QuadTari

[doug0909]

Not sure how many people even have the equipment to play, but would 4 Trackball hacks work for Centipede and Missile Command? If so, would that only be in analog mode? 

[Thomas Jentzsch]

6 minutes ago, doug0909 said:

Not sure how many people even have the equipment to play, but would 4 Trackball hacks work for Centipede and Missile Command? If so, would that only be in analog mode? 

Trackballs are not listed as compatible on the QuadTari website. But I think they should work.

 

Then multiple trackballs hacks should work too. if there is enough CPU time during kernel display.

 

[doug0909]

Now that I think about it Dodge It with trackball controls (even if in digital mode) would probably be great... Chase It, not so much, I think that game is so fun BECAUSE OF the limitations of digital controls. But what about a 4 player marble escape game where you have to carefully go through narrow passages to a exit (with slowdown penalty for hitting objects and borders...)? 

 

Something like the great homebrew Fall Down would also be fun with 4 players...

 

For one button inspiration, see the homebrew p0 snake for Commodore 64. Basically, your snake-like character is traveling in a clockwise motion in a small circle when the button isn't being pressed. Pressing the button starts counterclockwise movement and hitting it for short, carefully timed bursts allows you to move around the playfield and pick up objects. It's actually a very fun, challenging play mechanic... 

Edited February 28, 2021 by doug0909
Additional ideas

[+ZeroPage Homebrew]

1 hour ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

I created a non-playable demo of my simple, eight player, one button racing game.

Wow, this is going to be a blast!! I can imagine everybody trying to optimize speeds as much as they can while passing over the arrows. The great thing about it is that as the car goes faster, it's harder to accurately press the button while over the arrows, it automatically balances the gameplay!

 

1 hour ago, johnnywc said:

With all these multiplayer games being made, maybe @ZeroPage Homebrew James should consider adding a "Best Multi-player Game" category to next year's award.  

Whaaa?? MORE categories, hahahah.. We'll have to add an extra non-televised day for all the technical awards like the Academy Awards does.

 

- James

 

[+ZeroPage Homebrew]

25 minutes ago, doug0909 said:

For one button inspiration, see the homebrew p0 snake for Commodore 64. Basically, your snake-like character is traveling in a clockwise motion in a small circle when the button isn't being pressed. Pressing the button starts counterclockwise movement and hitting it for short, carefully timed bursts allows you to move around the playfield and pick up objects. It's actually a very fun, challenging play mechanic... 

There is a single player game like this for the 2600 called Kuru Kuru Tsuchinoko and it only uses one button to move around like you describe. I find the game extremely challenging but it could be adapted to eight players somehow? Might get crowded on the screen. ?

 

- James

[doug0909]

8 minutes ago, ZeroPage Homebrew said:

There is a single player game like this for the 2600 called Kuru Kuru Tsuchinoko and it only uses one button to move around like you describe. I find the game extremely challenging but it could be adapted to eight players somehow? Might get crowded on the screen. ?

 

- James

Did not know about that. Tried it and it seems a bit needlessly difficult Try the C64 game, much more pleasant, and probably a better model for a multi player game... 

 

Also, the Odyssey 2 game Smithereens might lend itself nicely to a four player, one button adaptation. Maybe one guy in each corner, and you only use the joystick to change the direction you are catapulting your rock? 

Edited February 28, 2021 by doug0909

[+ZeroPage Homebrew]

3 minutes ago, doug0909 said:

Did not know about that. Tried it and it seems a bit needlessly difficult Try the C64 game, much more pleasant, and probably a better model for a multi player game... 

p0 snake looks like a much more reasonable representation of movement with one button, great idea!

 

- James

[doug0909]

Commodore 64 homebrews are a great source of ideas... 

 

https://lyonsden.net/single-button-games-for-c64/

 

There's also this one button space invaders game where you (and if you want a friend) shoot and change direction when you press the button, but I needed to take a xanax after trying to play it for more than 5 minutes... Very frustrating... 

 

https://darrenfoulds.itch.io/1nvader

 

[Thomas Jentzsch]

On 2/28/2021 at 8:36 PM, Thomas Jentzsch said:

I created a non-playable demo of my simple, eight player, one button racing game. 

 

Gameplay (not implemented yet):

• When the button is pressed and the car is over the boost arrows, the car accelerates. 
• When the button is pressed and the car is not over the boost arrows, the car brakes. 
• When no button is pressed, the car slows down gradually.
• The horizontal position of the car signals the position in the race. Also it requires the reaction of the leading players to be faster. Currently the difference per position is half the car width, this may change, even while the game is played.

 

Vroom 8! (v0.1).bin 2 kB · 11 downloads

Continued here.

[gauauu]

On 2/28/2021 at 2:37 PM, doug0909 said:

But the Wizard of Wor demo did not work with the quadtari plugged into the left port and atarivox plugged into the right port (one stick controlled both characters, with right direction not working). Meanwhile Gorf Arcade and Quad Games demos did not load through my Harmony Cart, on the 2600 or 7800. Could be my futzy modded systems I guess. Or maybe I have to update my Harmony cart? I ordered the WoW cartridge and I'll test with that. 

