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In Defense of the Classic Controller
Kotaku has an opinion piece by Leigh Alexander singing the praises of classic, button-rich controllers for the level of precision and complexity they offer. While the Wii Remote and upcoming motion-control offerings from Microsoft and Sony are generating a lot of interest, there will always be games for which more traditional input devices are better suited. Quoting:
"With all this talk about new audiences — and the tech designed to serve them — it's easy to get excited. It's also easy to feel a little lost in the shuffle. For gamers who've been there since before anyone cared about making games 'for everyone,' having that object in our hands was more than a way to access the game world — it was half the appeal. Anyone who's ever pulled off a chain of combos in a console fighter can tell you about the joy of expertise and control. ... Gamers may suffer some kind of identity crisis as the familiar markers of their beloved niche evolve — or disappear entirely. The solution to that one's easy: Get over it. Like it or not, it's clear that gaming's not a 'niche' anymore, and its shape will change. The more pressing issue is whether or not controller-less gaming will truly make the medium richer. Making something 'more accessible' doesn't necessarily make it better."
I have always maintained that the original SNES controller is the best gaming controller ever developed. It has the right feel, just enough buttons, and great responsiveness. I haven't seen a better pad in 20+ years of gaming.
Anyone afraid that buttons are going to disappear is just getting upset for no good reason. There's bazillions of hours invested into buttons, programming buttons, and designing game interfaces around buttons. Everyone isn't going to just up and abandon all of that investment and knowledge just because something new has appeared.
You'll just have to live with the fact that your beloved button based games might have to sit next to some motion control games on the store shelves. But that's not really something worth whining about.
One time I threw a brick at a duck.
For most non-simulator games, I'd stick with mouse and keyboard any day! Try to sniping someone in the head in a fast-paced game with a traditional controller without any auto aims, and then talk about "precision".
Punch Out for the Wii has both motion based and button based control schemes. Very few people use the motion based controls after the first few levels, because, let's face it, we're not real boxers and most of have no desire to be.
D-pad: SNES
Analog: Gamecube.
Why? Go play some SNES/Cube games. I'm not sure which guys in Nintendo are developing the controllers, but they used to do a very, very good job. Too bad they kind of screwed up the Classic Controller for the Wii. They should have gone with the SNES controller, without editing too much, just new start and select buttons.
Making something 'more accessible' doesn't necessarily make it better.
I said that when they paved over paradise and put up a parking lot.
For short : diversity is good, no one size fits all solution, to each his own, etc...
You just got troll'd!
The gamecube controller is the best ever, imo.
The stick is in the upper left and not in the odd uncomfortable position of the dual shock stick.
The right button placement is great. Large A button in the middle. Small B button to the left. X is above the A and Y is to the right of the A. The buttons all have different shapes so you can feel what button your thumb is on without having to look.
And of course, the *epic* analog shoulder buttons. The buttons have a huge range of motion; I'm pretty sure they depress over half an inch, and they 'lock' at the bottom. I've never seen another controller with such awesome analog buttons.
If you had super powers, would you use them for good, or for awesome?
You know, I always think it's great when people say this, but they always forget the alternative... I don't have to play video games if I don't think they are fun. There are tons of other things to do in this world. In fact, I'm actually not going to play video games if I don't think they are fun. I have something called a job for when I want to do things that aren't fun.
More importantly for the people who say, "Get over it," if I find that the new video games aren't fun, I'll stop buying them and wait until someone produces some that are worthy. Heck, since I'll likely fill my leisure time with alternative activities I might just forget that games exist entirely....
"MIT betrayed all of its basic principles."
Well... it does make it better for people who previously found it less accessible.
It's interesting, though, what you can acclimate yourself to. Back in the day, when I was a young buck, I had no trouble memorizing the completely keyboard-driven controls for PC games like the Ultimas I-V, and I found the simplified, mouse friendly interface of Ultima VI maddening. That said, despite my familiarity with not necessarily user-accessible controls, a console gaming controller renders me utterly helpless.
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
Having a game controller was half the appeal? Tell that to PC gamers, who by and large still use the keyboard.
Also, who is going to miss the arcane key combinations required to pull off a chain of combos? I for one won't miss Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A one bit.
Give me motion control on my portable systems. I want to look like a complete idiot in the waiting room. "Sir, Mental Health is down the hall."
If there is one thing I wish all consoles would adopt from the Wii it's not the motion controlls but the ability to hold your hands independently.
Playing Zelda on the Wii was the most relaxing way to play a game I've experienced to date. I could just sit back, put one hand behind my head while the other rests comfortably on the couch. I want to do that on the other consoles, too.
