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Redefinable joystick keys

Lee TonksLee Tonks
edited July 2004 in Emulators
Er... difficult to describe in a subject line, but you'll see what I mean. :)

Just about all Spectrum emulators allow you to map one of the joystick formats to the keyboard, so you can use the cursor keys as your Kempston joystick, for instance.

What they don't seem to do (and other emulators do - C64 emulator 'Vice' and Atari ST emualtor 'Steem' do this, for example) is let you redefine which keys the joystick is mapped to.

Now I dunno about you lot, but I hate the PC cursor keys - I want to use Q, A, O, P and M. Someone feel like implementing this functionality into their emulator? It'd be a godsend for games that don't already have a redefinable keyboard option.
Post edited by Lee Tonks on

Comments

  • GOCGOC
    edited July 2004
    I agree with Blood! and I'd also like to suggest a key-to-key remapping option, for those games with a really stupid key layout...
  • Vladimir KladovVladimir Kladov
    edited July 2004
    This already done in EmuZWin. ANY PC key to ANY ZX key or ANY two ZX keys, and even with some additions (fixed key, repeat pressing). Layout can be saved and loaded later to reuse in other games.
  • Lee TonksLee Tonks
    edited July 2004
    Hi Vladimir!

    I've been trying to do something like this with your emulator but I can't quite figure out how to do it...

    I managed to map one Speccy key to another, but I can't seem to figure out how to map a joystick direction onto a key. Any tips? :)
  • Vladimir KladovVladimir Kladov
    edited July 2004
    question was another: how to redirect QAOPspace (e.g.) to joystick. For real joystick(s) it is possible now to tell to emulator that it should redefine its moves to cursor or some certain kind of joystick (Kempston, Interface II...).
  • Lee TonksLee Tonks
    edited July 2004
    Ah, I see - that's the opposite of what I wanted to do! :)

    So... it looks like there's still no emulator which does what I originally talked about. Snap to it, emulator chaps! ;)
  • Philip KendallPhilip Kendall
    edited July 2004
    Fuse uses QAOP<space> for emulating the joystick, which may be close enough to what you want. If not, it's a trivial recompile (see input.c:keypress() and keyrelease() in latest CVS).
  • Vladimir KladovVladimir Kladov
    edited July 2004
    BTW. It should be possible to redefine joystick as any other PC key. In configuration, in Key mapping, click PC Key and while a dialog is on screen, move/press joystick. Don't forget turn joystick on before!
  • Dr BEEPDr BEEP
    edited July 2004
    In (win)Z80 you can define any key for any direction(= USERDEFINED KEYS).



  • Lee TonksLee Tonks
    edited July 2004
    Nah - you've all got it the wrong way around (except for Phil - thanks for the tip, I'll check that out).

    What Vladimir and Dr Beep are talking about is setting up your joystick to press any keys you like.

    I don't have a joystick - I'm talking about EMULATED joysticks.... Kempston, Cursor, Sinclair... yes?

    Take 'Spectaculator', for example. On the 'keyboard' tab of the 'options' screen, there's an option at the bottom which says 'Choose a joystick to emulate using your computer's arrow keys...', and it then allows you to select one of the Speccy standards. That's the functionality I was talking about - it's okay as it is, but I want to map the Kempston onto a set of user-definable keys and not onto the PC's cursor pad.

    Is that any clearer? It's a bit difficult to explain. :)
  • Philip KendallPhilip Kendall
    edited July 2004
    Press 'Q', get effect 'Kempston Up' (for arbitrary values of 'Q', 'Kempston' and 'Up') is how I'd explain it.
  • Vladimir KladovVladimir Kladov
    edited July 2004
    In EmuZWin, go to Configuration, in tab Key map click label PC Key, enter key, then click ZX Key, click key on drawn keyboard; repeat for each key you want define. There is ready .ecm file for QAOPspace, just load it. What can be difficult there?
  • Lee TonksLee Tonks
    edited July 2004
    Nicely worded, Phil. That's exactly it.

    Vladimir - your example is easy and works, but it maps key to key, not 'kempston direction' to key. Yes?
  • Lee TonksLee Tonks
    edited July 2004
    Er... of course (puts thinking cap back on) your method would work fine for joysticks which were based on keyboard keys, like cursor, sinclair, etc. Silly me. :)
  • DunnyDunny
    edited July 2004
    SPIN 0.501 which *should* be released tonight has now got a redefinable keystick, in that you can now choose what PC keys to use in place of the cursors/ctrl. You *can* use a kempston with QAOPM, or even use the Ultimate keys (QWERT) with your QAOPM.

    D.
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