Tron with spinner arm spinning

rwoodruff

I had this similar problem and am still sort of new to retro pi. I wanted to play the arcade classic Tron as it should be with a custom built controller that has the trigger based joystick and a spinner for the aiming arm control. I had run into the usual issues and had to do quite a bit of studying before I came up with this on my own and never found an article or post that helped. Here is the story.

Installed retropi 4.2 or 4.3. I then added the Tron rom to the arcade folder so I could select which Mame to use. I installed a joystick usb zero delay and Usb dongle ultrimarc spintrack spinner. I did not have to do any special command line config for the spinner but did do a command line test to see that it was working and it was. You can find this test command by searching easily.

I tried launching with Mame for all and got nothing from the spinner. I then went to pi config and installed optional package of AdvanceMAME. Then hit a before launching Tron and selected AdvanceMAME as my choice for this rom. The spinner now works and controls his arm.
Now the problem is when joystick left or right his arm spins wildly without moving the spinner. The spinner still works but there is a mapping issue. I searched online to find people with this problem and others who say they didn’t have it. I tried every possible tab Mame Control map option there was and could fix this. It also did the same with any gamepad installed. I figure it most be a Mame programming map issue that always wants left and right to be mapped to the gamepad in some way.
I tried Mame 2010 and it failed to install. I figure there must be a way to command line configure this but it is over my head and cannot be done through any of the normal mapping controls. It would have to be a custom written control configuration I’m guessing.

edmaul69

@rwoodruff so if left and right is doing the same thing as the spinner, then you have the joystick configured as a spinner/trackball/mouse. You need to fix that issue.

adf2112

This is frustrating to me as well! I have this same problem with any game that requires movement paired with analog for aiming including:
tron, heavy barrel, etc.
This happens with mame4all and advancemane14. It is usually only one or 2 joystick directions that cause the spinning - which is strange.
Thinking there was a control conflict, I have tried to completely un-mapping all controls (global) and then just mapping the movement buttons to the main joystick - but still get the auto-spinning :( .
Setup:

I have retropie running well with 2 old gravis gamepad USB contollers (wired to full size arcade buttons/joys).
I plug in a mouse/spinner when needed for advmame and use the inc/dec mapped to buttons for mame4all.
This setup works fine for all analog control games except where the game needs a move/aim combo.

Since I have not seen this issue reported with stand-alone mame versions - thinking it might be retroarch/emulation station issues... but I have no evidence to prove that.

Any suggestions or places I could look for more info would be greatly appreciated.
The comment "then you have the joystick configured as a spinner/trackball/mouse" is interesting. Should I be looking in the on-screen mame control setup - or is there a config file for setting up the joystick as the mouse? Thanks!

caver01

@adf2112 While playing TRON, connect a keyboard, press TAB and bring up the MAME GUI menu. You want to edit the key mapping for THIS GAME. Scroll through the menu and you will see that despite the fact that analog controls work, the directions are ALSO mapped to the joystick. You need to delete these. Map them to NONE. To do that you should be able to select the mapping, and press your UI Cancel button twice.

Note that you cannot mess up your analog config doing this. What we are doing here is removing the digital/joystick settings that affect the spinning arm.

adf2112

Thanks for the suggestions @caver01 - unfortunately they did not work for me :(
I went in the control UI (this game) and mapped all controls to none... returned to the game and joy1 left and right would spin the man in ikari - dang. I mapped all global controls to none as well. Same thing.
I am thinking that maybe there is a mapping in another place or file that i cant find.

I did figure out a workaround that gets me part way there...

If I map the Player 2 controls to player 1 - all is well! Sadly, I cant run 2 players at a time but at least I can play the game without issues. I can use P2 joy for movement and P2 buttons for the rotate/shoot - or in advMame I can use my mouse for the rotate/shoot. This works for all games that I had the problem with. Funny... while in this configuration, Joy1 left/right STILL rotates the guy ! :-)

So it appears that Joy1 left/right seem to be somehow tied to the spin controls even though I can find no sign of them being mapped in the mame control UI. I searched carefully!

I will continue to look on the system for any other files that could be mapping those.
Any other thoughts or suggestions are appreciated! Thanks for your time!

caver01

@adf2112 Is the joy1 that still spins the guy an analog joystick? You can only map/unmap digital controls in the TAB menu. To modify analog mapping, you need to go into the .rc file and edit it. My experience with this has usually been unmapping the specific inputs that are overlaying the analog.

Ikari is an unusual case, as the triggers for rotating the player character came from a rotating joystick and the trigger is digital. I was referring to games that have analog controls like trackball or spinner where you want to remove the additional inputs from a digital joystick.

Still, I think there must be a way. If I am right about a joystick mapping, it may be something you don't have access to change in the UI and you will need to edit the .rc file.

Markdonnell1975

@adf2112 Were you ever able to sort this out? I have the exact same problem with left and right on the joy canceling out the spinner.

Markdonnell1975

@caver01 said in Tron with spinner arm spinning:

@adf2112 Is the joy1 that still spins the guy an analog joystick? You can only map/unmap digital controls in the TAB menu. To modify analog mapping, you need to go into the .rc file and edit it. My experience with this has usually been unmapping the specific inputs that are overlaying the analog.

Ikari is an unusual case, as the triggers for rotating the player character came from a rotating joystick and the trigger is digital. I was referring to games that have analog controls like trackball or spinner where you want to remove the additional inputs from a digital joystick.

Still, I think there must be a way. If I am right about a joystick mapping, it may be something you don't have access to change in the UI and you will need to edit the .rc file.

I can't seem to figure this one out. I found your original post and was able to modify the advmame.rc file and get the spinner to work properly for all spinner games but Tron and Discs of Tron. I am having this same conflict where the spinner works fine until I go left or right with the joystick then it stops working. If I start spinning the spinner first then go left or right it allows control. If I choose a direction with the joystick first, the spinner will not be recognized until I stop using a direction. I deleted all controls in the Tab menu and re-added. I am at a loss where to go now.....

Markdonnell1975

I am talking into the void at this point on this thread but I did find a solution for this for anyone searching the interweb in the future like I was. I end arounded this "joystick 1" problem with hardware. I purchased an additional USB controller board ($10) and configured it as well. Once I determined which board advmame assigned to J1 I just moved the joystick wiring to the other board that was assigned J3 then remapped in the Tab menu to those controls. I now technically have 3 controllers but only 2 actual functional controllers on the arcade control panel itself. I would guess there is a software way to fix this but it was way easier to eat $10 and save the time and hassle of troubleshooting and hours of reading config files with no actual knowledge :)