Atari Track Ball Questions

[Mot]

I have just scored an Atari Track Ball CX22 and I have some questions:

 

Is Missile Command TB the only game designed to work in track ball mode for the 2600?

 

Is there any game on any other system that uses the track ball mode?

How hard is it to convert 2600 or 7800 games to use the track ball mode?

 

Here is my list of games that are mostly used with a track ball:

2600:

Missile command

Crystal castles

Centipede

Millipede

Reactor

7800:

Centipede

 

Have I missed any?

 

What games do you play with the Atari Track Ball (on any system)?

 

What about the Stelladaptor 2600 to USB Interface ($29), I know it only supports: joysticks, paddles, and driving controllers, but is the Atari track ball in track ball mode physically impossible to support?

 

Thank you.

[Mindfield]

I have just scored an Atari Track Ball CX22 and I have some questions:

 

Is Missile Command TB the only game designed to work in track ball mode for the 2600?

 

Yes.

 

Is there any game on any other system that uses the track ball mode?]

 

Those trak balls were mostly made for the 8-bit Atari -- Crystal Castles, Missile Command, Centipede and others all have trak ball support.

 

How hard is it to convert 2600 or 7800 games to use the track ball mode?

 

Damn near impossible on a 2600. Polling the trak ball takes a lot of machine cycles, and Missile Command is probably the only one originally designed to use a trak ball that had enough free cycles in the kernal to spare.

 

What games do you play with the Atari Track Ball (on any system)?

 

Part of the fun of the trak ball on the 2600 is trying different games out for tit that may not have been designed to use it. There are some games that jjust aren't suited for it (any game that requires that the joystick be held in one direction -- Pitfall/Pitfall II, Smurfs, etc.), and some that work quite well (Crossbow, Spitfire Attack, Gangster Alley, etc.)

 

What about the Stelladaptor 2600 to USB Interface ($29), I know it only supports: joysticks, paddles, and driving controllers, but is the Atari track ball in track ball mode physically impossible to support?

 

Again, it's the practicality of it. Other than Thomas' Missile Command TB, there are no games on the 2600 that use the trak ball in trak ball mode, so there wouldn't have been much call to implement it. I suppose it could be done -- there's more than enough bandwidth for USB 1.1 to poll a trak ball.

[Mot]

Those trak balls were mostly made for the 8-bit Atari -- Crystal Castles, Missile Command, Centipede and others all have trak ball support.

Hay thanks.

 

Now I will have to play these games on the 800XL and see how much fun they are.

 

and some that work quite well (Crossbow, Spitfire Attack, Gangster Alley, etc.)

 

So is it fun to play Star Raider with the track ball?

 

 

I just found out that the 5200's track ball is only compatible with 12 games. I always thought that it was the same as the joysticks.

[Mindfield]

Never tried Star Raiders, but it'd probably be a little klunkier with the trak ball in your lap and the keypad beside you. The Y axis inversion might also be a little more confusing for some on the trak ball. (Yeah, I know that also applies to Spitfire Attack, but you don't use the Y axis as often there)

 

I've never cracked a 5200 trak ball open, but it's probably opto-mechanical (like a ball mouse) or magneto-mechanical (like the roller wheel on a CV Super Action Controller) and therefore works via directional pulses (either optical beam/receptor pairs being intermittently interrupted by the holes in a perforated wheel passing through them, or metallic wafers on a disc passing by low power electromagnets). Quite different from the way a joystick operates (microswitches or membrane contacts tripping a directional line either high or low) and a game would have to be written to tell the difference and behave accordingly.

[vdub_bobby]

How hard is it to convert 2600 or 7800 games to use the track ball mode?

 

Damn near impossible on a 2600. Polling the trak ball takes a lot of machine cycles, and Missile Command is probably the only one originally designed to use a trak ball that had enough free cycles in the kernal to spare.

How does the track ball work? Why do you have to poll it during the kernal?

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Why do you have to poll it during the kernal?

Yup. Internally each axis works like a Driving Controller ("quadrature encoding"), but the resolution is much, much higher. So you have to check it much more often (at constant intervalls!). And that's only possible inside the kernel.

[vdub_bobby]

Why do you have to poll it during the kernal?

Yup. Internally each axis works like a Driving Controller ("quadrature encoding"), but the resolution is much, much higher. So you have to check it much more often (at constant intervalls!). And that's only possible inside the kernel.

Is there some documentation somewhere for how that works? Or have you released (or will you) the source for Missile Command TB?

 

I'm interested in seeing how it works. Track balls are fun