rotary controllers and tempest

[jagwiz]

Hi I am new to the atari scene only owning a jag and a copy of tempest 2000 and defender 2000 and a jag of course. I was wondering what is a rotary controller, did atari ever make one and if not where can I get my hands on one. Also is a rotary controller worth the bother as tempest is an awsome game and I cant stop playing it at the moment does it improve the game make it easyer etc. I have only had my jag a week so please be patient if this has been discussed before as this is my first post.

[Paolo]

Hi, and welcome.

I would suggest you to make a search here at AtariAge with Tempest and Rotary controller. You'll find ALL you need to know.

Long story made short, a rotary is a knob that allows you to play Tempest as it was in the arcade. It was not made by Atari for Jaguar, and you can use it just because J.Minter put a specific piece of code in Tempest.

By the way, there is a TOTAL difference in playing Tempest with or without a rotary controller, be it a Tyrant's rotary, or a JedyJeff one, or even a modified VCS steering controller.

 

Have fun!

[jagwiz]

Ok thanks have had a good look and found alot and really makes me want one. I have found two up on ebay at the moment so I will try my luck winning one of those, though there is a third for £50 is that the going rate for one, seems a bit pricey to me so I am going to try for the pro rotary.

[Paolo]

Hey, I just saw those three controllers up on epay. They aren't Tyrants, although they are quite similar, aren't they? Who's this Johnatan guy? Somebody here at AA? Any tech specs for those controllers?

[Serblander]

jagwiz wrote:

Hi I am new to the atari scene...

welcome jagwiz hope you are enjoying the Jag as much as the rest of us

 

I just received one of jonathans ebay rotary's yesterday and it is quite good indeed! It's very precise, but i still have to get used to it (esp when trying to get to the opposite end of the screen quickly).

 

Paolo wrote:

They aren't Tyrants, although they are quite similar, aren't they?

Are you sure about that Paolo? What is the difference between the two (if they are different)?

 

Who's this Johnatan guy? Somebody here at AA?

I'm wondering that myself... I don't know who he is but he has been selling a LOT of goodies over the last two months, including:

 

many SEALED Scatboxes

many SEALED Aircars (ICD originals - Not B&C repo's)

at least 6+ rotary controllers

 

Can anyone elaborate if those rotary's are Tyrant's or not? I thought they were (the one i got at home is EXCELLENT quality & workmanship!)

[doctorclu]

"I just received one of jonathans ebay rotary's yesterday and it is quite good indeed! It's very precise, but i still have to get used to it (esp when trying to get to the opposite end of the screen quickly)."

 

Got one of those controllers last weekend. Been loving it!

 

Best I have found to get the guy from one end of the layout to the other is not to spin the rotary controller real quick... that seems to overload the game. You have to follow through with the rotary, turning it at a consistant rate.

 

So the difference is... turning consistantly... click .. click..click..click...

 

Spinning it... click... ZIP! click...

 

The game reads four movements on the consistant ones, and seems to only read two in the spinning. Even worse, it seems to temporarily daze the game, sending it the opposite direction a click or two.

 

So this is what I've noticed.

[Stone]

Best I have found to get the guy from one end of the layout to the other is not to spin the rotary controller real quick... that seems to overload the game.   You have to follow through with the rotary, turning it at a consistant rate.

 

      So the difference is... turning consistantly... click .. click..click..click...

 

      Spinning it... click... ZIP!  click...

 

      The game reads four movements on the consistant ones, and seems to only read two in the spinning.  Even worse, it seems to temporarily daze the game, sending it the opposite direction a click or two.

 

      So this is what I've noticed.

It's a small bug in the game - if you spin faster than the pads are read then the Jag sees it as going backwards. It's just an artifact of how rotary encoders work and there's nothing you can do about it, sadly.

 

It's still pretty impressive given Jeff was given a hacked 2600 controller to make work, 3 days before code finalisation though

 

Stone

[Paolo]

Serblander: the look of the controller (as far as I can see from the picture) is the same as Tyrant's: the knob looks identical. My question was:

 

did Tyrant made them and then Johnatan bought a lot of them and he's now selling them, or Johnatan made them himself?

 

Just to understand why I never heard of him working on this kind of stuff.

 

Regards

[Tyrant]

It would apear, from his ebay history, that he originally bought one of my controllers second hand from Atari Smeghead, and is now selling cloned copies of it, which if you ask me is rather impolite, if not nescessarily illegal or dishonest (he makes no claims as to their origins, and infact provides very little information about them at all on the auctions).

