicade does :)).

Connecting to GPIO with a retrogame program gives normally good results.

mholgatem

@bonesaw - You definitely can use usb port. Mileage may vary though. I'm not sure which encoder that they have listed there.

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