Joysticks for the CPC - The Good, The Bad and the Ugly

[Shaun M. Neary]

I was a cruiser guy as well. But it was the blue one with the red handle and the white buttons. It was later succeeded with two models, the full black one and the multi coloured green, pink and yellow one which was an utter horror to look at.

Still trying to track down a blue one. I kinda miss it. It was great for playing Renegade with cos you could just stick it to the table with the suction cups and move with your left hand and free your right hand to use the 3 attack keys and it felt like playing an arcade game. Couldn't do that with a Speedking, that's for certain!

[tjohnson]

I was a cruiser guy as well. But it was the blue one with the red handle and the white buttons. It was later succeeded with two models, the full black one and the multi coloured green, pink and yellow one which was an utter horror to look at.

Still trying to track down a blue one. I kinda miss it. It was great for playing Renegade with cos you could just stick it to the table with the suction cups and move with your left hand and free your right hand to use the 3 attack keys and it felt like playing an arcade game. Couldn't do that with a Speedking, that's for certain!

I have a black cruiser, the green pink and yellow one is to much for me. Never seen a blue one though so maybe they are quite rare, if that is the case probably find the eBay sellers will want 99 quid boxed or something.

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[Shaun M. Neary]

I have a black cruiser, the green pink and yellow one is to much for me. Never seen a blue one though so maybe they are quite rare, if that is the case probably find the eBay sellers will want 99 quid boxed or something.

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I'm under the impression that the blue one was first, because the stick was modelled slightly differently for the black and multicoloured ones. The blue one also didn't have the second port for Spectrums. Just standard 9pin port.

[VincentGR]

And some Tomahawk/Pacman porn.
Micro switches is the only way 

[rave_dj]

Telemach 200 is the only way to go 

[gaos74]

My 2 beasts.

Pacman on the left (80s) and custom build on the right (last month):

[Flonky_Tash]

I've always liked using the Quickshot QS-128F or "Maverick 1". I think it's a fairly decent non-micro-switched device that's quite robust and mine has been able to survive several years of Daley Thompson waggling.


(Yeah, I know, that last remark there sounds filthy)

[Shaun M. Neary]

I've always liked using the Quickshot QS-128F or "Maverick 1". I think it's a fairly decent non-micro-switched device that's quite robust and mine has been able to survive several years of Daley Thompson waggling.


(Yeah, I know, that last remark there sounds filthy)

Whatever about waggling Daley Thompson 
But it's a godsend of a stick for Hypersports and Combat School as well. 😃

[Flonky_Tash]

Whatever about waggling Daley Thompson 
But it's a godsend of a stick for Hypersports and Combat School as well. 😃

It also has two connectors, which I guess was used for the Amiga, as a lot of games were picky about which joystick port to use. So with this one you could plug both connectors in and just use the switch instead of swapping the ports. But enough about Amigas, they piss me off.

[Shaun M. Neary]

It also has two connectors, which I guess was used for the Amiga, as a lot of games were picky about which joystick port to use. So with this one you could plug both connectors in and just use the switch instead of swapping the ports. But enough about Amigas, they piss me off.

Actually it's a player 1 / player 2 switch for non simultaneous games for systems like the plus machines, c64 and the Sega Megadrive.

[Flonky_Tash]

Actually it's a player 1 / player 2 switch for non simultaneous games for systems like the plus machines, c64 and the Sega Megadrive.

Oh right  . That makes more sense haha. To be fair I never actually used that function myself, I just took an educated guess.

[Shaun M. Neary]

Oh right  . That makes more sense haha. To be fair I never actually used that function myself, I just took an educated guess.

Only got one of those sticks last year so learned it myself. Actually quite useful really. 

[Flonky_Tash]

Only got one of those sticks last year so learned it myself. Actually quite useful really. 

