Has anyone made a db9 games controller switch box?

[F4LL3N]

Hear me out...

 

So I have been batting around an idea for a while now in how to create a games room capable of housing up to 8 players without having messy controllers, lots of extension cables etc. I realise emulation would probably solve a lot of what I am about to talk about, but I am creating a room using original hardware.

 

What I would like to do is create a built in panel in an arm chair that houses different joystick/gamepad connections. Now rather than having one db9 connection per console that uses it (which would take up too much space if you had many consoles utilising the same cable/connector) I'd like to create a switch. If I take 2 consoles as an example:

 

Mega Drive (Player 1) Port -> Input A (Switchbox 1)

Atari 2600 (Player 1) Port -> Input B (Switchbox 1)

Output (Switchbox 1) -> Panel (Player 1 Chair)

 

Mega Drive (Player 2) Port -> Input A (Switchbox 2)

Atari 2600 (Player 2) Port -> Input B (Switchbox 2)

Output (Switchbox 2) -> Panel (Player 2 Chair)

 

So basically... you could plug in your megadrive controller next to you, set the switch to Input A, turn your megadrive on and play away, with only one extension cable running to the switch box. In theory you could also use the megadrive controller on the 2600 if you really wanted... If you wanted to use a 2600 joystick, you'd plug that into the same panel port and set the switch to Input B, turn on the 2600 on and play away.

 

Why? Well, I want to create a cinema/games room. Have a projector that points to a screen, 8 chairs set out accordingly representing 1 - 8 players and make it easy to grab a controller and plug it in. I would then attempt a similar video switch. Obviously consoles utilising wireless controllers (not including unreliable IR) wouldn't have this problem.

 

Thoughts?

[F4LL3N]

I've just noticed that you can actually buy db9 switches, but nothing suitable to what I would like (plus they don't look great and not sure if they would work for controllers). So any help greatly appreciated

[+Stephen Moss]

Installing a 9 pin D plug and a switch to select which of two (or more) console it is used on should not be difficult especially if it is only two consoles and each controller has the same unused pin you can use to send the switching signal down otherwise you will need a 15 pin D (9 for controller signals and 6 for switching signals) from you chair to the switch box.

 

How would you accomplish that...

Connect the controller signals in parallel to the inputs of one octal line drivers/buffer with open collector or tri-state outputs (i.e.74HC244) per console then use the switch signal to enable the respective driver/buffer and disable the other.

For more than two consoles I would use a hex switch and a PIC Microcontroller (requires programming) to do the switching or if you can find one a 1 in to 4 (or 8 ) out multiplexer could be used instead of the microcontroller.

 

What is not so clear is how that would work with the 8 players, are they all routed to one console for multiplayer gaming or are their 8 identical console set ups (one for each player), if the latter I can't see how that would work if you only had the one display.

[F4LL3N]

Really appreciate the reply

 

The idea is that there is only one console for multiplayer gaming (i.e. there wouldn't be 2 mega drives for instance) and there would be a switch built per player - so 8 separate switches.

 

So basically, its just like plugging in the joysticks directly into one console (obviously the 8 player thing only works for consoles that support up to 8 players possibly using multi-taps), but the switch allows you to select which console you are plugging your joystick into (i.e. the chair panel).

 

The chair panel would have other connectors too (which may or may not need switches depending on how unique that connector is to the console), but for now I am focussing on the 9pin d plug as its the most common connector across consoles.