I've been making game controllers for other systems a lot recently. I successfully made new controllers for the ColecoVision, the Neo Geo AES, the Atari 8 bit family and the C64. (I also have a design for the CD32 that's just waiting on some components. I need to bundle up a big order with Mouser).
With all that experience under my belt, I thought about the CreatiVision solutions I had done in the past and it occurred to me that it really wouldn't be too hard to adapt the work done on the replacement membrane PCBs to be a workable standalone controller...
So I got to work on it. As large amounts were "cut'n'paste", and I'm much better at this stuff these days, it came together remarkably quickly.
The first decision was how to handle the directional pad. after thinking about it I realised it was just a conductive disk that pushes down onto a conductive surface. I designed a system that used rubber washers as the return mechanism and scribbled out a design.
It looked like I could make it so I proceeded to the design phase. It took a little while to get everything in place, but with a combination of CorelDRAW and KiCAD, it came out like this:
I still need to design the upper and lower laser cut panels, but to be honest, they'll be done after I have assembled the first prototype, and I can't afford a JLCPCB order this fortnight
Once they are in my hot sweaty hands, I'll give them a test and let you all know how they go.
Cheers!
Chesh
