Date:	Fri, 9 May 1997 14:30:49 -0400
From:	Bryan Murphy <bryan AT hcst DOT com>
Subject:	Re: Need Shawn's (or anybody's) advice on making joystick buffer...
To:	djgpp AT delorie DOT com
Message-ID:	<Pine.3.89.9705091454.B31537-0100000@alpha.hcst.com>
MIME-Version:	1.0

On 7 May 1997, Calvin French wrote:
> So how? I know that there is a keyboard interrupt that gets called 
> whenever a key is hit, but for the joy buffer all I can think to do is 
> have a little little routine which is polled, say, 5 or 10 times a sec 
> (how fast do i really 'spect people to be able to trigger, anyways?) 
> and the compare states, then pushing any change of states onto the joy 
> buffer, basically. Does this sound like the right approach? It's sort 
> of an odd thing, I know, but it will simplify SF2-style combos...

I'll tell you what, you want to poll it fast.  It takes 30 frames 
per second animation for something to appear smooth to the human eye, but 
it usually takes about 60 frames per second to feel smooth.  What I mean 
is, when you have a game checking everything 60 times per second 
(including keyboard, joystick, etc.) it's going to feel a lot smoother 
and react a lot quicker.  Also, my friends and I used to timer ourselves 
years ago (we had a nintendo controller that could time our reactions).  
We usually were able to press the fire button between 12 and 15 times 
per second in short bursts, sometimes even faster.  My one friend is also 
about twice as fast as us because he can use two fingers and alternate 
them (something I've never been good at).  So, he could probably hit the 
button +20 per second if he wanted to.  You'd be surpised what people are 
capable of, especially when they've been playing high action fast reflex 
games for years.

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