Why does your trackball not have buttons?

[MadDogHoek818]

I've been planning a cabinet build for quite some time. And over the last couple of weeks I pulled the trigger and have purchased a 4 joystick setup, got my pie 4 running (been testing with game pads), and I am now considering a trackball. My goal is to first plan my control deck layout. Looking around the web I see a lot of people using 1 trackball in the middle of the board, as a apposed to a trackball with 3 buttons. I would think it would be easier to play games like centipede or crystal castle if you had buttons. ...for that matter what about 2 player marble madness? (note, I could care less about any golf game - I know that's heresy to some)

What am I missing?

[Clyde]

I don't have a trackball, but most control panels that I see on the web have a center trackball in addition to the typical 6-8 buttons for their joysticks. Do you mean the same kind of layout, and if so, why are those joystick buttons not also enough for the trackball?

That said, there are trackball games that don't use any buttons at all, Quantum for example:

[MadDogHoek818]

I understand there are multiple games without trackballs, that's why my tongue-in-cheek comment of "golf game" eluding to Golden Tee.

I guess my question lies in that I would run my trackball as a mouse, and I would think the buttons would work as left/right clicks and can be used in-game. Considering that I'm going for a 4-player setup, I would assume the trackball would run independent of the joystick setups, since I'd be running it as a mouse.

OR, is the answer to my question that the player 1 joystick button combination could be used in conjunction with the trackball at the same time? i.e. it all works together at the same time during gameplay.

[Ashpool]

@MadDogHoek818 I think it depends on what emulators and what type of "encoder(s)" you are using for the Arcade Parts. On my Setup I am using an I-PAC 2 in Keyboard Mode with the Trackball connected to the I-PAC (but having it on its own USB Controller without any Buttons connected wouldn't make a difference here (AFAIK)). And the usage/assignment for the Buttons is a mixture of core/game overrides (Libretro Cores) and at least for Mame (also for the lr-mames) sometimes a few tweaks/assignments from its own (TAB-)Menu. For others it depends on how configurable/versatile they are in regards to a keyboard/trackball only setup.
In my experience you can't have it all, there is always something that isn't suited to be played with a particular setup/hardware configuration (That's why I have one Retropie Setup for my 2 Player (mostly-)Arcade Panel, one for retro-computers (Keyboard/Mouse/Stick alike to a "Quickshot II Turbo") and another for some vintage consoles (Gamepads)). Think about your use-cases and maybe you can try your hardware on some test-scenarios before deciding on a layout for your cab/panel to see what is possible and what may not work.

Edit:
P.S.: Sorry, I totally forgot %^] -> My Trackball has no Buttons, because on my Layout further Buttons to be used as "Mouse" would have ended up in places where "playing" them wouldn't be any fun/would be uncomfortable for the player;.. And (IMHO) reassigning the existing buttons for trackball games is far more convenient then designing a layout with dedicated mouse/trackball buttons that are really usable without any discomfort to the player(s).

[MadDogHoek818]

I decided to update my question, just in case someone comes back to look at this asking the same question I was.

I'm using joystick encoders instead of a keyboard encoder. What I found is that retroarch allows you to setup a mouse for use with the game. So my trackball goes in as mouse 1. Since I do not have a UI running on my setup, I don't actually need mouse buttons. I only need the trackball input for the games.

What all this means is that the retroarch setup will use a joystick along side the trackball... meaning the buttons going through the joystick controller work along side the track ball and I don't need extra buttong for left and right mouse clicks.