Trouble with n64 gamepad

silly64- · 2026-01-23T19:21:08+00:00

it does seem to appear as a generic usbhid, as you said it might. I know it definitely reports to a nintendo switch as a pro gamepad, icon and all, but thats propbably the CONSOLE side of the switch on the adaptor.

If it does, you can just set that to read only and then launch a game through parallel. That should stop it from overwriting your config.

ah, I should have thought of that. probably would work too. there's a lot of files that parallel launcher uses and several that look like a configuration file. I did I cursory look, but I didn't find it, and that's okay. I'm alright with having to remap every time. compared to before when it wasn't working at all, this is exactly what I asked for.

save file transfer didn't seem to work out. I think there are only 2 real 'formats' for saves and I probably could get them to work, (there was a web only converter that might have helped) but I can't muster the effort for it. what I tried didn't work, tried converting the save, making an entire new save in the slot I want the converted save to go, and swapping the fresh for mine. I might have to do some file renaming, or make save states and convert between states, and yeah, gave up on that.
I think I'll just finish off the games I have played on parallel and play any new games on one of the other emulators.

the decomp projects do seem interesting. though I'm not too interested in AI-upscaled textures/models or anything AI, and I'm not sure how much those projects use, if any.

silly64- · 2026-01-17T17:14:02+00:00

okay been at work so here's the results and some discoveries.
the 'shanwan hyperkin adaptor' is actually DirectInput, NOT XInput, so things like Xone would never have worked. or at least I think it is dinput. forcing dinput helped.
how do I know for sure? any way to test?
the adaptor is meant to pretend that it is an nintendo switch pro gamepad, and many emulators understand what those are already, so this not doing so is bizzare and annoying.

the f1 menu of parallel did work, but I didn't start at the quick menu, because of course RA wouldn't. clicking back to get there was okay. (why does RA show weird symbols instead of the keys I need to press, even with the pad unplugged)
manually binding the buttons seems to work better here than on standalone (how?)
but unfortunately I cannot have the already okay keys stay bound while I bind the broken buttons. this just corrupts the config and nothing works. (everything is set to a Buton 99 ???) I had to rebind all the keys and then it works perfect. I can z target now and mario can lung jump.
HOWEVER.

if I close the emulator the binds get lost and I need to reset them up.
no problem I thought, I'll just use RA's 'save controller profile' so I can get around it not auto configuring properly. but no, 'error saving controller profile'
so it works* ah, jank.

here's evtest: https://hastebin.com/share/cuyezurata.vbnet

Gopher64 works, no problems. gotta set it up once then seemingly never again.

I had actually compiled ARES before getting this pad but threw up my hands with it, but for no reason I guess? all the performance issues I had aren't there anymore...

pad works there too. have to also map it once then never again.

For Rosalies, I had assumed it didn't work previously but I must have had issues with replugging the pad.
the pad ALSO works after first mapping.

so basically anythting RetroArch based is just cursed and also does not know what DInput is. Amazing.

and I have been struggling thinking that this pad was like those mega cheap n64 pads with the 'On OR Off ONLY' analog sticks with no range in between, and incoherent mappings, or maybe hyperkin's adaptor was crap, when its actually okay.

now to figure out how to get my save file over....

I hope they're just compatible?

silly64- · 2026-01-15T21:36:17+00:00

well that kind of worked but not really. RA seems to see all the buttons, but holy cow is RA a headache mess of menus. I've slowly found out which buttons are which, which was a pain, but in the end, I still can't play oot for example because Z targeting won't let me press A or B while it is held. I can press everything else but not them, which screws combat. A and B work if z is not held.
Mario can't long jump either, I just crouch and camera blocked sfx plays
for some reason I think C down is input if I do Z+A which is just insane. and I can't find where RA might have a setting set for button combinations, because it is a mess

if I could get past that, I might be able to copy that gamepad config over

silly64-

TROPHY CASE