I recently won an MSX2 and after eagerly setting it up with Vampire Killer, I discovered the UP doesn't work no matter what controller I hook up (Genesis or Colecovision). I thought something might be wrong with a pin, but in the start up screen (pre-BIOS), I can move the cursor in any direction with the controller--no problem. So why doesn't it work during the game?

Any help would be appreciated. I am not tech savvy and new to the MSX experience.

--Adam

What exactly did you try in that pre-BIOS screen? (I call this the built in firmware application.)

You can see it has cursor selected by default (upper left red bar is under the cursor icon). If you press the RIGHT cursor key, it will select the 2nd icon, a joypad (joystick works as well). Press ENTER/RETURN to confirm. After that you get an arrow-shaped cursor. Try to see if you can move it in all directions with your joystick/pad. If that works, it should definately work in the game.

Yes, it moves in all directions in the firmware app, but still not in game. Weird. I've searched to see if anyone has had any similar problem, but no dice. Maybe it has something to do with the game itself. Right now I only have one game, so I guess i'll have to wait to find another to test it.

Cursor keys work fine in the game?

Yeah.

Thanks for your interest and help. It seems to have somthing to do with the game. I can go up the stairs, but cannot jump with up (though that's how it is with the keypad). None of the buttons, however, let me do so. What is the best multi-button controller to use?

I think that button B is also jump... Can someone confirm this?

Maybe there is a button always pushed.
Attach joystick to port one and try this little BASIC loop to tests the buttons:

10 print stick(1);
20 print strig (1);strig(3)
30 goto 10

You should get all zeroes, if no button is pressed.
If you push A or B button, you will see some (-1) and, if you move the stick, then values from 1-8 should appear.
Make sure that if you HOLD any direction or button, it should be stable, not flickering...

Just checked it, it is indeed normal that you can't use UP in Vampire Killer when playing with joystick to jump. Use indeed trigger B to jump.

That's a nice trick (I haven't written anything in BASIC since I was a kid with my Commodore 64)

I got values for only one trigger button with both the Sega Master controller and the Genesis one. There should be two, right? Is it time to open the thing and check the connectors?

I appreciately all your help with my seemingly small problem.

Use an MSX controller device! The pinout of other controllers may not be 100% compatible with the MSX. Especially the trigger B is often different. The wiring is on faq.msxnet.org.