Tempest: trackball as spinner?

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WillFromNehalem
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Tempest: trackball as spinner?

Post by WillFromNehalem » Tue Jun 28, 2022 4:03 am

Thanks for what you’re doing here. The hardware, plus the way you’ve integrated a crapton of software to pull everything together is astounding. Thank you.

I’ve got an old trackball working in Attract Mode via an optiwiz board. It plays Missile Command and Centipede perfectly. I’d like to use it as a spinner in Tempest and maybe arkanoid. I haven’t tested it with Arkanoid but my situation with Tempest is—

- I screwed up the game-specific input keys and can’t remember how to remove key assignments in mame078. Pressing del before selecting the entry didn’t seem to do it.
-I was hoping to select, say, right, and then spin the ball to the right but no go. Is there a file I should tweak for this and the above issue?
- I thought I’d try tempest with another emulator but none of the mame-related emulators will launch when I edit the “emulator” in Attract Mode for Tempest.

Oh. As I write this I suspect that last issue is because the rom is in the wrong directory. I’ll try this tomorrow. Is trying another emulator the right path?

tl;dr: how to set up Tempest to be controlled with the x-axis of the USB mouse?

dee2eR
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Re: Tempest: trackball as spinner?

Post by dee2eR » Tue Jun 28, 2022 4:44 am

Pretty sure I run Tempest in AdvMAME for analog input. I'd only run in 078 for digital joystick input as it is better at digital 'analog' input simulation than AdvMAME, Retroarch based emulators can be a bit tricky with real analog input.

Not sure if AdvMAME and 078 will use the same rom but it could be as easy as moving the rom to the mame-106 rom folder. If that doesn't work you'l neecd the right rom for MAME 0.106 (the romset AdvMAME uses).

If that doesn't help let me know and I can check it out, I have the trackball and Opti-Wiz combo too but it's not currently setup.

WillFromNehalem
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Re: Tempest: trackball as spinner?

Post by WillFromNehalem » Tue Jun 28, 2022 6:16 pm

The tempest rom supplied for mame078 works with advmame. And so does my trackball. Thank you! :D

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