A2 Gameport and/or Internal Game Connector

[zeroone@nospam.nonet (zeroone)]

Hi all,

Just wondering if it is possible to have a pair of Apple II joysticks
hooked up at the same time to the Apple II 9 pin game port (as found on
the back of all the IIe, IIc, IIc+, IIgs computers), possibly with a Y
cable?

Were there ever any "head to head" type games created for the Apple II
series of computers which allowed two joysticks to be used in the above
fashion at the exact same time or did that require a special dual port
expansion card in one of the expansion slots?

I realize that early on, during the original ][ and ][ Plus days, Apple
included the pair of Apple paddle controllers which hooked up to the
internal 16 pin game connector on the motherboard, and I was just
wondering if something similar could be achieved with a pair of standard
A2 joysticks hooked up to the 9 pin gameport...

Also, using the pin-outs of the A2 game port, which are the X and Y axis
pins (obviously the paddle related pins), In other words, pins 4, 5, 8,
9....what are their respective functions and for which joystick/paddle,
assuming more than one joystick can be hooked up at the same time to this
9 pin gameport connector?


A2 Gameport pin-outs
--------------------
1     Switch 1  (Option Key - a.k.a Solid Apple Key)
2     +5 volts
3     Signal Ground
4     Paddle 2
5     Paddle 0
6     Switch 2
7     Switch 0  (Open Apple Key)
8     Paddle 1
9     Paddle 3