Introduction: Playing a 2 Player Sega Genesis Game With One Controller on PC Emulator.

About: I might be the perfect mix of a geek and a redneck. I have a beat up clunker 4x4 truck that the tires are WAAAY too small on, like beer and all that stuff, live in a trailer with tires on the roof, and dress …

If any of you are classic era gamers like I am, you no doubt have an emulator for an older console on your PC.  Emulators mimic the original hardware through software allowing a person to play a ROM of their favorite game on their computer.  Emulators for thousands of game consoles and older PC systems exist.  Just Google your system you want to emulate and you should get to a page for the emulators available.  Most if not all are free of charge.  The acronym "ROM" stands for "Read Only Memory".  Many classic game consoles and computers used cartridges and disks for their software.  A ROM is simply a file of the software dumped from the original cartridge or disk to use and store on modern PCs.  Most are in a ".bin" format.   ROMs are all over the internet and I won't get into the legality of downloading them.  Better check the legality for where you live.  Download at your own risk.  If you go to jail for downloading ROMs, don't say I didn't warn you...

I am a gamer of the Sega Genesis era and use an emulator called Fusion 3.64  This program emulates these classic Sega consoles: Sega SG 1000, SG 3000, Master System, Game Gear, 16 bit Genesis (Megadrive for folks outside the US), CD system (including the option to boot a real CD game disk from optical drive if PC has one), and 32X.  It may emulate more Sega systems of that era but that is all I can remember off the top of my head.  I play a lot of the Sonic the Hedgehog games on it.

I found that games like Sonic 2 and Sonic 3 feature a 2 tailed fox called "Tails" following Sonic around.  A second player in controller port 2 can control Tails at the same time as player 1 controls sonic for a tag team play system.  There are times I needed Tails to go do something that Sonic couldn't do alone.  (Say flying Sonic to a platform in Sonic 3.)  So I figured out how to get both port 1 and 2 controllers on my 14 button USB controller.  Here's how I  did it and you can too.  this will be handy for games that feature a 2 player option and you want to play both at the same time by yourself.  You do need a USB controller with 14 buttons and 2 joysticks for this to work with Fusion 3.64.  I can't say how this works for other emulators.  You have to experiment yourself and figure it out.

Step 1: Controller Configuration.

An overview of how I set my USB controller buttons for port 1 and 2 Genesis controllers functionality.  This is a standard generic USB PS2 style controller with 14 buttons, turbo and auto fire functions.  There are 2 shoulder buttons on each side like a PS2 controller and they are labeled 1 for the top one and 2 for bottom one.  Each joystick has a button under it that is activated by pressing straight down on joystick like you are trying to push it into the casing.  Left side will be controller 1 and right side will be controller 2.  Imagine splitting it right down the center for 2 controllers and you'll understand what I mean by left and right side.  Feel free to reverse the left and right side controller designation if you prefer it the other way.  See image notes for my button configuration.  I have this set to work as 2 Sega 6 button controllers.

Step 2: Getting to the Configuration Menu.

First step of setting up.  Open Fusion up.  Go to the OPTIONS menu.  Select "Set Config...".

Step 3: Controller Selection.

You should now come up with a window titled "Fusion Configuration".  In this window select "Controllers".  If your USB controller has already been installed in Windows, you're good to go.  If not, stop and do so now.  I'll wait for you.  When ready, see image notes for further instructions.

Step 4: Final Setup.

Now that your controller has been selected as the one to use, we need to set the buttons up.  To do this, go to controller 1. (It's labeled "Port 1".)  click on the "Define" button.  At the bottom of the window right above the "OK/ Cancel/ Apply" buttons you will see a message appear.  It will say this: "Press button/ Direction or Keyboard Key to use for [#]" whereas [#] will be replaced by the buttons to set.  They go in this order. UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT, A, B, C, START, X, Y, Z, MODE.  Select the corresponding button on the controller and push it to set.  Do the same thing for "Port 2".  The Master System/ Game Gear controls are set up the same way but only use UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT, A, B, Start/ Pause.  Set these how you like.  When finished, either click "OK" to start playing a game or click "Apply" if you need to set other settings in here.  I'm not going to get into those.  Their easy enough to understand.

Step 5: Closing Words and a Video Link of This in Action.

If you followed my steps, then your controller should be setup to be both player 1 and 2 at the same time.  Now go and kick some butt in a 2 player battle game like Super Street Fighter or do some tag team action in some Sonic games.  Last of all, here is a link to a video of my setup in action.  I must warn you, there is some bad language in video so don't watch if you are easily offended over this.  Don't complain that I didn't warn you.  Also, the controller in the video is a different one but the setup is exactly the same.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDNgftyV5wk