Lost in Sega Hardware (Super Hang-On)

[iCEQB]

Hi everybody,

I'm new to the Arcade scene so please bare with me

As a kid I played Super Hang-On on the Sega Mega Drive like a little mad man and I would still do it today, if only my stupid self from the past wouldn't have sold everything
Almost 372 years in the future I played it again on the 3DS and I was like "man is it 60 fps?? why does the OST sound so much greater ?? and where is my original mode ??".
It was around that time I learned that there is an Arcade version for this game and that I just played it, which gave me serious autismo

So I looked around and saw the cab and everything and I said to myself, that one day I will at least own the PCB of this great game and now I'm on the hunt for it ... but that's a different story

I tried to gather as much information as possible by taking a deep dive into the whole arcade scene. I got my head around Neo-Geo and Capcoms CPS2 pretty quick which I both like and it's a breeze to understand in a small amount of time.
But for me the old Sega Hardware is whole different game (no pun intended), so here I am with my questions, which I hope you awesome peeps can help me find answers to.

I saw that there is no name for the "base" of all the games, like System 16, System 24, Model 1, 2, 3, etc. This site here just calls it "Sega Hang-On Hardware": http://segaretro.org/Sega_Hang-On_hardware

I looked at the board in the picture and compared to a picture from another site where I saw the Super Hang-On PCB was sold, which looked like this:

DisplayCollapse view

To me those are two completely different boards and I can't find any information about the differences anywhere, so I hope someone can enlighten me on this bad boy.

And probably my biggest question: Let's say I get my hands on this board, how do I harness it? Can I play it with a Joystick? All the cabs came with bike handles and in the game you have multiple tilt angles to get around the curves, how would I control this w/o the handlebars?

Those are my two main concerns right now and I'm sure there will be more once more light gets shed on this
I hope you can help me guys so I can finally play this game again in the way it was intended.

Regards,
iCEQB

[Asayuki]

As you have already figured out by now, the most common stuff in the Arcade world wires up using Jamma harnesses, joysticks, buttons, etc. Boards older than this standard have their own custom pinout, sometimes unique, but you can still wire up an adapter. Sega simulators are a world on their own: first of all quite a lot of those games run on their own unique hardware, therefore there exists no "base" you can plug a cartridge into in order to change the game. Also, the controllers they use are full of analog pots for steering, accelerating, etc. Even brakes are assigned to a pot in order to react to how much you brake. And they also have lamps and motors which are controlled by the motherboard through the harness. Definitely nothing you can wire up to a simple joystick. As these games are unique pearls and often masterpieces, owning the board without owning the original controller and cabinet as well is imho pointless as you can't enjoy the game as it is meant to be played.
If I may say so, you have chosen yourself a quite high target for your first arcade! I should suggest that you start with something simpler like a Neo Geo, but I do understand your wishes and I think most people around this forum would simply love to own a Sega simulator as well; including me. I see two possible choices for you:
1) Spare a hell lot of money, hunt down a complete Super Hang On cabinet (difficult task), buy it (expensive), have it delivered to your place (for even more money), have it fixed if it needs to (troubles with finding spare parts, etc.), enjoy the rarity you have the honour to host at home and devote some free time to keep it in good working conditions (that is, have it fixed should it break or even better learn how to do it yourself).
2) If you haven't already, try out the MAME emulator first, with which you can run the original arcade game on an off-the-shelf PC, and buy some steering wheel and controls you can use with it at home at a fraction of the cost and a fraction of the space.

[mufunyo]

I agree that if you don't intend to use the original cabinet with the hardware, you are better off using MAME than trying to hack up a way to interface the original board with non-original controls.

[iCEQB]

Thank you for your answer !

I am currently building up on CPS2 and Neo Geo, which I love as hell ... but Super Hang-On man

I understand what you are saying and if I had the choice to buy a complete SHO cab I'd go for it in a heartbeat.
Right now I might have the chance to get the PCB which would be an awesome start

I have seen a similar situation with Outrun, where peeps are hooking up standard controllers to it via a few mods, check these:



http://reassembler.blogspot.de/2011/07/ ... oject.html

So I was wondering if I'd invest my time into learning this stuff and try to come up with something similar for SGH, by hooking something like this onto the board via an adapter:

http://www.ebay.com/itm/NEW-MOTORCYCLE- ... 0322617545

It has to be possible to translate the controllers signal into something the SGH PCB accepts.
This is something I'd definitely would invest time in, but if someone who has the knowledge already could tell, if it makes sense or not (in terms of functionality) I'd be grateful

And about MAME ... no chance man
MAME is awesome for an emulator hands down! But emulation is like watching a concert on YouTube, it's not the same

[mufunyo]

emulation is like watching a concert on YouTube, it's not the same

I would say the same about playing an arcade racer on a PS2 gamepad, or even a PC steering wheel with FFB. The motor inside a consumer wheel is so weak, if we're going by the concert analogy it's like playing music on an iPad speaker. Let the Hang On board go to someone who's going to do something useful with it like restore a cabinet that has its mainboard missing. Not this sacrilege.

[iCEQB]

What you say is right, but there will be a situation where SHO cabs won't be available anymore or not on sale.
The cab where this board came out was destroyed and I'm sure ther are more SHO cabs that had the same fate.

Playing it with joysticks might not be the same as the original cab, but the closest in terms of true hardware (the PCB) and that is something that needs to be preserved (sooner rather than later).

My point is having multiple options, to have alternatives for input, rather than everyone buying a cab who have the board on hand.
The guy who made the Dreamcast to OutRun adaptation proved this situation imo.

[Shou]

There are effectively 3 versions of Super Hang-On: Ride-on, Sitdown and Limited Edition. The tracks are different between all of the games.

The Ride-on version is a conversion kit for the original Hang-On which has a completely different wiring harness from the OutRun type Sitdown and Limited Edition versions. These conversion kits were not common and myself have only come across 2 recently. The Ride-on version also uses a suicide battery so that is another issue.


I currently play all of these deluxe games at home using custom controllers built using parts from the arcade cabs.
Here is an old picture of my motorcycle controller while being made.

[Asayuki]

That picture brings back memories