Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
I know that a lot of early Playstation games don't use the analog stick at all, (they just rely on the D-Pad), and I know that some games came out during the time that they were making a transition over to the analog controllers. A few questions I have about the analog stick:
- For the old games that originally were meant for just the D-Pad, but allow the use of the analog sticks, would the analog stick really just function as a glorified D-Pad? That is, would the analog stick offer a wider range of functionality, or would it just emulate a D-Pad with eight directions?
- There were games that actually used the 360 degree (is that number correct?) functionality of the analog sticks in the later years of the Playstation (and indeed NEEDED them; Ape Escape comes to mind). Is there a plugin as of yet (similar to the TAS input plugin for N64) that emulates the sticks? I apologize if these questions have been answered elsewhere but I didn't see anything that fully answered my questions.
Joined: 8/6/2006
Posts: 784
Location: Connecticut, USA
Well, I realize that a circle has 360 degrees but... I was wondering if there were actually 360 separate directions in which you could move your character... Heh. That was just an incidental question anyway.
I was wondering if there were actually 360 separate directions in which you could move your character
Actually, there are a little more. The x and y axes have 256 distinct values each. Off the top of my head, I'd say that there are 512 different directions you could go and 128 different "intensity levels" (I can't find the word right now; you know, one time you run right and one time you just walk at normal pace). This all of course only is the case if the game(s) actually support such a fine movement, which i seriously doubt.
No, no- if you have 256*256 space, there are 65536 possible values for stick location- though some will be in the same direction, eg. (+1, +2) and (+2, +4)
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
Anyway, you know how the PSX Analog stick sucks. It may be durable, but it just doesn't feel analog at all. In 99% of the cases it's all about 2 speeds - walking and running.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
No, no- if you have 256*256 space, there are 65536 possible values for stick location- though some will be in the same direction, eg. (+1, +2) and (+2, +4)
I know. That's why I've been talking about directions and strengths, not possible locations :P
Assuming the dualshock controller indeed sends 256 distinct values for the x and y axes of the analog stick, then the extreme positions of the stick would have 256 (all the values in the extreme left) + 256 (all values in the extreme right) + 256 (all values in the extreme up) + 256 (all values in the extreme bottom) - 4 (because the four corners share values) possible directions in the extreme position of the analog stick, for a total of 1020 different directions.
I wouldn't be surprised if the actual number was slightly lower than this, though (eg. because of physical issues, calibration issues, chipset issues, driver issues...).
Btw, doesn't the dualshock gamepad have two distinct modes (switchable with a mode button on the gamepad)? In one mode it emulates the old gamepad, while in the other mode it works as a dualshock gamepad, and in this latter mode it requires that the game specifically supports it?
Joined: 2/28/2006
Posts: 2275
Location: Milky Way -> Earth -> Brazil
no way dude... that analog is shit... it must have like 5 distinct values for the directions.
At least this is how it feels. If it's really that accurate it was never ever implemented in any game.
"Genuine self-esteem, however, consists not of causeless feelings, but of certain knowledge about yourself.
It rests on the conviction that you — by your choices, effort and actions — have made yourself into the
kind of person able to deal with reality. It is the conviction — based on the evidence of your own volitional
functioning — that you are fundamentally able to succeed in life and, therefore, are deserving of that success."
- Onkar Ghate
Bisqwit wrote:
I wouldn't be surprised if the actual number was slightly lower than this, though (eg. because of physical issues, calibration issues, chipset issues, driver issues...).
According to my PSX/2->USB adapter, an original DualShock actually can send 256 distinct values per axis.
Warp wrote:
Btw, doesn't the dualshock gamepad have two distinct modes (switchable with a mode button on the gamepad)? In one mode it emulates the old gamepad, while in the other mode it works as a dualshock gamepad, and in this latter mode it requires that the game specifically supports it?
Yes, it does. When the analog LED is off, it identifies itself as 0x41 (LSB) just like a regular d-pad-only controller and has 2 button bytes (10 buttons, 4 bits for each direction and two empty bits). If in analog mode (=LED on), these two formerly empty bits are responsible for L3 and R3 (pressing the analog sticks). 4 more bytes are added to the response (one for each axis) and the byte the controller identifies itself with becomes 0x73 (DualShock 2) or 0x53 (analog controller with green LED turned on). It doesn't matter for old games, though, because the controller is "told to shut up" when the extra axes byte were to be sent by pulling high the SEL/ATT line again. This way even old BIOSes can handle newer controllers.
My theory is that a game can interfere with that process of querying a controller and write and read the raw data on its own. This way the analog sticks can be used by a new game even if the PSX's BIOS is the very first one.
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