It's a useful joystick in general really, as you can switch between, Sega, Amstrad, MSX, Atari and Commodore. So it's great if you have multiple machines. But I guess that was fairly common too. Don't see that nowadays, can't use an xbox pad on a playstation, for example. Not that I'd want to anyway, I dislike modern consoles.

[tjohnson]

So it was my birthday, after a day in the office and spending some time with the kids eating cake I decided I would finish off my joystick.  All complete, I used the wire from a bust JY-2 to give it an authentic look.  Works like a dream and so much more responsive than some of the joysticks from back in the day.  Both fire buttons act as fire 1.

[LambdaMikel]

Looks great!  Would love to play Fruity Frank or Sorcery with it. 

[||C|-|E||]

It definitely looks extremely professional!

[tjohnson]

It definitely looks extremely professional!

Thanks, the box was very nice quality and looks great.  I would have preferred to make the buttons independent but the cable I used only supported the primary button.  I could make a couple more up if anyone was interested but the issue is getting cables, I salvaged one from a broken JY-2 joystick but its not something I have a ready supply of.

[Lazy Dude]

They are standard D-sub connectors,  readily available on the net. Use a bit of multicore cabe, solder it up as the cpc manual shows you. No need to bucher any of those quality JY01's for the cable!
I am really liking that people are making their own joysticks, modern microswitches are miles better than the in period leaf contacts. Plus if you manage to break a switch in the joy, the micros are simple an cheap to replace.

[Skunkfish]

I've had a joystick project on the back burner for the last year or two. I have the stick, buttons (enough for Fire 1 & 2 and an additional UP). I've got a 'megadrive joypad extension cable' for a few quid off eBay which should hopefully do for wiring it up. I just need a nice case and some time to build it

[tjohnson]

My main reason for salvaging the lead from another joystick was to get the stopper to hold the lead in place between the two parts of the case and make it look more oem.  The jy1/2 joysticks are pretty terrible, ok they are original equipment but anyone still using one is suffering unnecessarily!

They are standard D-sub connectors,  readily available on the net. Use a bit of multicore cabe, solder it up as the cpc manual shows you. No need to bucher any of those quality JY01's for the cable!
I am really liking that people are making their own joysticks, modern microswitches are miles better than the in period leaf contacts. Plus if you manage to break a switch in the joy, the micros are simple an cheap to replace.

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[Lazy Dude]

I remember suffering unnecessarily back in the day! But only so 2 joys could be plugged in . For 1 player I used a cheetah 125+ though as a child how I managed with such chunky grips I have no idea! And then there was the shit autofire that did not work 

[Lazy Dude]

I've had a joystick project on the back burner for the last year or two. I have the stick, buttons (enough for Fire 1 & 2 and an additional UP). I've got a 'megadrive joypad extension cable' for a few quid off eBay which should hopefully do for wiring it up. I just need a nice case and some time to build it

Sanwa or seimitsu? I like the elephant logo, so I use Sanwa!

[tjohnson]

Sanwa or seimitsu? I like the elephant logo, so I use Sanwa!

My joystick uses sanwa.  I have a home built arcade machine which i use il joysticks of the bat type, i prefer these to the sanwa as they are a little firmer in the hand .  The buttons are gold leaf concave arcade buttons, they arent microswitched which i prefer for the buttons.  I bought the stuff from arcadeworlduk.

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[Skunkfish]

Sanwa or seimitsu? I like the elephant logo, so I use Sanwa!

Lets call it 'Sanwa compatible'. I doubt it's genuine for the price I paid!

[tjohnson]

This is the joystick I used


https://www.arcadeworlduk.com/products/Sanwa-JLF-TP-8YT-Ball-Top-Joystick.html - I desoldered the 5pin connector and attached the wires directly


There are the buttons


https://www.arcadeworlduk.com/products/Gold-Leaf-Arcade-Button.html


This is the enclosure


http://cpc.farnell.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=10001&langId=69&urlRequestType=Base&partNumber=EN83645&storeId=10180