Anyone getting the Sinden light gun?

Clyde

Update: I tested the gun on my Desktop x86 PC running Kubuntu Linux 18.04 LTS.

The test program opened a non-fullscreen window that was positioned too low to show the whole border, and couldn't be made fullscreen by normal means. Thus, the gun didn't recognise the partly-shown border. Only after I forced the window to be fullscreen, it worked as expected. All hail the window rules of KDE Plasma's window manager Kwin. 🍻
Alas, the gun doesn't work either with this machine's RetroPie installation. Though in contrast to my Pi, the trigger and side buttons of the gun can be bound as mouse buttons in RetroArch, there's still no moving crosshair in lr-fcecumm running Duck Hunt. My normal PC mouse, however, does work out of the box with the game.

I'm going to bed now. Stay tuned for further updates.

Emulatre71

I'm not exactly sold on this, I wish they make this more open so it would work on my Raspberry Pi unit running Lakka OS.

Clyde

@emulatre71 Yes, I also wish they would make their drivers and tools open source and release them on an public online repository like Github. Ideally, they'd go the extra mile and get the driver integrated in the Linux kernel. Then the guns should run on most Linux devices out of the box like so many other devices do. But I doubt this will happen in the forseeable future.

As for Lakka, according to this thread on the LibRetro forums, there are severe incompatibilities in software (Lakka doesn't have Mono) and licensing (Sinden's software is closed source and reserves all rights to themselves).

I don't understand how today a project that is targeted primarily at the retrogaming and emulation community can be so closed-minded (and -sourced) that they don't see the benefits of opening their code for improvement by that same community, when most emulators, frontends, and tools already took that route.

mitu

@clyde said in Anyone getting the Sinden light gun?:

@emulatre71 Yes, I also wish they would make their drivers and tools open source and release them on an public online repository like Github. Ideally, they'd go the extra mile and get the driver integrated in the Linux kernel.

I don't think they have any kernel driver included, isn't the device emulating a keyboard + mouse input, which should work OOB on both Windows and Linux ?

As for Lakka, according to this thread on the LibRetro forums, there are severe incompatibilities in software (Lakka doesn't have Mono) and licensing (Sinden's software is closed source and reserves all rights to themselves).

'severe incompatibility' is a bit far fetched. It's the calibration/configuration utility that is not supported and Lakka is a 'sealed' system (i.e. you can't install anything on it).

I don't understand how today a project that is targeted primarily at the retrogaming and emulation community can be so closed-minded (and -sourced) ...

Did 8bitDo / Microsoft open source their hardware or utilities ? The fact that it works - also - with open source emulators/software doesn't require open sourcing the hardware or the configuration utility. I don't see an issue with the creator retaining the rights on their creations and - at least in the first phase - trying to make a profit off of it. See for instance RetroTink Ultimate, which open sourced the design of their RGB hat after the author decided it wouldn't produce it anymore.

Clyde

[deleted because sent accidentally before finishing]

Clyde

@mitu said in Anyone getting the Sinden light gun?:

I don't think they have any kernel driver included, isn't the device emulating a keyboard + mouse input, which should work OOB on both Windows and Linux ?

I don't think so either, I just wish they would.

Without the mono driver, the gun is registered as three USB devices: a camera, a keyboard, and a mouse. But it needs the driver to recognise the white or coloured border around the screen to pinpoint its position and bearing. Without it, the "mouse" either doesn't give any movement output or just gibberish.

'severe incompatibility' is a bit far fetched. It's the calibration/configuration utility that is not supported and Lakka is a 'sealed' system (i.e. you can't install anything on it).

It's mostly semantics, but I would call a sealed system without a necessary component (mono) and a license that prohibits any distribution of the driver and tools except by the hardware's vendor quite severe obstacles.

Did 8bitDo / Microsoft open source their hardware or utilities ?

I don't know about 8bitDo, but Power Shell and NET were open sourced years ago. Microsoft is far from a role model for openness, but even they invest heavily in open source since their currenct CEO changed the company's course in the 2010s. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_and_open_source for details.

Better examples would be Intel who have a long history of open source drivers, and AMD who still have an closed source driver but work together with the community on an open source driver that is way better than the NVidia counterpart that is ignored or even hindered by Nvidia.

The fact that it works - also - with open source emulators/software doesn't require open sourcing the hardware or the configuration utility. I don't see an issue with the creator retaining the rights on their creations and - at least in the first phase - trying to make a profit off of it.

It doesn't require it, but it could take some load off the developers of this small company, by letting the community participating in the process. In which way would the creator lose any rights? Open sourcing doesn't take any from them that I can think of.

That said, Sinden doesn't make profit from its software that is freely available from their website. Its the hardware – or the combination of both – that people have already paid millions for. I don't see how that's going to change by opening the software to scrutiny and collaboration. They could even retain some binary microcode inside for critical parts like the border detection.

