Caltrops - M.A.M.E.





	[quote name="Ice Cream Jonsey"][quote name="Ice Cream Jonsey"]Next post I will discuss my crushing disappointment trying to buy buttons directly from Happ and getting together something for an Asteroids layout, which is all buttons. [/quote] This thread has not been abandoned. Don't buy directly from Happ! They will RAPE you on shipping and handling, and if I remember right, they charge an additional fee if you are not buying hundreds of items. They are perfectly happy to resell to other people who have much more reasonable rates. I had not played Asteroids in the arcade since it was new and hot, and years of poor ports (the 2600 version does not feature rocks that move sideways: I hope this revelation ruins the entire experience of the 2600 for everyone else like it did for me) made me ignorant of the fact that the layout is all buttons. While trying to break 6,000 points in Asteroids I decided to take a look at the exact layout: rotate is on the left, hyperspace is towards the bottom and fire & thrust are controlled on the right. Pinback was able to get to 10,000 with five guys left by using a keyboard and it's safe to say that turning using a gamepad or joystick just doesn't work. I bought a hole saw that plugged into my impotent cordless drill. You want a 1 and 1/8th inch hole and this size is easy to get at the Home Depot. I grabbed some scrap wood and started to drill. I could only do three holes a night due to the shittiness of my drill -- I had to power it up for several hours afterwards. I like these games, but I am not the sort of person to jump out of bed and start hole-sawing, so it was essentially three holes a day. The results: <img src="http://img158.imageshack.us/img158/4162/controller8od.jpg"> I know I posted a pic of it further along in this base, but allow me to go back in time and show progress from the correct starting point. The green glowing thing is the Ultimarc IPAC2 keyboard encoder. Long story short, the ROM on mine was bad and I had to have a new one shipped. It took me forever to realize that. But Andy at Ultimarc is awesome and fixed the error quickly and competently. I was now able to play Asteroids properly on a plank of wood. More to come! the dark and gritty...Ice Cream Jonsey! [/quote]