Happ Controls

[Bill Lange]

Has anyone used a real arcade joystick from a maker such as Happ Controls with the Atari? The 2600 and 8-bit machines used digital joysticks so it seems this solid joystick should work.

 

 

http://www.happcontrols.com/index.html?htt...s_amusement.htm

 

WRL

[davidbrit2]

Happ stuff is awesome. I would recommend the Super Joystick. It's absolutely amazing. I have one in my MAME cabinet. It's super easy to wire one up, because there's just four microswitches around the base. You can even use spade quick connectors if you're so inclined.

[Bill Lange]

I just order some ULTIMATE J/S,8WAY,MS,RED joysticks as well as buttons yesterday.

 

Did you create your own mame plans or use one of the ones that are on the net?

 

Bill

[davidbrit2]

Well, I got a non-working Locomotion for $50, so the cabinet pretty much built itself. There were only a couple of necessary modifications. First, the cabinet needed a board running across the back to support the iMac (hey, I've got an iBook, so I needed to use it for something.) Then I made a new monitor bezel out of some matting used for picture framing. Other than that, and adding a few extra buttons here and there, everything else was pretty much just a wiring issue.

 

Here's how it turned out, if you'd like to see: http://www2.gvsu.edu/~brittedg/photos/imacfull.jpg

 

The stick and buttons are from Happ, with the exception of the tiny red control buttons - those I got from Radio Shack.

[Bill Lange]

Nice Apple sticker.

 

I ordered a red joystick and four red buttons. A blue joystick with four blue buttons. Two white buttons with one and two player overlays. And two black buttons to use for credits.

 

I built a six inch cardboard cabinet model over the weekend. This coming weekend I will build on six foot cabinet out of press board since it is cheap, about $6 per 4x8 slice.

 

If it comes out ok, I plan to build a final mame cabinet out of sanded plywood which is more like $25 for a 4x8 slice.

 

I have to get one of those keyboard encoders and figure out how it works.

 

Should be fun. I am also interested to see if the Happ joysticks can be wired to an 2600 and/or 8-bit Atari.

 

WRL

[Curt Vendel]

I used the replacement Ms. Pac Man / Galaga joysticks when I built the reproduction of the original Colecovision kiosk. They work great and I'll tell you its like day and night playing CV games on an arcade joystick, they work equally well on the 2600 too so if you're building an arcade controller for your game console you can't beat coin-op joysticks.

 

 

 

Curt

[Bill Lange]

The MS PACMAN sticks are 4-way sticks aren't they? Don't you need a 8-way stick for the Ataris?

 

WRL

[monzamess]

I built home arcade controls from Happ parts.

 

My website for it is at:

http://dgbrown.h-body.org/videogames/joystick/index.html

 

I built it for a PC using a keyboard encoder... However, there is no

reason it wouldn't work for a 2600/8-bit/etc.

 

If you look up the controller pinout for the 9-pin connector, you'll see that

there is a pin for each direction and the fire button as well

as ground.

 

To "press" a button or direction, all you do is connect

that pin to ground. If you get a momentary switch

(like the ones Happ sells) and hook ground to one side and

the "fire" pin to the other, each press of the button will fire.

Ditto for the directions. Since the joystick is just four switches,

you wire up ground and each direction pin to the appropriate

switch on the joystick.

 

So, all you have to do is get a 9-pin

female D-sub connector and some wire (go to Radio Shack or sacrifice an old joystick) and wire up the connections as described above.

Then mount the joystick in a sturdy box and you're done.

 

That's one nice thing about the 2600/8-bit/C64/etc joysticks:

they're just a simple set switches, unlike controllers for newer

systems that encode the button presses serially using internal

electronics.

[monzamess]

The Ms. Pac-Man sticks are 4-way. You should get 8-ways

if you play any games that use diagonals! The Happ Super

joystick is convertible (at assembly time--you can't convert it

back and forth without taking it apart).

 

In the link I referenced

above, I have pictures of all the parts of the Super Joystick and

the Ms. Pac-Man stick. One "catch" with the Ms. Pac-Man stick

is that it is built to be mounted on metal. If you want to mount it

on wood it will either be too short or you'll have to modify it

(I modified mine).

 

BTW, my bed isn't pink, that's the guest room.

 

P.S. Curt--saw you on "That 70's Home" on HGTV. Neat!

[Curt Vendel]

Nope, they are eight ways, you can move them in all directions....

 

 

 

Curt

[monzamess]

My Ms.Pac-Man replacement stick from Happ just does 4 ways.

 

If you try to go diagonal, you can move the stick that way just a bit, then

you hit a stop. No switch is pressed if you go exactly diagonal, and if you

vary a bit off diagonal, you will hit one direction or the other, but not two at

the same time.

 

I don't know if Happ now offers a 4/8-way reversible bushing for this stick

(like the Super Joystick) but mine just came with a 4-way one.

 

Your experience may differ, but that's how mine works...