 

The knob does look identical yes, but its a very common design available from a number of shops, I would be interested to know what kind of encoder mechanism he's using, and how its all coonected, but I suspect its the exact same one... makes me think I should have burred the numbers off the back of them to prevent this kind of thing.

 

Suffice it to say that these are not my controllers, but apear to be exact copies, which I am very unhappy about and shall be contacting him. While the basic concept is public knowladge (a simple wiring plan is in the Jaguar FAQ), the specific design of my controllers took me quite some time and effort to work out, and while neither officially copyrighted or pattented, remains my intelectual property and I am not pleased with it being blatently copied in this manner.

[justclaws]

Hello,

 

It would apear, from his ebay history, that he originally bought one of my controllers second hand from Atari Smeghead, and is now selling cloned copies of it, which if you ask me is rather impolite, if not nescessarily illegal or dishonest (he makes no claims as to their origins, and infact provides very little information about them at all on the auctions).

That is what I feared, to be honest... anger understood!

It also makes one wonder about those Aircars etc..

 

The knob does look identical yes, but its a very common design available from a number of shops, I would be interested to know what kind of encoder mechanism he's using, and how its all coonected, but I suspect its the exact same one...

The knob looks a little blue on his photos though, where your photos always made it look carbon black. Is this possible? It was putting me off a purchase in any case before you confirmed this possible cloning...

 

makes me think I should have burred the numbers off the back of them to prevent this kind of thing.

This is real hardware piracy. I hope Jonathan is on AA and can explain the situation.

 

Suffice it to say that these are not my controllers, but apear to be exact copies, which I am very unhappy about and shall be contacting him. While the basic concept is public knowladge (a simple wiring plan is in the Jaguar FAQ), the specific design of my controllers took me quite some time and effort to work out, and while neither officially copyrighted or pattented, remains my intelectual property and I am not pleased with it being blatently copied in this manner.

It seems to me you had a very nice design, unique on the Jaguar to-date. Therefore it goes beyond the wiring diagrams. Fixing the rotary in place through the old joypad port must require something extra to the published designs which previously required just putting a hole through the back of the case or using a project box etc.. Thus, this is theft of your design if it's been cloned.

 

It seems that your lack of supply gave him a window of opportunity. So any chance you'll be producing some more, then we can buy your units?

 

Cheers,

JustClaws.

[Atari Smeghead]

It would apear, from his ebay history, that he originally bought one of my controllers second hand from Atari Smeghead, and is now selling cloned copies of it...

 

Yup, he was high bidder on my auction. I was in need of money and was rather overjoyed to receive $138.50USD for an item I bought via eBay from JagWarlord earlier this year for $75.00.

 

When I saw that he was selling rotaries, my first thought was that he's not a particularly intelligent fellow. Y'know, buy one for $138 and turn around and sell it for what ended up to be around half that...plus, he's competing against himself, what with all those auctions at once.

 

I realized that he was not selling the one I sold him, since my old one had black keypad but all his show the grey keypads.

 

Also, a Pro-controller rotary? Is there even the slightest point in that? Isn't it a waste of a Pro?

 

So, Tyrant, sorry to be a pawn in this ordeal.

 

Smeg

[Serblander]

Hi guys,

 

I just got an email from jonathan the other day. He has recently joined Atari Age but hasn't confirmed his password yet so, he hasn't posted so far (but will soon). He confirmed that they are made by himself and not by Tyrant. I hope to see him on here soon so he can answer any questions himself.

 

Atari Smeghead wrote:

I realized that he was not selling the one I sold him, since my old one had black keypad but all his show the grey keypads.

I was wondering about that, as i was the person Jon 'sniped' in the final seconds for Smeg's rotary, and as i was also the first purchaser of Jonathans' BIN rotaries (i naturally thought it was the very same one i missed out on a few weeks ago).

[Symmetry of TNG]

Hi!

 

Just a short reflection... (b4 me real question)

 

He confirmed that they are made by himself and not by Tyrant.

 

Well.. that would be obvious wouldn't it? Since Tyrant did not make them!... but the point Tyrant made was that his "design" & solution of the problem, was/might have been copied... Something which, if it is true, wouldnt be nice to do, since he is making money of someone elses ideas (Even though he made the actual "wiering"/copying himself...

