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Request: remapping of ALL keys...what do you think?

 
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Jakobud
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 24, 2002 8:49 pm    Post subject: Request: remapping of ALL keys...what do you think? Reply with quote

First of all, let me tell you where I am coming from: I am trying to run Magic Engine in my custom built arcade cabinet. All the joysticks and buttons are wired to a keyboard encoder. Basically, what is comes down to, is the fact that there is just not enough keyboard keys that Magic Engine will allow to be mapped to controller buttons... Lets pretend that I had 5 controllers wired to the keyboard encoder. Each one would require 15 inputs inorder to fully take advantage of Magic Engine (according to the config layout in the UI). That's 75 total inputs. But Magic Engine only allows you to remap about 35-40 buttons. You can't remap the number buttons, numpad buttons, function keys, and several other misc. keys. Now, obviously, I don't need 15 inputs per Magic Engine controller. Just like about 8 each (4 for the joystick, and 4 for 2 buttons, select, start).

Anyways, my request is simple: allow us to remap EVERY key and every function that is available. Magic Engine is an excellent emulator. It does it's thing very well. But us power users are a bit limited in areas like what I just described. I mean, for example, I know that having the number keys mapped to turn certain sound channels on/off is probably a good thing for some people, but for me...i never ever need it. I would rather just have the ability to remap all 10 number buttons to keys I can actually use and not worry about turning sound channels on/off. Same goes for all the stuff with the function keys and the number pad.

If you want a VERY good example of another emulator that has this type of thing going, check out VirtualNES: http://virtuanes.s1.xrea.com/ The website is in Japanese, but just download the English version of it there. Anyways, the emulator has this one Shortcut Keys window, where you can redefine every single function of the emulator with any key you want. And the functions that you don't care to use, you can just leave them blank so you don't have to worry about them. It's a really good example of the way it should be done. The only other emulator that I've seen that come close is ZSnes. You can remap quite a few functions of its.

Anyways, to the developer, is there any way you would consider adding in this sort of support into v1.0? Is it difficult to implement?

jakobud
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dmichel
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PostPosted: Mon Jun 24, 2002 10:48 pm    Post subject: Re: Request: remapping of ALL keys...what do you think? Reply with quote

You can unlock more keys in MagicEngine by changing a few options in the pce.ini file : 'numpad', 'numkeys' and 'ctrlkeys'. Smile
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David Michel
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ebola
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PostPosted: Tue Jul 09, 2002 4:10 pm    Post subject: Re: Request: remapping of ALL keys...what do you think? Reply with quote

I fully agree with Jakobud here. I have an arcade PC cabinet with a Hotrod SE controller (From www.hanaho.com) . Unfortunately, the buttons on the controller are hard mapped to certain keys including LCtrl, LAlt which can't be mapped (from the GUI at least). Thus, I can only use the right control stick and buttons for play. I emailed the author on this but never heard back.

It''s nice to know that certain keys can be added or mapped via the pce.ini file, but this is something that should be able to be configured via the GUI. (IMO At least)

Other than that, awesome work, I absolutely love the Emu!

For more information on the mapping of the Hotrod SE controls check out
http://hanaho.com/products/HotRodJoystick/faq.html

-Ebola
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dmichel
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PostPosted: Wed Jul 10, 2002 12:13 pm    Post subject: Re: Request: remapping of ALL keys...what do you think? Reply with quote

ebola wrote:
I fully agree with Jakobud here. I have an arcade PC cabinet with a Hotrod SE controller (From www.hanaho.com) . Unfortunately, the buttons on the controller are hard mapped to certain keys including LCtrl, LAlt which can't be mapped (from the GUI at least).


Hmm, you can use LCtrl and LAlt keys, those are the default keys that MagicEngine uses for button I and II.

Quote:

Thus, I can only use the right control stick and buttons for play. I emailed the author on this but never heard back.


I'm a busy author. Razz
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David Michel
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slizzap
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PostPosted: Tue Sep 10, 2002 8:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

These questions go out to David and you guys that are running this in an arcade cabinet. I'm running ArcadeOS in a modded arcade cabinet with a true arcade monitor frontending multiple emulators. I used Magic Engine back in a the day and it's absolutely incredible. I've been waiting to purchase ME because there isn't a new DOS version available and I'm running my programs through pure DOS (Win98 version). I ran into 2 major issues when I was looking into adding ME to my list of emulators: 1st being the remapping of keys issue, which I'll have too look into again after reading this thread, and 2nd being command line options.

Anyways, here are my 2 main questions:

Is it really possible to remap any keys? I purchased a HotRod myself and the buttons are pre-set to specific keys...but I moved the buttons around to accommodate a specific setup and I remember not being able to remap all the keys I needed.

Is a new DOS version due out soon? If not, what command line options are available in the Windows version? I could possibly have my PC boot into Windows and run ArcadeOS from there so that ME works, but it was my experience after testing the newer version of ME that it's a full fledged emulator with it's own front end. I recall not being able to load ROMs directly with a command line. You have to load up the emulator and select the the game from a list. In order to add this emulator to my list with the other emulators, it needs to be able to call and run a specific ROM through command line.

Anyone have any comments? Thanks for any help you guys can provide.

And to David - Excellent emulator! If I can get these 2 issues worked out I'll be a new customer.
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dmichel
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PostPosted: Fri Sep 13, 2002 1:35 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Is it really possible to remap any keys? I purchased a HotRod myself and the buttons are pre-set to specific keys...but I moved the buttons around to accommodate a specific setup and I remember not being able to remap all the keys I needed.


You can remap all the keys used by the HotRod gamepad, but you first need to change a few options in the pce.ini file, change 'numpad', 'numkeys' and 'ctrlkeys'. Everything should be ok after that.

Quote:
Is a new DOS version due out soon?


Not in a near future. ^^;

Quote:
If not, what command line options are available in the Windows version?


MagicEngine has minimal support for an external front end program, you can put the path of a ROM on the command line to run this ROM automaticaly, and when the emulator is started like that pressing the 'esc' key will exit the emulator instead of going to the menu screen.

Quote:
And to David - Excellent emulator! If I can get these 2 issues worked out I'll be a new customer.


Very Happy
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