Atari 2600 2 Button Controls

[Lordmonkus]

Have you ever played an Atari 2600 game and wished it had 2 buttons instead of 1 ?

Certain games such as HERO this would be extremely handy since most if not all of use controllers with multiple buttons.

Well there is a way to do this. First off you would need a hacked rom to make use of a 2nd button and those can be found over on the AtariAge forums here https://atariage.com/forums/topic/158430-rom-hacks-to-support-2-buttons-with-genesis-controllers/. Second,  you need an emulator that supports using a "Genesis" controller and for that you will need a stand alone version of Stella. The latest version of Stella as of the time of this post is 5.0.2 and is really good to have because a lot of the newer homebrew and rom hacks are starting to require a recent version. Unfortunately the Retroarch Stella core is not up to date and will not support this at all. Now the last thing you will need is to setup Stella to use the "Genesis" controller and bind the 2nd button and for that I will just point you to this short guide here: http://www.randomterrain.com/atari-2600-memories-batari-basic-commands.html#2buttons.

Now you can enjoy some 2 button goodness plaing Atari 2600 games.

[DOS76]

Now only if RA would keep up with Stella

[Lordmonkus]

Yeah for sure, I have posted over on their forums asking about it but it's the 2600 which most people seem to have very little interest in because of its age and primitive looks. The core appears to based on a pre 4.0 version of Stella which is extremely out dated but is perfectly functional for the basic and common usage.

[mothergoose729]

RA stella also doesn't support paddle controllers, which is a shame. 

[zorkiii]

On 10/21/2017 at 4:24 PM, lordmonkus said:

Yeah for sure, I have posted over on their forums asking about it but it's the 2600 which most people seem to have very little interest in because of its age and primitive looks. The core appears to based on a pre 4.0 version of Stella which is extremely out dated but is perfectly functional for the basic and common usage.

As someone who grew up playing the 2600 as a kid from its heyday, its hard for me to believe there would be little interest in it. There's a handful of games that are still really fun despite the machines limitations. But I have had a hard time convincing my 20 and early 30 something friends that the 2600 is cool or worth playing, I guess the experience is not quite the same for those who weren't there when it happened. 

Also this is cool regarding the two button solution, thanks for this!

[Lordmonkus]

Yeah I grew up on the 2600 and while I have nostalgic love for it, it really is tough to go back and play a great percentage of the games. Only a small selection of the games are still fun for me to go back and play.

I'm fairly certain the lack of real interest in it is because of its age and for a great percentage of people today it was not their first console. While it was popular it was no way near as popular as the NES.

[mothergoose729]

45 minutes ago, lordmonkus said:

Yeah I grew up on the 2600 and while I have nostalgic love for it, it really is tough to go back and play a great percentage of the games. Only a small selection of the games are still fun for me to go back and play.

I'm fairly certain the lack of real interest in it is because of its age and for a great percentage of people today it was not their first console. While it was popular it was no way near as popular as the NES.

I never played the atari 2600 on the real console, but a fair number of the games are great fun. I like frogs and flies, Kaboom, Circus Atari, Enduro,  Stampede, and Combat. The arcade ports are hard to get behind because  MAME is so much better, but the 2600 version of donkey kong isn't bad. I play on the original controllers with an adapter too, even though they are objectively terrible. 

Edited October 25, 2017 by mothergoose729

[Lordmonkus]

Here's my Atari 2600 playlist of the games I feel are the "Best of" but of course these are just my personal favourites looking back on it from a "today perspective". There are a couple of homebrew / rom hack improvements on there like Pac-Man.