See for instance RetroTink Ultimate, which open sourced the design of their RGB hat after the author decided it wouldn't produce it anymore.

It's nice if creators do that (id software is another prominent example), but that doesn't say anything about closed source being necessary for profit. In fact, the countless profitable open source based projects and companys contrict that thesis, as does the heavy investment of global corporations in this sector.

I don't want to hijack this thread. Please feel free to detach our discussion to a new one at your discretion. 😇

Emulatre71

There are many of use who are sick and tired of the bs associated with proprietary software. I would love to see more trends towards Open Source.

Chupachups

If it was open source I could easily find the solution to the problems here. Instead I bought the article and as soon as I connected, following the instructions, it didn't work.

It is true that I have been busy with something else so far and have not run any further tests. I reinstalled Retropie and followed the instructions. Now I also have to reconfigure everything on that raspberry.

But I don't know English well, neither linux, nor Discord. So I can't even quite understand what to try to solve.

It could be the reason why many users resold the gun on ebay a few days after receiving it.

Clyde

@chupachups Well, FOSS (free and open source software) isn't some kind of magic that fixes everything – you still need people who have the skills and motivation for it. But at least FOSS makes it a possibility, whereas CSS hinders any collaboration of the community. And I think that especially small businesses with a niche consumer base can profit from such collaboration.

It could be the reason why many users resold the gun on ebay a few days after receiving it.

That, or they want to exploit the current scarcity of the guns to get more than they themselves paid for them.

I don't have time to tinker with mine before the weekend. My next plans are to try the „Bare Bones“ image and a vestal official RetroPie image. If one of those does work, I'll compare their config files to find any clues.

Clyde

Update: After some tedious testing with the Bare Bones image, I found out that the mouse index in RetroArch isn't the same as the system's. As said before, the Sinden gun appears as /dev/input/mouse0 and /dev/input/event2 in the system. But in RetroArch, I have to set the mouse index to 1!

So far, so irritating. 🙄 Now I can move the cursor in both lr-fceumm and lr-pcsx-rearmed, not only in the Bare Bones image, but also in my own RetroPie system.
😀🍻😁

BUT alas, solving one problem led to the next: The gun seems to assume a higher screen resolution than lr-fceumm and lr-pcsx-rearmed provide, i.e. the crosshair is way too fast and will already have reached the screen border when the gun's real aim just moved approx. a third of that distance. Calibrating the gun by holding lefton its D-Pad for three seconds doesn't fix that, as it aligns the aim at one position, but from there the movement is still too fast.

I couldn't find any reports about this phenomenon on the web. My monitor's native resolution is 1600x1200. Changing the aspect ratio in RetroArch doesn't fix the problem.

Any ideas? Otherwise, my next step will be to contact Sinden support and/or asking on https://www.reddit.com/r/SindenLightgun/. But not today, the lengthy troubleshooting was enough for one day. 😛

Chupachups

I can't download the BAREBONES 7.1 image, from HarryDogs site (https://barebones.lightgun.dev/bb7x1.rar), it always stops
:( :( :(

Clyde

@chupachups How do you try to download it?

If everything else fails, boot up your normal RetroPie and use wget. ;)

Download to the current directory:

wget https://barebones.lightgun.dev/bb7x1.rar

Download to the system's root directory that can be read in Windows:

sudo wget -P / https://barebones.lightgun.dev/bb7x1.rar

Chupachups

Thanks for the hint. Today the download from firefox is ok.

EDIT: installed but.. don't work the player1test :( I will try another time tomorrow

Dipkid

Noticed my production / order id was cleared at the factory sometime in the last weeks.
Did you guys get a tracking number pretty quickly, or did the gun just show up in the end?

theissdev

@dipkid Mine just showed up.

Chupachups

@dipkid just showed up

Clyde

@chupachups said in Anyone getting the Sinden light gun?:

@dipkid just showed up

As did another Update:

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-sinden-lightgun#/updates/all

Dipkid

@clyde yeah, thats where i saw mine should be on the way. im a #7000 backer

Clyde

Another update, this time with some news about improving the software (mainly for Windows, but Linux was at least mentioned honorably):

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/the-sinden-lightgun#/updates/all

For the Linux software I have the stability improvements that are overdue for release which I will release this month (hopefully next week) but I will be dedicating some time and effort to the Linux software after the Windows improvements are released. A front end is most definitely required to make things a lot easier to setup and diagnose any issues.

Let's hope that they don't forget (or forgo) the ARM Linux drivers, which I suspect to be second in number of users after Windows, because of the Pi's popularity in the retro gaming community.

AdamBeGood

My gun has arrived!

I have it working on Duck Hunt, then had a quick look at MAME2016 as I want to try Beast Busters but couldn't suss that at all just yet - there doesn't seem to be an option to select a gun as an input device (ie. "Zapper" for NES).

I'll have another look later though, should do some work now...