Soldering an NES controller to a C64 and writing your own little demonstration program is the kind of above and beyond effort you just won't find on any other channel :D Great video!

You forgot to mention how you can also move the NES controller in the same direction that you're pressing on the D-pad in order to make your character go even faster. Every 80s kid knows this.

Would imagine this dudes "loose cable drawer" is more like a "loose cable room".

Ok. Wiring an nes controller to a c64 and showing it working was damn impressive.

It's so enjoyable to have answers to questions you had 30 years ago and stopped wondering about.

When I was in my early electrical engineering courses and I decided to use an NES controller to interface with, I was surprised at how simple it was. That got me down the road of building my own 8 bit video game system on a xylinx fpga.

Take a shot every time he writes a program in basic to demonstrate how the controller works.

You've given me something to watch during my free time at school, as I have limited options on restricted mode. Thank you.

Not only *how* they work in general, but a demonstration of how to make them work on a specific piece of retro hardware -- very cool!!

Legend says you can press all 4 buttons on the D-pad at the same time.

9:40 "you can only physically push 1 directional button at a time" you mean "2" directional buttons at a time.

Edit: Based on some replies, I assume the thing he said about Genesis controllers damaging Atari/Commodore consoles was just speculation. I'm glad to hear that people have tried it and didn't have their consoles blow up. 👍

I never really thought about the number of pins on some controllers, until now! This was way more interesting than I could've ever imagined!

When I was little, my dad made a homebrew "joystick" for our ZX Spectrum using a soap box and 4 microswitches on the bottom, so it was essentially a mouse that you had to tilt instead of moving. It worked way better than cheap stick-type joysticks available at the time.

I love how simple the early controllers are from a hardware perspective. There something poetic about restrictions like this for how it influences creativity.

3:30 - That's genuinely terrifying.

Thank you 8-Controller Guy

You can press two directions at once, i.e up+left. It's an 8-direction controller.

This is great. I am going to show this in my High School Electrical Engineering class.

Great Scott! Those NES extension cable plugs looks like the ones on the high voltage cable Dr Brown used in Back To The Future!

You should do an episode sometime on how fastload cartridges worked. It still baffles me that such a serious flaw with the disk drive could be fixed using something that just plugs right into the back of the computer.

Look, my favorite youtuber has uploaded!

Paddle POT input is also how things like the Koala Pad and other drawing tablets worked. The digital joystick inputs on the Atari are also used for mice & trackballs, as well as the keyboard controller. They're I/O ports (not *just* input), so that's how you can get 12 buttons to work, per port! The output functionality is also used for multijoy devices. (I *just* got one that plugs into the two controller ports of my Atari 8-bit, and up to 8 joysticks!)

Love the effort to really demonstrate how these work. I remember hearing the mega drive pad was bad for the Amiga but I never knew why...

Discrete logic NES -> Atari adapters do exist, even far back in the day. They can be accomplished fairly easily with a single 555 timer and an inverted-latch, effectively replicating exactly what the NES already did internally.

I totally love that you've nicknamed joypads as "flat game controllers". I need to start using that term! :D

Brilliant! I'm almost jealous, when I tinkered with an nes controller, there was no online datasheets or anything! heck there wasn't even an online!

This is my favorite type of video from you, David; you're great at explaining how things work. The NES controller proof of concept was especially wonderful. Great stuff!

*Sees title, thinks it's a simple video. *Watches video, jaw drops.

Great video but you were wrong with the genesis/mega drive controller description. Select is not a button, in fact it is an input to the controller which allows you to switch between the buttons you want to read. In its default state (select being high) you can read U,D,L,R plus B and C like you would on the master system controller. This is for backwards compatibility with software and hardware between the two. If you ground the select line, it will change the controller state and allow you to read A and Start, whilst also grounding the L and R directions. So to read all buttons, you'd read the controller data with select high, then flip select low and you would see the second set of button data required. You could do this much the same like you did with the NES pad. The 6 button pad works much the same but if you read the controller 3 times in quick succession, on the 4th read you'll have XYZ and Mode on the button inputs instead. Whilst I'm not going to argue that it could cause problems with the C64, it wouldnt damage it as the 5V would only set Select to be high and thus you'd only see the B and C buttons. Im not sure if the controller would function right as it expects power on pin 5 but without testing i wouldnt know. And this is all from experience from reading many controllers to get them to work on other consoles or arcade game boards!