 

Hmm, that's strange. I've heard issues about Quad Games not loading on some Harmony Carts without an update, I'll see if I can find details. (My Harmony is maybe 4 years old and hasn't been updated since I got it). No idea about the WoW demo, we'll have to see what @johnnywc thinks about it.

 

 

On 2/28/2021 at 2:37 PM, doug0909 said:

And of course 4 player Surround, and Indy 500 with four driving controllers.

There's a 4-player Surround-style game on QuadGames.

[+McCallister]

7 minutes ago, gauauu said:

Hmm, that's strange. I've heard issues about Quad Games not loading on some Harmony Carts without an update, I'll see if I can find details. (My Harmony is maybe 4 years old and hasn't been updated since I got it). No idea about the WoW demo, we'll have to see what @johnnywc thinks about it.

I have not tried the W.O.W demo, but for the other problems, try reflashing the bios. Although I had a somewhat new Harmony cart and was running 1.06, Quadgames and other 32k games would not load(other roms were just fine.)  Once I reloaded 1.06  everything would load and play fine, with and without the Quadtari.

[+sramirez2008]

Woohoo!  I’ve connected the QuadTari to my Edladdin Super Twin and a 2600 joystick coupler (pair of CX10s).  Can’t wait for my son to arrive so we can play some co-op Robotwar 2684. 
 

<Edit> The QuadTari is brilliant. Brilliant I tell you!

[Thomas Jentzsch]

On 2/22/2021 at 11:44 PM, johnnywc said:

However, it may just be because I have no way of mapping those ports because they aren't recognized as inputs with Stella.  Meaning, when I try to map inputs to joysticks P2 and P3, I can't map to the additional joysticks because Stella would need to set DUMPPORTS high to enable the physical joystick connected to port 3 of the QuadTari.  I'm confused actually; I'm not sure how it would work in software, but somehow you would need to map using the 2nd physical joystick connected to QuadTari port 3 to Stella joystick port P2.  (and the same for QT port 4/Stella joystick input configuration for P3).    

I finally found the time, using my 2600-daptor II on my PC. I did not even get my standard joystick working correctly in ports 1 and 2. It seems like the 2600-daptor detects a different kind of controller. @johnnywcWhat did you use for your tests?

 

BTW: I don't think this can be implemented at all. It seems the 2600-daptor communication is only unidirectional. So there is no way to tell the QuadTari to switch. I have contacted the 2600-daptor developer to verify.

[+fdr4prez]

11 hours ago, Thomas Jentzsch said:

I finally found the time, using my 2600-daptor II on my PC. I did not even get my standard joystick working correctly in ports 1 and 2. It seems like the 2600-daptor detects a different kind of controller. @johnnywcWhat did you use for your tests?

 

BTW: I don't think this can be implemented at all. It seems the 2600-daptor communication is only unidirectional. So there is no way to tell the QuadTari to switch. I have contacted the 2600-daptor developer to verify.

I am pretty sure Stella on the PC doesn't need the QuadTari. 

 

Stella emulates it, so you just need to have 4 joysticks (4x 2600-daptors) connected to the pc. 

 

The QuadTari is for consoles. 

[Thomas Jentzsch]

6 hours ago, fdr4prez said:

Stella emulates it, so you just need to have 4 joysticks (4x 2600-daptors) connected to the pc. 

The QuadTari is for consoles. 

True, but the original question came for the RetroN 77. I am not sure if it can handle that many 2600-daptors at once via OTG cable and a USB hub. Also one QuadTari would save for two 2600-daptors.

 

Anyway, for now I consider this not feasible, also because SDL currently does only support reading from controllers.

[+johnnywc]

On 5/5/2021 at 10:21 AM, Thomas Jentzsch said:

I finally found the time, using my 2600-daptor II on my PC. I did not even get my standard joystick working correctly in ports 1 and 2. It seems like the 2600-daptor detects a different kind of controller. @johnnywcWhat did you use for your tests?

Hi TJ, apologies for not replying a bit sooner.  My QT tests with the Retron77 all had issues, whether connected to the front ports or through the 2600dapter/Stelladapter with USB. ?  

On 5/5/2021 at 10:21 AM, Thomas Jentzsch said:

BTW: I don't think this can be implemented at all. It seems the 2600-daptor communication is only unidirectional. So there is no way to tell the QuadTari to switch. I have contacted the 2600-daptor developer to verify.

Perhaps.  I would assume with the paddles it has to somehow tell the paddles to charge using dumpports through pins 5 and 9; perhaps a similar approach could be used to 'switch' the QuadTari? I'm not a hardware guy but I would think that at some point those pins would have to be set high for paddles to work.

On 5/5/2021 at 10:03 PM, fdr4prez said:

I am pretty sure Stella on the PC doesn't need the QuadTari. 

