The Great Controllers Of Our Time: A Debate

Is this just turning into a Nintendo fansite, or something?

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3] [Part 4] [Part 5] [Part 6]

 

Oberon: Nintendo GameCube controller (in Spice Orange, of course)

...and a loud sigh is heard from the Nintendo table. Why, Sony? Why must you copy every innovation that Nintendo have ever introduced? Look at your supposedly 'revolutionary' PSX pad. You said it yourself, it was a complete rip of the SNES.

And when Nintendo introduce their N64 controller, sporting a nifty analogue stick, and the Rumble Pak for force feedback, what happens? The 'Dual Shock' arrives, again stealing from Nintendo. Are their lawyers awake?

But, seeing as Sony are quite obviously too lazy to improve 'their' controller, Nintendo have taken the initiative and released yet another masterful controller for the GameCube. I present to you, sheer unparelleled genius.

D-pad? Check. A little small but it's still got the advantage over the horrible effort by Sony. Sticks? Count 'em - two, the analogue main stick and the C-stick, both perfectly placed - and unlike the PS1, both sticks are _actually used_! Yes, I know that's quite a shock.The button arrangement - A, B, X and Y - may look odd, but once you get to use it, you'll not want to go back to the traditional SNES-style arrangement. And then there's the two analogue shoulder buttons, a convienient - if under-used - Z button, plus the ubiquitous Start button.

The pad's also the most comfortable I've ever used. You won't want to settle for anything else after you've given this baby a try. But hey, it's not all bad, I guess you could buy an adaptor so you could use this work of art on a Playstation.

 

Mad Paddy O'Semtex: Anything but the Playstation

.Maybe it's because of my Megadrive and N64 upbringing, I didn't own a Playstation 2 until I saw MGS2 and REZ, but I've always found the Playstation pad incredibly uncomfortable to hold. Were you supposed to have one finger on each shoulder, or two? I never knew, but either way it bent my fingers around it, as opposed to it moulding around them like my beloved gold edition N64 pad. I maintain that the only pad more comfortable is an early Sidewinder, borrow mine and see what I mean.

The analogue buttons are a nice idea, but I hardly ever use them. I don't have many PSX or PS2 games, but as far as I can tell they seem to honk horns or other superfluous functions that could easily be assigned to other buttons. It's a nice idea to have another button directly under your movement thumb in the pitch of battle but no game seems to use it to it's potential, surely there's a reason for this.

What the fuck is the point in dual analogue?

Sorry, but why? What purpose does it serve? 9 out of 10 games don't even use the bloody thing! I despise the Playstation analogues, and for the first month I just used the D-pad. They just feel wrong, the rubbery texture feels horrible compared to Nintendo's concentric rings, the resistance is all wrong and they take a lot of getting used to.
Personally, I find force feedback really distracting, but if you enjoy a brief finger massage while busting heads then Nintendo and many 3rd parties made rumble packs for the N64, a very useful system for rumble, memory and suchlike, one even the mighty Microsoft approve of.

 

Oberon: Well, I'm not going to argue.