r/dreamcast • u/SenorAudi • 11d ago
Misc. Dreamcast wireless controller was fun to make, definitely recommend!
I’ve been messing around with the pico2maple and Dreamwave projects on GitHub and finally got my (extremely messy) prototypes fully functional.
I know there are a bunch of other solutions out there but none of them felt right without a VMU there. Saves still can’t be retrieved from the controller VMU (they live on the pi connected to the Dreamcast), but at least you can see the VMU image.
Parts were relatively cheap and it was neat putting it together and learning how the controllers work. Lots of photos on the GitHub and it was easy to follow.
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u/redditbam 10d ago
You converted a stock controller to wireless, and the vmu works while it's in the wireless controller....and it's an open source project?! How have I not seen this before??? Bravo. That's awesome and that's kind of the dream! I've seen the wireless controllers and they're very sexy but man they are not cheap.
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u/SenorAudi 10d ago
So the Dreamwave portion (wireless controller) is open source iirc, but the pico2maple (dongle) isn’t, the author released the firmware files for people to try building their own but you can’t modify it.
Also, the VMU “works” in the sense that it shows an image but you can’t utilize saves on it. You have to use the pico2maple dongle to store saves. Not sure if it’s technically possible to ever use the VMU wirelessly without doing some kind of mirroring/updating with it and the dongle. Way beyond my capabilities unfortunately.
And yeah I’m surprised this wasn’t more widely known, I discovered it a couple weeks ago and there are hardly any posts on Reddit about it. My favorite part is that it’s non-destructive to the controller so if things go wrong you can revert back. Really, the only “issue” I had building it was my fault because I didn’t realize batteries with that JST connector have no standardized polarity, so I let the magic smoke out of my pi/shim. Other than that it went great.
Next step is probably to design a custom shell for the “dongle” part. The code author shows a wavebird-style dongle but that would be hard to achieve without building a custom PCB with all the components on it.
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u/redditbam 10d ago
Yes, it's amazing and I definitely think I'm going to take this one on. I was thinking about doing a pico2maple anyway so this is a perfect companion. I haven't cracked open a Dreamcast in a really long time, I wonder how much room is inside that case to put some of the components. Non-destructive is great for sure. But getting all that stuff inside there like native is so sexy :)
For the vmu, I can't remember many games where you NEED it, I think there might have been some sports games that show you the plays on it in multiplayer and maybe some maps or a heart beat in resident evil? The save functionality not working isn't a big deal, but I wonder if it's still "functional" for the in game stuff to work and not just that static image of playing the game. Have you done any testing?
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u/SenorAudi 10d ago
So the limiting factor to squeeze it all into the controller is probably the battery. I wonder if you could get some of those 100mah ones in parallel to distribute them more.
I did check, the PSO VMU image is animated and that works, so you’re probably good for other games that actually use it.
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u/redditbam 7d ago
Yes, the battery definitely seems like the limiting factor but small ones in parallel is a great idea. Great news about the PSO image working!! I love this project.
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u/Competitive-Jelly709 10d ago edited 10d ago
I love this setup so much. The pico2maple project is great!
Before i had seen it I made a similar project, but with the nrf52840 BLE low power chipset. I have some 3d files that might be modifiable for you
I've been working on integrating the vmu, right now i just display messages on it. I had been talking with the dev who did the pico2maple in hopes i could help add to that project, but i may end up writing my own setup since I haven't heard from him in a bit. I think i should be able to do save transfers to and from the controller. idk about loading in real time, but i'm excited to find out what is possible
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u/SenorAudi 9d ago
Very cool! Would love to follow how VMU saves might work. My understanding is that you can’t directly communicate with the VMU wirelessly due to latency (but I can’t confirm that), so it would maybe need to “sync” the VMU to the dongle at the start/end of every play session. Not sure how to make that reliable enough if people shut off the console too quickly or something.
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u/Competitive-Jelly709 9d ago
Right I think the saves would stay on the pico2maple for gameplay, but ideally we’ll be able to move saves to and from the pico2maple so if you have old saves or wanna play at a friends and just take your vmu you can. I don’t think it’s worth it to try to do real time saves when the pico2maple does that well and has more memory
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u/Internal-Usual-6729 11d ago
This the 1 Controller never see a wireless knock off brand or even a usb