Ahh well.. enough about that, dont whant to be part of any flaming Moes

 

 

Anyhow my real question:

How.. ..?... actually does the Rorary work when it comes to the Extra levels in Tempest? ...I mean is the Up/Down/L/R thing still usable under that knob, or? ....it must be right? or there would be no way to play the extra levels in T since some of them require U/D action.... (though most action is L/R, but still).

 

If it does, I do appresiate the work/solution you made Tyrant since atm I couldnt even think of a nice solution myself

Might have to order such a thing one day

..though only if it garantees to beat my personal record that i just beat yesterday ....(though it wasnt saved.. might be to old eeprom.. typical)

 

just my 2cents

cheers

/Sym

[K3V]

Anyhow my real question:

How.. ..?... actually does the Rorary work when it comes to the Extra levels in Tempest? ...I mean is the Up/Down/L/R thing still usable under that knob, or? ....it must be right? or there would be no way to play the extra levels in T since some of them require U/D action.... (though most action is L/R, but still).

 

A&C act as up and down and the rotary controls right and left during the bonus levels. Pretty difficult to navigate using this setup but at least it (somewhat) works.

 

Oh, and before someone asks - a controller in port #2 lets you put in your initials for a high score

[Stone]

Oh, and before someone asks - a controller in port #2 lets you put in your initials for a high score  

A controller in port2 also lets you play bonus levels. Nice thought

 

(and it's way easier for the 'Jupiter Warp' ones, there's a small bug in the rotary code for those)

 

Stone

[justclaws]

Hello,

 

Hey, I just saw those three controllers up on epay. They aren't Tyrants, although they are quite similar, aren't they? Who's this Johnatan guy? Somebody here at AA? Any tech specs for those controllers?

Jonathan is now registered here - it appears validated as well now.

Username "jonathan ascough", member 5993, joined 09 Nov 2004.

 

I'm certainly interested in one myself if Tyrant's not producing them.

However, I would like to know if they're clones, or uniquely designed.

 

Cheers,

JustClaws.

[jonathan ascough]

Hi all

 

This is my first post on AA and yes it is going to be about my rotary controllers. They are uniquely designed by me and are not clones of tyrants controllers. The standard rotary controllers that are made by me are ones that are made using a controller which has grey keys and the serial number on the back starts with a G on the serial number,Tyrants are black keyed ones that start with a B as the serial number on the back. This may not seem significant at first but on the inside they are different and the first rotary I made was a B type and well it did not work. I had another controller and that was a G type and I was able to make one from that (the mouldings on the back on the inside is the main difference). The reason why I make a pro rotary is that the mouldings are similar to that of a G type. All the information I got to make a rotary came from this sight, but for what it is worth I had to map out the pro rotary myself as there was not a diagram of a pro controller on this sight. The big difference being that a standard controller has a bank of 13 wires as shown on this sight but a pro controller is split into a bank of 6 and another of 7 and I had to figure out what did what on my own. Also pro controllers are easyer to come by as I believe that the G type controller is the type supplied with a jag and a B type is sold seperatley.

 

Which then leads me to why I purchased the one of ebay. To be honest I wanted to see how a rotary was made using a B type controller as this still remained a mystery to me and by the time I received it I had already made two working rotary controllers of my own. I now do know how to make one using a B type but wont as it is not my design. Tyrants rotary switch is threaded though a piece of plastic and I have no idea were it comes from or what it is. The d controller is used in mine which has a hole to which the switch is threaded and is placed back in but upside down after I have sanded it flat. I used this as it is the right shape to easliy fit back in without having to mold or cut anything.

 

It is very sad for me that after all this work my controllers started to get a bit of a bad press as it is close to one that has been made before, but we are both using atari controllers. It is a shame that Tyrant is upset as that was never my intention and I do publicaly appologies to Tyrant if he felt cloned, copied or angered in any way. However if the roles were reversed and I did not know I would feel the same as him and would also feel unhappy.

 

I hope this goes some way to clear things up and if you are still uncertain then go for a pro rotary as that is all mine as I had no diagram to work from, had to map the controller myself and Tyrant never made one. As for you question about the knob on mine is also black it just looks blue as I used a camera phone and the resolution is not as good.

[justclaws]

Hello Jonathan,

 

This is my first post on AA and yes it is going to be about my rotary controllers.

I hope it won't be the last. I think it's gone a long way to resolve this.

 

They are uniquely designed by me and are not clones of tyrants controllers.

