Virtual-On Twin-Stick Mapping Guide

Discuss VO-related projects (Twin Sticks, etc.)
mukiex
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Joined: 15 Oct 2019, 11:33

Virtual-On Twin-Stick Mapping Guide

Post by mukiex »

I'm working on a DIY mapping guide for Virtual-On Twin Sticks. It can be found here.

It's a little early right now, but the eventual plan is for it to be the place to go for modding or basically rebuilding home Virtual-On sticks from old Saturn/Dreamcast Twin Sticks, and knowing both how to map them to a controller and how to set various titles in the Virtual-On franchise to work with those mappings, whether on the system itself or through an emulator.

Right now, the data it includes is:

- Button mapping, including control modes, for as many Virtual-On titles as I can personally test out and verify
- Stick wiring mapping. Basically, which color wire on the joystick PCB would go to which lead on a controller board. Another page includes a visual guide; made a vector diagram of the Saturn ASCII stick underside from a photo.
- Labels. Right now I've got an SVG of the Sega Saturn twin sticks in there

Thus far I've only got the Saturn sticks at home for getting this info, but I have a Dreamcast stick en route and will update the guide accordingly.

If you guys think there's any data that needs to be in there, lemme know. Among the things, I'd love to know the physical distance between the two sticks on Arcade, Saturn, Dreamcast, Xbox 360, and PS4 boards.
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MentholMoose
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Joined: 15 Dec 2008, 22:06

Re: Virtual-On Twin-Stick Mapping Guide

Post by MentholMoose »

Hi, welcome to the forums. IIRC some of this can be found on the forums. I wrote guides for wiring arcade Twin Sticks to Dreamcast and Xbox 360. I'll do some digging. I have most Twin Sticks variations so I can get measurements if I can't dig them up here.
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Billkwando
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Joined: 30 Apr 2009, 06:38

Re: Virtual-On Twin-Stick Mapping Guide

Post by Billkwando »

mukiex wrote: 17 Oct 2019, 11:02 I'm working on a DIY mapping guide for Virtual-On Twin Sticks. It can be found here.

It's a little early right now, but the eventual plan is for it to be the place to go for modding or basically rebuilding home Virtual-On sticks from old Saturn/Dreamcast Twin Sticks, and knowing both how to map them to a controller and how to set various titles in the Virtual-On franchise to work with those mappings, whether on the system itself or through an emulator.

Right now, the data it includes is:

- Button mapping, including control modes, for as many Virtual-On titles as I can personally test out and verify
- Stick wiring mapping. Basically, which color wire on the joystick PCB would go to which lead on a controller board. Another page includes a visual guide; made a vector diagram of the Saturn ASCII stick underside from a photo.
- Labels. Right now I've got an SVG of the Sega Saturn twin sticks in there

Thus far I've only got the Saturn sticks at home for getting this info, but I have a Dreamcast stick en route and will update the guide accordingly.

If you guys think there's any data that needs to be in there, lemme know. Among the things, I'd love to know the physical distance between the two sticks on Arcade, Saturn, Dreamcast, Xbox 360, and PS4 boards.
I can see one thing your spreadsheet is missing. Cybertroopers Virtual On (aka Operation Moongate, VOOM, or OMG) is also available on Xbox 360 Japan, and shares the same mappings as VOOT. The way I got it was to switch my console region (and maybe language, but that might not be necessary) to Japan, then find it in the store (I did it by going through all the letters in the alphabet sorting until I found it), download the demo, and then buy a Japanese points card. I got mine digitally delivered from https://www.offgamers.com/game-card/con ... ft-card-jp so once I paid with PayPal, it was less than an hour until I had a picture of the code. After I downloaded the demo I switched everything back and put in the code and it worked just fine. One thing to keep in mind is while the game used to be 800 points or 1000 yen, the price has since gone up, which forces you to buy a 2000 yen card, and have money left over (which you CAN use to buy most of the DLC levels for Virtual On Force, though I hear they're not that great).

I used my Japanese gamertag for the above, but I'm not sure if that part is necessary or not. I kept my login info for it, so after getting the game on 360, I logged it in on my Xbox One, and downloaded VOOM from my Ready to Install section on the dashboard, which made it available to my main US account as well, of course.

I'm currently using a Saturn Twin Stick on Xbox One and 360 (and PS4) with the help of a pricey controller converter and another, much cheaper, converter.

I also noticed that you left off A Certain Magical Virtual On. I came here to post about that game today, actually, because as of yesterday, they have patched in (as of Ver 1.05) a twin stick configuration that can be used on the analog sticks. I hope to find an option to make it more like Twin Type B (I'll worry about the extra buttons this game uses later) but I've only been messing with it for like 5 minutes and I don't know Japanese.

If you're interested in knowing more let me know, and I'll let you know what I figure out.


Edit: I just realized your spreadsheet is also missing the Japan-only Virtual On Force, which is a region free disc and can be played on any 360. It's not backward compatible yet, alas. It's a lot like Marz. It has a Twin Type B config as well, except one of the turbo buttons switches targets instead. The Special button recovers a downed teammate. :)
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ChexGuy
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Joined: 23 Sep 2013, 18:50

Re: Virtual-On Twin-Stick Mapping Guide

Post by ChexGuy »

index's twinstick config is specifically meant to be used with the crowdfunded twinstick, which means that's the only config you're going to get. it's unfortunate, but it's almost an afterthought for that game so a type B config won't be put in.
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Billkwando
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Re: Virtual-On Twin-Stick Mapping Guide

Post by Billkwando »

ChexGuy wrote: 28 Nov 2019, 07:47 index's twinstick config is specifically meant to be used with the crowdfunded twinstick, which means that's the only config you're going to get. it's unfortunate, but it's almost an afterthought for that game so a type B config won't be put in.
They could have easily made it so you only get the new config options if the console recognizes the controller ID of the Tanita stick, which is what I was afraid they would do. Instead, we get an option that everyone can experiment with, and every button is remappable. Something that's not really necessary for a proprietary stick. That would be like Steel Battalion having remappable buttons.....pretty pointless when you have a dedicated stick where everything is already where the developers intended it. That's why I'm not assuming right away that there isn't some sort of Type B option. It seems like they made it this way specifically so folks without the twin stick can still play twin stick style on their controller, so it seems like they're putting some thought into it..
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Porcupine
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Joined: 19 Jul 2012, 19:07

Re: Virtual-On Twin-Stick Mapping Guide

Post by Porcupine »

I'm not sure how they did twin stick controls for Index because that's the first game in the series that was designed around a controller. There are certain subtle movements that work only on a controller which may be difficult to implement with twinsticks. Just as there are some subtle kinds of mixed-walking motions on the old VO games that aren't replicable at all on controller. Overall you can do the important things no matter what you use, but a few obscure techniques get lost in translation.