Famicom peripheral compatibility with NES

[SeanOrange]

Hi all! Long time no anything!

I recently got my copy of Super Russian Roulette, and thought to myself "woildn't It be cool if I could use the Famicom Light Gun with this?"  So I ordered an adapter, which arrived a couple of days ago.

But it doesn't work.  (Maybe this doesn't come as a shock to some/most of you.)

I tried some other peripherals.  Third party controller pads work fine, but pretty much nothing else does.  I asked the seller about this, and got the following Reply:

"Anything that uses more than the 5 conductors a standard controller does will not work (eg: light guns). Normal controllers are expected to work, the Joy Ball being the only known exception."

So, okay, that was totally unclear from his listing, but whatever.

My question for you guys: is this adapter simply not wired to allow peripherals like the gun to function on the NES, or is it simply impossible because the wiring in the NES P2 port won't allow for it?

[Great Hierophant]

Its the adapter.  An adapter can be wired to made that provides the wires you need to make a light gun work properly with the Famicom Expansion Port.  Your seller just didn't care enough to bother or was just ignorant of the two wires needed to be connected.   

[P]

Yeah the light guns works exactly the same way. I guess that adapter was only made to support controllers, and he skipped the two pins used by the light gun (among other peripherals) like Great Hierophant said. Lazy guy!

I think about all pins in the Famicom expansion port can be found either in the NES controller ports or in the NES expansion port, so probably all Famicom accessories can be connected to a NES with an adapter. The same can't be said about the Famicom though, the NES Power Pad / Family Fun Fitness mat and the NES Arkanoid paddle are a few examples I believe can't be used on a Famicom with just an adapter.

[helicomatic]

I was looking into making these, and couldn't find any NES extension cables that had all 7 pins connected, nor could I find just the NES controller plug by itself. Clone controllers also only have the same 5 wires a standard NES controller needs.

That basically left scrapping cables out of NES Zappers themselves just to make an adapter to use the Famicom light gun, and it wouldn't help at all for the other 'unusual' controllers like the Arakanoid 1/2 Vaus or the Family Trainer Mat/Pokkun Mogura Mat.

Super Russian Roulette is probably the first NES game where it feels super appropriate to use the Famicom gun, so it might make sense to make a few of these adapters. I'll keep my eye out for some broken Zappers, unless anyone has a source for NES controller plugs.

EDIT:
Diassembled a Zapper just to confirm it would work, and of course it only has 4 wires connected, since it doesn't need the CLOCK/DATA/LATCH that a normal controller uses. That leaves the only current solution taking apart official Nintendo connectors and adding the two extra pins. I don't have a foolproof way to get them apart cleanly, they seem to be designed to go together only once and never come apart, so I'd prefer not to.

If anyone knows of NES extension cables that are fully populated, or bare controller plugs, please let me know and I'll make some of these adapters.

[P]

I found fully populated extension cables locally and used them to make a NES->Famicom adapter, it works for the Zapper. Looks like Raphnet are selling fully populated extension cables. You might want to ask him first to be sure though.

Super Russian Roulette is probably the first NES game where it feels super appropriate to use the Famicom gun

What about Wild Gunman or even Hogan's Alley!