The explanation of the differences is fascinating. I have to say that

although I've got several controllers, I'd never examined the relationship

between grey/black buttons and serial numbers, but your explanation

makes some sense of what I thought what just a difference relating to

production runs. Fascinating. It also means we can tell rotaries apart.

 

All the information I got to make a rotary came from this sight, but for what it is worth I had to map out the pro rotary myself as there was not a diagram of a pro controller on this sight.

Feel free to post a diagram of the Pro Controller. I don't mean for the

rotary, I just mean for general interest, and for people who use them to

make home-brew arcade joysticks. (I made a Pro controller type joystick

years ago and gave it to a 3rd party who lived in Redcar. If anybody ever

sees a very nice Pro type arcade joystick for sale there, I made it in '95.)

 

Which then leads me to why I purchased the one of ebay.

OK that works for me. I'm interested to hear the differences between the

two controllers, as to-date I haven't bought one, or made one actually. (I

have a couple of Atari 2600 driving controllers which I got intending to do

something with them... but time always eluded me. 50 quid for a rotary

has also eluded allocation to some other cause, like my kids, recently too.

 

It is a shame that Tyrant is upset as that was never my intention and I do publicaly appologies to Tyrant if he felt cloned, copied or angered in any way. However if the roles were reversed and I did not know I would feel the same as him and would also feel unhappy.

Apology and empathy. I think this goes a long way to help. Jaguar fans

who want a pure black look could still go for Tyrant's own controllers too!

 

Maybe you two can get in touch, and check if you've got any other such

projects you can team up on even. I'd quite like to see a rotary+ where

there is a discrete "seam" switch at the back, which allows the user to

swap over buttons A and C for example. Maybe then a rapid fire version?

 

I'd also like to see a Pro Controller with a switch which allows the user to

swap over the shoulder buttons from mapping to 7 and 9 to 5 and 7. This

would mean some applications not written for it would work even better -

like Alien Vs. Predator where shuffle left/right are not on the shoulders.

 

As for you question about the knob on mine is also black it just looks blue as I used a camera phone and the resolution is not as good.

OK, that's good to know. I just could not bear to have a Jaguar rotary

controller with a... blue knob. I tried to find a way to write this without

triggering British sniggers, but it's impossible to avoid it...

 

Cheers,

JustClaws.

[leearco]

to jonathan ascough

 

just wondering if your controllers are going to be available for sale on say your website(if got one) or will they be available only on ebay? just curious if they will be easy and common to purchase.

[jonathan ascough]

To leearco

 

my controllers will only be available via ebay as I dont have my own website. Now i did order enough parts to make 20 controllers. 8 Have been sold on ebay, and 2 i have given to friends of mine. depending on how well they sell will determine whether or not I will make another batch of 20.

[Tyrant]

Apology accepted, from what you’ve said, it seems clear that you are a decent guy selling a unique product, and not simply another outsider attempting to take a rare product *cough*soulstar*cough* and cash in on it by making copies. I too should apologise for slightly over-reacting, but the Jaguar community has had a pretty bad history of similar things happening and I really wasn’t happy about it happening to me too. I'm glad that this isn’t the case.

 

I love your approach to plugging the hole, that’s really a very neat approach, well done. I had to search a looong time to find something suitable to do it with (the d-pads from the ones I use are not really an option, they’re the wrong shape, and too fat, and mostly hollow at the back).

 

Again, I’d like to publicly say that now I’ve read your post about them, I have absolutely no problem with your controllers at all and I wish you the best of luck making and selling them. If I were you, I would consider investing in that second batch, but dont worry if you dont sell them all at once, the demand for them comes and goes, and just because for a while the price may drop or you may end up with some not selling at all, a few months down the line people will be beating your door down for them .

[Serblander]

[MegaManFan]

Any links to the seller's eBay account and/or one of these controllers for sale?

[Paolo]

AA Jaggers RULE!

(somebody should say this every now and then)

[jonathan ascough]

Thanks for the kind words Nick and as I said I can understand your initial reaction. I am thinking about making another batch as I do not have many left and could only post a pro rotary up this week (and I only have two of these left at the mo). So for the benefit of people that miss out on my last two auctions if I get enough requests from this site then I will do another batch.

 

For what it is worth I have made one working B type controller that works and it is a hybrid of yours and mine. I wont sell it though and at least I will have the parts to make at least one more pro rotary. Once again thanks for the kind words and it is my hope that the people that have purchased my rotaries enjoy them .