Dr.Agons' Really Big Project Thread!

[Dr.Agon]

Well yeah, I'm just wondering if this has any advantages over something like the GBP.

Probably only that the "I did this myself, so suck on it and be jealous" -factor is thru the roof.

[Dr.Agon]

OK, this is pretty badass!  Any chance of a little how-to on this bad boy?   I'd LOVE to make one of these for myself

ok this is the internet, cant tell if u serious or not,

...game boy player?

not to knock your work or anything, I just don't see the point in it

I would wager it's just to use the awesome one-off joystick

this

Well yeah, I'm just wondering if this has any advantages over something like the GBP.

also gbp cant play every gb/gbc/gba game, this can.

did a lot of thinking about how to play gb/gba at home, i dont do much traveling, occasionally to the city for comics and games, but on the whole i stay at home, so handhelds dont come out that often. seriously looked into super gameboy and gameboy player, just decided id like a standalone solution, plus using the gamecube controller for gba games would feel v. weird

Well yeah, I'm just wondering if this has any advantages over something like the GBP.

Probably only that the "I did this myself, so suck on it and be jealous" -factor is thru the roof.

LOL!, nah i would never think like that!

[Dr.Agon]

What games can the GB Player not play?

afaik, the only games that don't play are the GBA Video carts. I wouldn't want to play any of those on a TV anyhow, they'd look pretty damn awful.

GBPlayer has actual GBA hardware in it after all...
...Again, not dissing your work or anything, it's great work and that arcade style controller is pretty badass, but yeah. Not exactly something I'd care to do for myself.

im not an expert on the gbplayer, afaik the games with the tilt controller are unplayable, simply due to the way the cart is orientated, and would you like to pick up your gc to tilt it around??
boktai might not be playable either, how would the sunlight sensor pick up the sunlight?
again never owned or plan on owning a gbplayer so i could be wrong on these...
...ok its only a handful of games, most of which i dont plan on buying, but still...

thought about getting one of those hori pads for the wii, too damn expensive!!

[Dr.Agon]

ok this is the internet, cant tell if u serious or not,

Super duper serious, for real.


Also, for you guys that don't wanna build something like this, you could build something like these guys do.  I've been considering make something like this for myself for a while now.

http://shadaloo.eu/

i guess you're serious then!, from the link i take it you only want the stick?

ok lets pretend you know nothing about controllers, if you open up a control pad and look at the place where the buttons would press on you'll see a pair of contacts seperated by a small gap, when you press on the button contact is made between these 2 points and the appropriate action is performed in game, when i went to wire in the GBA stick each button on the stick needed to be wired to these pads seperatly, no daisy chaining inside the gba or i got miss controls or no control at all, took a bit of trial and error, but thats what i ended up with..

Cheaper alternative to the horipads is :

Retroport + genuine SNES pad

for the wii you could just do a gamecube pad hack, thats what i did for my wii arcade stick, (which needs a new/better case)

[Dr.Agon]

im not an expert on the gbplayer, afaik the games with the tilt controller are unplayable, simply due to the way the cart is orientated, and would you like to pick up your gc to tilt it around??
boktai might not be playable either, how would the sunlight sensor pick up the sunlight?
again never owned or plan on owning a gbplayer so i could be wrong on these...
...ok its only a handful of games, most of which i dont plan on buying, but still...

The tilt games *work*, but, as you said, not very practical.  Though, with all those cables coming out from that GBA unit, I'm not sure how easily they'd work in it. Cheesy

Boktai games work just fine in the Game Boy Player.  In fact, they work better, if you happen to be a vampire or other sun-fearing creature.  Apparently, a typical TV remote (or such) that uses IR will trick the light sensor into thinking it is in sunlight.

The GBA Videos won't play (supposedly due to licensing reasons), but that's no huge loss. Wink

[Dr.Agon]

What games can the GB Player not play?

afaik, the only games that don't play are the GBA Video carts. I wouldn't want to play any of those on a TV anyhow, they'd look pretty damn awful.

GBPlayer has actual GBA hardware in it after all...
...Again, not dissing your work or anything, it's great work and that arcade style controller is pretty badass, but yeah. Not exactly something I'd care to do for myself.

im not an expert on the gbplayer, afaik the games with the tilt controller are unplayable, simply due to the way the cart is orientated, and would you like to pick up your gc to tilt it around??
boktai might not be playable either, how would the sunlight sensor pick up the sunlight?

