Tri-axis Analog Joystick

[KVermilion]

I've been looking for most of the day on a way to use a three axis joystick... and no dice...

This could be done in one of three ways:

1. Convert the signal of a digital tri-axis joystick to analog.
2. Modify a digital tri-axis joystick to by pass digital encoding (if it uses pots).
3. Find an analog tri-axis joystick.

Number one would be pretty hard, because it would require sniffing of the packets using a program, and then it would require design of a custom circuit (fpga, multiple DAC chips, etc). This is obvously not in the scope of the remaining 5 weeks of build time, but this could possibly be done during the break between shipping and regonals (Is this allowed? It is OI work...)

Number two would require a tri-axis joystick that uses 3 100k pots and some minor wiring.... Yeah, but how do we find a candidate?

Number three would require pretty much no "work" but allot of research... The MS Sidewinder 3D Pro (a very, very old dual mode triaxis stick) Does anyone have this stick? Does the third axis work in analog mode?