I have never seen such a good intro/outro! I just love it, the way it does that weird code stuff is so cool! The video was really entertaining as well!

After watching this, I’ve decided to subscribe. You put a lot of effort into your videos and I haven’t seen something like this done before.

Having already taken all my old controllers apart as a kid I knew most of this ... but I always find something new to learn from watching your videos. Huzzah!

Huge respect for you, just for the fact that you go to such lengths to show the concepts so clearly and make such great content. Take a bow, Sir.

It's been a while since your last video and I'm glad you're back. Thank you for making these.

I just saw this on my feed, which is amazing considering I've been thinking about working on my own Your videos are honestly fascinating and I find them helpful as someone who would like to understand electronics better. Thank you!

Very cool! I love watching your videos because I get to learn how these things work! Thanks!

4:23 Holy crap, the "Top Gun" Thrustmaster! For a lot of us, that was the first time we got to use a "real" flightstick because it was the first Thrustmaster released that was

Great video, never knew this. Very informative. Please go on touching new different subjects like this! And a merry Christmas to you and the family,

Neat, I've been working on a USB interface for SNES controllers myself using this same information lately.

8-Bit Guy , was/are you ever a School Teacher? i would have listened and learned from you, as you are perfect at explaining everything in easy to understand instructions! Many thanks from me in the U.K

Waiting for "How Modern Game Controllers Work"

I love this channel with all of the vintage computers! I was growing up as these came out and it was great fun to play all of these machines when I was a kid! Thanks for keeping memories alive!

love watching your videos they help me with all kind of issues. You and LGR are my go to for all knowledge

I haven't given a thought about these controllers until now. Interesting video 👌🏽

@0:30 *WOW...be careful where you point that thing!*

As always, brilliant video...you are one of my favorite youtubers...

Dude I love these videos, they're so chilling, but you still can learn a ton of things from them.

fantastic episode! see you on the next one!

“I wrote a little proof of concept program...” aaaaaaaaand my head explodes

this is the kind of effort id like to see on every video i watch on youtube! this is one of a kind!

This man made a whole adapter for the video. Also on top of that a video that kept my attention even though I don’t under stand some of the stuff he’s talking about you’ve got my sub!

When I was a kid I missed my zaper gun into a mouse so that when Impressed the trigger it would click. Ruined a mouse and a zaper gun but it worked.

10 minutes of 8 bit guy amazingness! :)

Thanks for the great video. This reminded me of something I did in 87 to connect a piano toy I disassembled to an ATARI 800XL. I used the two joystick ports to read the key presses in the piano and wrote a program to play the correct note. A good experiment you might want to try. Of course, there are not enough entry signals for a chromatic octave.

Very good video. I always wondered how it worked with the system. Never knew each pin was a direction or function. Keep up the great work. Very good channel.

And a good day to you too, Mr. 8-Bit Guy.

I like to smoke one and watch your very cool and in-depth videos. I appreciate all the research presented and nice shots.

You deserve so much recognition for this well put together video.

Very nicely done! I especially liked your adaptor and demonstration :)

That was really interesting - but how does a 6-button Genesis controller work? Also I remember using my Genesis controller on my C64 back in the day, I'm glad I never hit the start button!

Great video! Will you explain how a four-score NES adapter works in the next episode?

Amazing video, it's always crazy to see how much you know about the old school systems and how they work.

As usual great video man! Loved the NES gamepad experiment.

Today I received an NES classic. My brother and I got it for Christmas.

I used a Genesis control on my 2600 for years. Good thing I’ve never touched select. But you can get some really high scores in Taz with the d-pad over the clunky joystick.

The adapter in the end was awesome! Worth watching the video just for that!

This was such a great presentation, and I've watched many people do this type of stuff.