Wario Ware Twisted works fine if you don't mind twisting the whole console! 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZZ2zBtsKtFU
(looks like a blast actually... I might have to get this game and try this myself!)

Boktai probably isn't playable without like, sitting outside with your 'cube or something, but on the other hand, I doubt it's playable with what you have setup either. (Short of using Unclebob's IR remote suggestion.)

like i said, its a few games

i agree about boktai, probably not gonna work so well unless you phisically go outside, i read an interview once where the developer basically said that's why the sun sensor was added, so you'd have to go outside rather than sitting in you'r darkend room!

[Dr.Agon]

Also, there's a minority of GBA games that actually have some minor enhancements and features via the GBPlayer. Drill Dozer for example will actually trigger the rumble motors in a regular Gamecube controller.

cool! didnt know that they'd done stuff like that!

drill dozer: i was so hyped about that game when i first read about it, but afaik it never made it to europe?

[Dr.Agon]

A GBP and one of those Hori controllers is definetly the way to go. Bought one of those a few years back CIB for $30. Glad I did!

And I can pretty much play anyhting you want. Yeah, its definetly not always practical, but I had some fun playing Kirby Tilt N' Tumble with a buddy. It was like a co-op mode, I held the Gamecube and he used the controller! It was pretty fun actually!

[Dr.Agon]

A GBP and one of those Hori controllers is definetly the way to go. Bought one of those a few years back CIB for $30. Glad I did!

And I can pretty much play anyhting you want. Yeah, its definetly not always practical, but I had some fun playing Kirby Tilt N' Tumble with a buddy. It was like a co-op mode, I held the Gamecube and he used the controller! It was pretty fun actually!

cost of second GC, GBP and hori controller would be too high, and i wanted a standalone solution (not having to rely on a GC), is why i did it this way. gba convertor cost £40 maybe, whole thing £50-ish

when i was researching this i SERIOUSLY considerd hacking a GC with a WODE or similar to have a disc-less GBP and turning it into some kind of console looking thing!

[Dr.Agon]

promised these, then forgot about it!



this is the stick closed, the A B L and R buttons are Seimetsu 30mm, the stick is also a Seimetsu, the other 2 are Happ, the one with the man icon is start and the other is select



inside the box, we'll call one of those thick wires "ground" and the other "signal", in order to perform an action the signal and ground need to make a connection, so each button needs a signal and ground wire,





note 2 wires each. in a previous post i explained that inside the GBA each button needed to be connected to signal and ground seperatly, but i had already tried connecting the grounds together, this would have meant only one thick wire coming from the GBA to the stick, however this didnt work, so i had to add another wire to carry the grounds,

close up of the joystick connections.



all buttons and sticks were supplied by gremlin solutions here in the UK, but any good arcade supplier should have them,

the box was just a cheap wooden one bought off ebay for another project,

the kirby art was taken off of the internet thanks to google image search, covered with a clear film and glued on,

no internal shots of the GBA side, so youll just have to wait until i update my Wii/Gamecube padhack!

[Dr.Agon]

just thought id revive this thread a little, if anyone wants me to build them a gba console, PM me!

[Dr.Agon]

Do you have a few more pics of the finished console? How do you have it going to the tv?

the tv converter has a wire coming out, s-video and composite video with the red and white audio plugs.

I'd like to see a finished product as well.  Is it possible to house the GBA on the underside?  The pics I saw were kind of ugly and not something I'd want to be using. 

if someone where to commission me to build one they would have the final say on looks, obviously im happy with what ive done for myself, but everyone is different.

[Dr.Agon]

and what sort of price would a commision like this cost?

no idea!, as a guide the tv converter would cost around £60, thats to get it in my hands, after that it would depend on what controls you wanted, what if any housing you wanted, etc.
£100 maybe?

[Dr.Agon]

Tv converters available on eBay for £25 plus uk post.

I'm quite interested in having one with a snes controller in some kind of custom shell (maybe an external hard disk shell, like icy box or something, with a custom decal),  but couldn't stretch to that kind of money for what would essentially be a novelty item for me.  I do think what you've done is great though!

[Dr.Agon]

theres a guy in the US selling them, which is where i got mine from and would get any others from, comes to like £40, then you have to factor in import duty, so i think £60 would be about right, obviously if i could get that part cheaper, £31 (25 + p&p), then the total cost would be about £60-75