Replacing thumb hatswitch with thumbbutton

[LittleFlower]

I own a Fighterstick. I play FPS games, especially Unreal Tournament. In UT all weapons have 2 modes of firing. Before the Fighterstick, I used to use the trigger for primary fire, and a thumbbutton for secondary fire. With the Fighterstick, there is no thumbbutton. The thumbhatswitch is not suitable for the intesive use of the secondary fire. And I need the pinky button for dodging, as the CMS script requires me to use buttons on the joystick. (I'd prefer a mouse button here). So now I use a mousebutton for secondary fire. Very inconvenient.

I hardly use the thumb hatswitch.
I've looked at the Combatstick. But I need at least 2 easily accessible hatswitches for weaponswitches.

So I've come up with this idea. It looks like the hatswitches and the thumbbutton on the Combat switch are about the same size. Maybe I could order a spare thumbbutton. Then I could open my Fighterstick and replace the thumbhatswitch with a thumbbutton.

Would that work ? Are both types of buttons the same size ? Can I do the rewiring myself ? I don't mind playing tricks in the software. Or is this all just too far fetched ? TIA.

[MichaelCHProd]

I guess you could do it BUT IT WILL KILL YOUR WARRANTY.

[Pendragon]

goodness, how do you play FPS games with a joystick?

I would honestly like to know.

Do you use a joystick and mouse or just a joystick?

My mind boggles.

[LittleFlower]

I play with a joystick and trackbal.

I use the axis on the joystick for movement, the trigger for fire, the hatswitches for weaponswitching. The trackball for aiming (mouselook), and a trackball button for jump. When I play UT, I have a CMS script that makes the joystick pinky button do dodging.

I'm not the only one with this setup. There once was a device developed especially for FPS games. Called the PantherXL. It was an intergrated joystick and trackball. Quite popular with FPS players. Unfortunately the PXL had its problems. One of which was that the PXL was not very durable. I myself wrecked 4 of them within 6 months. Many ex-PXL users switched to a setup with a separate trackball and joystick. The combination CHP Fighterstick with a Logitech MarbleMouse has become very popular.

In the original Unreal game (before Unreal Tournament) the best online one-on-one player was an American called OverToad. He used the PXL.

See this site and this forum for more information about FPS players using joystick/trackball combinations:
http://www.clana3d.org/index.php
http://boards.gamers.com/messages/overview...name=panther_xl (http://boards.gamers.com/messages/overview.asp?name=panther_xl)

[LittleFlower]

Originally posted by MichaelCHProd@Jun 15 2004, 01:22 AM
I guess you could do it BUT IT WILL KILL YOUR WARRANTY.
Ah, nice to know. I might try sometime. After the warranty expires, or when I have a little more time to look into this. (I guess I will need full concentration if I am going to attempt this).