 

Stella emulates it, so you just need to have 4 joysticks (4x 2600-daptors) connected to the pc. 

Actually, I got it to work with 2 joysticks hooked up to the front ports and 2 joysticks hooked up to a USB OTB hub using 2 2600dapters.  There is a bit of slowdown on RobotWar 2 player co-op on the high levels but overall it runs pretty well.   

On 5/5/2021 at 10:03 PM, fdr4prez said:

The QuadTari is for consoles. 

True, the QT does work best on consoles, but certainly if there is a way to get it to work on the R77 that would be a cool bonus!  

On 5/6/2021 at 4:37 AM, Thomas Jentzsch said:

True, but the original question came for the RetroN 77. I am not sure if it can handle that many 2600-daptors at once via OTG cable and a USB hub. Also one QuadTari would save for two 2600-daptors.

See above; you can use 4 joysticks using the 2 front ports and 2 USB ports through a hub, so I don't think there would be any savings for 2600dapters, unless you could get two joysticks to work using one half of the QuadTari which could save for 1 2600dapter, but I'm not sure if that would be worth it.

 

What would be best if we could get the QuadTari to work through the front ports and not need any 2600dapters, but I'm not sure if that is possible.  I'm not sure if it's the R77 or Stella that is detecting paddles when they are connected to the front ports (if pin 5 and pin 9 are high are on startup).  If there was a way for it to detect that pin 5 is low and pin 9 is high (which identifies a QT), perhaps that would work.  I'm not a hardware guy so perhaps it's possible.  

On 5/6/2021 at 4:37 AM, Thomas Jentzsch said:

Anyway, for now I consider this not feasible, also because SDL currently does only support reading from controllers.

Do you mean the SDL for the 2600 dapters, the front ports of the R77, or both?  Just curious...   

 

Also, this is probably not the thread for it and I tried to create an issue in GitHub but was not able to, but one small change for the QuadTari configuration in Stella.  Currently, when you click the "QuadTari" button, it labels the 2 controllers for the left QuadTari port as P1 and P2, and the 2 controllers for the right QuadTari port as P3 and P4.  The physical QuadTari itself is labeled as Joystick 1/Joystick 3 on the left and Joystick 2/Joystick 4 on the right.  Would it be possible to change these labels to match the labels on the QT?  Also, perhaps it would be helpful to show what Pn it maps to in the configuration (Joystick 1 -> P0, Joystick 2 -> P1, Joystick 3 -> P2, Joystick 4 -> P3), so perhaps something like "Joystick 1 (P0)", ...  or "J1 (P0", ... 

 

Thanks!

John

[Thomas Jentzsch]

43 minutes ago, johnnywc said:

Perhaps.  I would assume with the paddles it has to somehow tell the paddles to charge using dumpports through pins 5 and 9; perhaps a similar approach could be used to 'switch' the QuadTari? I'm not a hardware guy but I would think that at some point those pins would have to be set high for paddles to work.

I am not a hardware guy too, but as far as I understand code and hardware, the port dumping is only virtual and done by Stella.

Quote

Do you mean the SDL for the 2600 dapters, the front ports of the R77, or both?  Just curious...   

Both, unfortunately.

Quote

Also, this is probably not the thread for it and I tried to create an issue in GitHub but was not able to,

What stopped you?

Quote

but one small change for the QuadTari configuration in Stella.  Currently, when you click the "QuadTari" button, it labels the 2 controllers for the left QuadTari port as P1 and P2, and the 2 controllers for the right QuadTari port as P3 and P4.  The physical QuadTari itself is labeled as Joystick 1/Joystick 3 on the left and Joystick 2/Joystick 4 on the right. Would it be possible to change these labels to match the labels on the QT? 

Good catch. I developed the UI before I got hands on my own QuadTari and did not check afterwards. The change is simple.

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Also, perhaps it would be helpful to show what Pn it maps to in the configuration (Joystick 1 -> P0, Joystick 2 -> P1, Joystick 3 -> P2, Joystick 4 -> P3), so perhaps something like "Joystick 1 (P0)", ...  or "J1 (P0", ... 

The counting from 0 is historical (a typical developer habit ). Probably that should be changed anyway. But that also has effect on the stored settings.

Edited May 11, 2021 by Thomas Jentzsch

[mos6507]

A great innovation and long overdue.

 

Edited July 29, 2021 by mos6507

[abrondino]

Here is a game concept which would be GREAT for the Quadtari: https://youtu.be/Xc23K3WrWNI

[Thomas Jentzsch]

9 hours ago, abrondino said:

Here is a game concept which would be GREAT for the Quadtari: https://youtu.be/Xc23K3WrWNI

Cool concept, and you as say, the controls wouldn't be a problem. The physics look feasible too.

 

But IMO the graphics are not possible without too hefty compromising. E.g. the circles would be have be done by using playfield. And that's definitely not well suited for round things.

Edited October 27, 2022 by Thomas Jentzsch