How did the more advanced, later generation light gun games work?

[RH | 4,928]

First, let me make it clear.  I know how the NES light gun worked, and I know how these devices are suppose to work in principle.  CRTs have an electron beam that scans left-to-right, and then the v-blank kicks it back to the left, one line down and it draws the next line.  NES games draw a small box where a duck/enemy is on the screen and if the light gun picks up the white light from the phosphor excitation, at a specific time, it reads that you hit the hitbox.  I know there's a bit more to it but that's the generalization.

Well, I was watching some footage of a later light gun game from about the PS1/Saturn era and I paused the video and I found a frame where the screen flashed and the entire frame was white during the trigger-pull phase.  This is quite different than the NES.  If you pause a digital NES frame, you see the boxes where the enemies were and you can see how this would be used for hit detection.  Again, I know how this would work on a CRT and how the hit would be detected.   But this doesn't make sense for an entirely white frame.

How did later light gun games work and detect hits?  I've paused this video I'm watching on multiple frames, and I've advanced the video 1-2 frames before and after the white frame to try and see if something else was signaling a hit.  Each trigger pulls seems to make a 100% white screen and that seems to be it.  Anyone know how these games worked?  I'm struggling to figure it out.

[phart010 | 1,708]

I don’t know how the newer light guns worked, but I do know that you had to plug the yellow video cable into a signal tapping device on the guns circuit and then ultimately that tapping device is what you would plug the newly created video signal into the tv with. Don’t really know what was taking place though  

 

Also PS3 had a light gun I believe and by that time we were using HDMI and digital tv’s.

[darkchylde28 | 1,546]

14 hours ago, phart010 said:

Also PS3 had a light gun I believe and by that time we were using HDMI and digital tv’s.

Yeah, but the PS3 still retained the "Playstation" connector port on the back, and as such could also output via RF, composite, or component.  Is the PS3 light gun that you're talking about a traditional light gun, or is it working on the same tech that the PS3 "wiimotes" do?  Because if it's the latter, it's not really going to be a shock if it works on HDTVs with HDMI inputs.

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

27 minutes ago, darkchylde28 said:

Yeah, but the PS3 still retained the "Playstation" connector port on the back, and as such could also output via RF, composite, or component.  Is the PS3 light gun that you're talking about a traditional light gun, or is it working on the same tech that the PS3 "wiimotes" do?  Because if it's the latter, it's not really going to be a shock if it works on HDTVs with HDMI inputs.

I believe all the PS3 "light gun" games used the Playstation Move controller and the camera. As you said, anything before that would've likely used the exact same technology as Duck Hunt.

Edited December 23, 2022 by DoctorEncore

[Tulpa | 3,525]

The PS3 GunCons use LEDs placed on the upper corners of the screen. They worked independent of the screen technology.

Edited December 23, 2022 by Tulpa

[CMR | 521]

I know the Super Scope could track scanlines and based on which scan line was being draw the games would calculate where the player was aiming.  It was probably the best light gun tech outside the arcades.

I figure the PS1 lightguns work similarly, but they got the scanline timing info directly from the video port.

 

Edited December 23, 2022 by CMR

[phart010 | 1,708]

6 hours ago, darkchylde28 said:

Yeah, but the PS3 still retained the "Playstation" connector port on the back, and as such could also output via RF, composite, or component.  Is the PS3 light gun that you're talking about a traditional light gun, or is it working on the same tech that the PS3 "wiimotes" do?  Because if it's the latter, it's not really going to be a shock if it works on HDTVs with HDMI inputs.

I just looked it up. Apparently Time Crisis 4 was compatible with both Guncon 3 as well as PlayStation Move controllers. With Guncon 3, you have to place some sensors next to your tv to make it work

Edited December 24, 2022 by phart010

[Tanooki | 4,942]

Here... https://ultimatepopculture.fandom.com/wiki/GunCon

The Guncon 3 utilizes two infrared LEDs as markers, placed on the left and right sides of the screen. An image sensor in the muzzle tracks the markers as reference points for determining where the gun is pointing on the screen. As opposed to the Guncon and Guncon 2, which are only compatible with CRT-based displays, the GunCon 3 supports a wide variety of display types, including LCD and Plasma.

[DoctorEncore | 3,691]

On 12/23/2022 at 2:44 PM, Tulpa said:

The PS3 GunCons use LEDs placed on the upper corners of the screen. They worked independent of the screen technology.

 

On 12/23/2022 at 8:37 PM, phart010 said:

I just looked it up. Apparently Time Crisis 4 was compatible with both Guncon 3 as well as PlayStation Move controllers. With Guncon 3, you have to place some sensors next to your tv to make it work

 

On 12/23/2022 at 10:52 PM, Tanooki said:

Here... https://ultimatepopculture.fandom.com/wiki/GunCon

The Guncon 3 utilizes two infrared LEDs as markers, placed on the left and right sides of the screen. An image sensor in the muzzle tracks the markers as reference points for determining where the gun is pointing on the screen. As opposed to the Guncon and Guncon 2, which are only compatible with CRT-based displays, the GunCon 3 supports a wide variety of display types, including LCD and Plasma.

Very cool. I had no idea there were light gun games using external tech like that.

[Tulpa | 3,525]

30 minutes ago, DoctorEncore said:

Very cool. I had no idea there were light gun games using external tech like that.

Fun fact, the Power Glove also used external tech, except instead of light/LEDs, it used sound. Ultrasonic speakers were in the glove itself, microphones in the sensors placed around the TV.