x-arcade dual-joystick setup issues

[Scott Nath]

Good Evening,

I am running into an issue getting the x-arcade dual joystick to work with retropie. I have it working correctly with Atari. But only on the left side and it doesn’t seem to be programmed totatally correctly.

These are the steps I went through:

Used [this lifehacker article](http://lifehacker.com/how-to-turn-your-raspberry-pi-into-a-retro-game-console-498561192) as my plan of attack.

started with ExFat formatted sd-card

1. Downloaded RetroPie Project SD-card Image V2.3
2. Used RPi-sd card builder v1.2 to extract image to the SD Card
3. followed lifehacker’s step 2 instructions for sudo raspi-config exactly
4. went to step 3/sudo ./retropie_setup.sh,

• installed the binaries first
• reboot
• updated setup script
• reboot
• 328 setup->Xarcade2Jstick: enabled

5. emulation station, tried a couple games, didn’t work
6. sudo ./retropie_setup.sh
* retroarch controller setup
7. emulation station, tried a couple games, atari worked mostly, mame did not, nes sorta – with weird button placement

Can you please tell me what I might have done wrong?
Is it possible to just drop in .cfg files somewhere?
Should I expect to have to create different .cfg files for my xarcade dual stick to work with each emulator?

thank you for any help!
Scott

[Scott Nath]

A couple addendums:

two config files?
There are two cfg files in /opt/retropie/emulators/RetroArch/configs:

• Xarcade-to-Gamepad-Device.cfg
• Xarcade-to-GamepadDevice.cfg

Should those both be in there?

I tried editing /opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch.cfg
I added the items found here:

XArcade + USB keyboard

but that made no difference at all.

thanks,
Scott

[thex]

There is a “Xarcade2JStick” in the retropie_setup that you can enable.
This will map all of the keys.

Let me know if the trackball works after you enable this.

[Scott Nath]

Yup, that was this line from the first post:

“328 setup->Xarcade2Jstick: enabled”

Didn’t help.

This isn’t the tank, it’s the dual and it doesn’t have the trackball sadly.

thanks,
Scott

[thex]

Okay – so the Xarcade2Jstick didn’t work for me either. So disabled it then edited /opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch.cfg.
I have all of the keys working in all of the emulators. When you run MAME, hit the tab key to access the game menu, and edit the keys there.

If you would like, I can attach the key mappings from the retroarch.cfg that I made.

[Scott Nath]

Hi Thex, Yes please! Exactly what I’m looking for…

Thank you, Scott

[thex]

Here you go.
I also included instructions on how I mapped the Player 1 + Player 2 buttons as an exit.

I made these notes for me so I can repeat them. That is why there is graphics!

[Scott Nath]

Hi Thex,

Just wanted to drop a line that I’m still working on this. Your .pdf helped a lot.

FYI,
* I did a completely new install of RetroPie from the SD Card Image v2.3.
* I followed the LifeHacker Article steps 1 and 2.
* Then I ssh’d in and changed /opt/retropie/configs/all/retroarch.cfg to follow your keymap charting exactly like this:

1. Modify the following lines:

input_player1_a = z
input_player1_b = shift
input_player1_y = ctrl
input_player1_x = alt
input_player1_start = num5
input_player1_select = c
input_player1_l = space
input_player1_r = x
input_player1_left = keypad4
input_player1_right = keypad6
input_player1_up = keypad8
input_player1_down = keypad2

2. Add the following lines:

input_player2_a = e
input_player2_b = w
input_player2_y = a
input_player2_x = s
input_player2_start = num6
input_player2_select = rightbracket
input_player2_l = q
input_player2_r = leftbracket
input_player2_left = d
input_player2_right = g
input_player2_up = r
input_player2_down = f

And that was it.

I did not install or enable the xarcadetojoystick code. Just changed retroarch.cfg and rebooted.

Following reboot Atari 2600 worked exactly right. I launched Gauntlet in MAME and it almost all worked except for Player 1’s joystick was not working.

I ran out of time there. But this week I will be revisiting this and trying games from all the systems I have. I’ll report back here when I have my findings.

thank you a ton for posting your notes,

Scott

[thex]

Remember, that you have to map the keys in mame using the TAB menu.

[Scott Nath]

I do. thanks.

Will I have to map any of the other emulators do you think?

[thex]

Mame was the only one I had to do. The mapping I gave you work with all of the other emulators that I am using.

[Scott Nath]

What about the ESC key? When I was in Atari I had to hit ESC on the keyboard. Is that correct?

[thex]

if you look at the document I gave you, i expalin what i changed in the cfg file to make player 1 + player 2 the new escape key.

[Scott Nath]

Aha. Found it. Thank you.

[Scott Nath]

I got it working! One extra thing is in the MAME general config (hit tab) you also need to program the “UI Cancel” option. It starts out as ESC, but you need to set it to both player buttons so it performs the escape-to-emulationstation functionality.

Thank you for helping me with your findings Thex – helped a lot.

I’m curious…what is it that xarcadetojoystick does if it’s not setting this up?

thanks,
Scott

[thex]

I don’t know. It did work for all of the emulators, except mame and it disabled the trackball. Doing it this way fixed everything for me.

Glad it is working for you!

[Scott Nath]

FYI…I got two sets of x-arcades working for a total of four players at once!

I open sourced what I put together:
https://github.com/scottnath/retropie-with-dual-x-arcades

thanks again for your help

scott

[mack505]

[quote=82745]I got it working! One extra thing is in the MAME general config (hit tab) you also need to program the “UI Cancel” option. It starts out as ESC, but you need to set it to both player buttons so it performs the escape-to-emulationstation functionality.

Thank you for helping me with your findings Thex – helped a lot.

I’m curious…what is it that xarcadetojoystick does if it’s not setting this up?

thanks,
Scott

[/quote]

Thanks Scott! This helped me as well. Question: Can you use 2 keys together for the UI Cancel in the mame config menu?

[Scott Nath]

@mack505 – I never attempted a dual-key setting.

[Anonymous]

Hello guys and many thanks to you for putting this all together.
I’m up and running almost perfectly now.

Only two problems.

1. I can’t get the exit emulator thing going at all. I’ve edited the to lines as described in the document. But it doesn’t work. Any suggestions?

2. My xarcade seems to not be working at random times. Sometimes it works from startup and sometimes I have to reconnect it. And sometimes I even have to reboot the whole raspi. Plz help
My arcade cabinet won’t be very nice if I have to open the whole thing up every time I start it up.

Please help me you gurus of the Internet

[Scott Nath]

alloca,

I don’t have any suggestions for exiting the emulator, sorry.

For the non-working x-arcade – are you using the default set of keys, or did you use a keyboard to change the keys.

If you changed the button layout, remember that with the x-arcade you need to click the button on the back of the box off and on to set it to the new settings every time the x-arcade loses power. It’s a weird quirk of those joysticks…

[Author]

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