Only time I've ever soldered anything was when hacking a controller so gotta respect this video.

Sega Genesis controllers work fine on Atari 8-bit computers. I've been using them on my Atari 800XL for 25 years. As a matter of fact, many homebrew games support them. I've also used them for years without issue on my Amiga 500.

This was way too cool. My first video here but will def delve into more of them!

This was honestly a lot more interesting / in-depth than I expected going in - very well done.

*gasp* we used our genesis controller on a c64 so many times, how did we not fry the thing. 😐

@9:40 : You can only press 1 direction? Then how did we do Diagonal in many NES games, where you'd push Up+Left, or Up+Right, etc?

This is awesome. I don’t know much about the inner working of how the things we grew up with works. So this definitely fulfills that curiosity. Hope to see a video on how the modern controllers operate!

Best youtube video I have seen, ever. If I had money, I'd patreon you. Thank you so much.

The NES controller is a legend in and of itself. It stood up to abuse due to a lost game, better than any other!

THE NES CONTROLLERS CHANGED EVERYTHING. The change was completely revolutionary.

MORE OF THESE PLEASE. Seriously. As much as I like your other stuff... THIS is very fascinating. How things work, and why they do what they did. How they interact with other components to make the small part of a bigger whole, function. That is some quality content.

I was planning on making a NES zapper wireless via bluetooth and your video just saved me a ton of work thank you!!

TI-99/4A would have been interesting. It read 2 joysticks on 1 9 pin connector.

I had to laugh after he pulled it out at 0:29

Your video reminded me of a project I did in high school in the mid-1980s. I bought Timex-Sinclair 2068 that had a Atari style game port. The Macintosh had just come out and wanted a mouse for my Timex-Sinclair. So I took apart an Atari joystick and discovered there just five switches. After discovering how simple the joystick worked, I went to Radio shack and bought four switches, and some wire. At a hobby shop, I bought some sheet plastic and assembled a "mouse" for Timex-Sinclair. Also, your video inspired to create an "Atari" joystick for the Raspberry Pi. Thanks for an excellent video.

Been waiting for this video for a long time, awesome!!

Aw, you only skimmed over the ColecoVision controller, that was my first console. It's fine though, I can tell you how the "joysticks" on those things really work: Through positive thought and an unrelenting death grip. They have almost no travel and are stiff as hell, they're literally half of the challenge and half the experience of playing Coleco games.

Wow the 500 XJ Epyx, great joystick I had one for my Amstrad. Ah you showed an A600, I had the HD version got an ram upgrade, and a 40MB HDD (cost me $AU350!) early 2000's

Your videos are amazing, thanks for your job.

I am writing to you from the future year of 2021 to say that this fellow's voice is absolutely perfect for explaining how technology works. Crisp, excellent enunciation, not overly complicated sentences.

This is a content creator. Not some dude streaming their GTA5

Wait, what about the third button on the Genesis controller? I'm guessing that one goes on the unused pin?

It’s also possible to wire up an NES controller from the inside using a standard 9 pin cable from an Atari joystick. I did this a long while back and posted the simple schematic on Aminet somewhere. I did it just because some games I were playing were more comfortable with the controller.

@0:11 The joystick at the lower left is the one I have. Wonderful joystick. No leaf spring contacts, this one has industrial microswitches, and a stainless steel reinforcing rod in the stick. Built very solid. Practically indestructible. The only downside is it is a right hand control, although they also made a left hand version as well if you asked for it. Was no problem until I got a left handed GF. She was able to use it but it was clumsy for her because she couldn't grip it as well.

if you and a buddy each had an Amiga, would you be Amiga Amigos?

That is very interesting. I am impressed that you made adapters and even demo showcases. I learned something new. Yes I would like a follow up with how modern USB controllers work, but I know it is not material for 8-bit

very educative video as usual! many thanks from Chile

AHHH ,the good old MS Sidewinder joystick days.

Input. more input. NEED MORE INPUT!

Another great video. Thanks for the early holiday present.

I love your channel man You are so informative man Thanks for the information

The SNES controller works perfectly for DS games. Well, except for the touchscreen.