The alleged "greater precision" of button-mashers is imaginary; a side effect of someone afraid to learn a new skill. People said exactly the same thing about analog sticks, and D-pads before them, and both times they were wrong. They are wrong again.
As for gratuitous complexity, which the author (like many others) have mistaken for "depth," this is a harmful thing. It has driven far more people away from gaming than it ever attracted, creating shallow and unrewarding experiences for most with very little actual gain in game quality: a childish domination fantasy, nothing more. This is just someone who wants to keep people out of gaming, and like other kinesophobes he deserves exactly two options: take the plunge or don't play. His attitude is harmful to the industry and ultimately, it's unhealthy to himself. He doesn't need more games; he needs professional help.
Model M.
I've enjoyed Wii Sports, Warioware Smooth Moves and the likes. They are a lot of fun and burn calories. However, I find I spend more time on the couch playing games like Metroid Prime 3 or Resident Evil 4 which make great use of the Wii Remote, but don't require to turn a game session into aerobics. This is why I don't see classic controllers being replaced by the likes of Natal anytime soon.
There will be a lot of impressive tech demos with Natal and probably a couple of fun games with the Sony controller, but I'm of the opinion that Nintendo achieved the best balance of motion vs classic controller.
Goodbye Slashdot. You've changed.
But really isn't motion control really about MORE granularity of control? There are 360 degrees of freedom in all 3 axes giving you MUCH more control really. Also, there will still be some buttons. Instead of doing an actual action (uppercut to the left) they have made it a tight series of button presses.
The worst example of this is Guitar Hero, where it is really NOTHING like playing guitar really.
Button based games are like 2D platform Games vs 3D First Person Shooters, they will always be beloved, but I bet you they will feel 10 years ago pretty soon...
What if you have 6 buttons and 4 motion controllers?? 2 feet, 2 hands and 3 buttons in each hand?!?
And did anyone else take it apart to press the "left" and "right" contact points simultaneously? Jiggling the joystick back and forth in the track events of Summer Games was for suckers.
Good times.
I never grew fond of these so-called controllers where I have to use my left thumb for steering because someone thought, hey, screw those righthanders by putting the movement control on the controller's left side.
I was perfectly happy with the old (digital) joysticks like the Competition Pro or some more robust joyboards which could be fixed to the desk using suction cups, and also offered automatic fire triggering.
Where I can see a use of the WiiMote for more lifelike gameplaying (e.g. Golf, Swordfight, Tennis), I never found these weird "let's replace the joystick by buttons or just a small thumbstick" controls really useful...
;)
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
Gamepads, or the "classic" controllers he's whining about, actually suck quite a lot. They have terrible precision when compared to a mouse, don't work that well for things like Flight Sims when compared to a flightstick, and don't offer accessability over motion controls.
I've never understood the appeal. Playing console shooters is like steering a drunk camel compared to on the PC. Good RTS with large numbers of units is pretty much a joke. Trying to explain to a non gamer how to play is an exercise in futility compared to the thirty seconds it takes to understand the Wiimote.
The only real upside to the things is that they're generic. You can shoehorn a lot of game types to work on the thing, no matter how badly it works for most of them.
-- "So they told me that using the download page to download something was not something they anticipated." - Bill Gates
Now there's a giant controller for those that like buttons! The key overlays are cool too...
Visit ssjx.co.uk
to not only not see the end of button controllers coming soon, but to see that as a bad thing.
Unless something drastic happens that makes us believe that we can't control games well with natural human movements, the controller is going to die.
Games are just so much more fun for so many more people when the input is intuitive rather than requiring you to learn what every buttons does. For those of us who grew up doing so AND kept practicing, it is not so hard, but for most people that is not true. And even for those of us who can do it, I wouldn't believe you if you said that you didn't find picking up the Wii controller "refreshing" the first time you did so.
I think of this when I hear the phrase "classic controller".
And I immediately think of a Wii accessory, as does Google.
Honestly, I've never had a controller that I couldn't get into. Controllers may differ greatly from one system to the next, but it's rather easy to get acustomed to the feel of it. You can even find your own ways of using it. My friend thought I was nuts when he saw me holding the N64 controller by the right and the middle protrusions for certain parts of games, but that was the easiest way for me at the time and it worked. I don't think there has ever been or will there ever be a "perfect" controller because each one can be adapted to.
"The Y chromosome is genetic. The odds are very good that if you are male then your father was too." -Internet Commenter
I think this is just an example of someone who is exhibiting the natural human trait of 'resistance to change', we do however have an even stronger trait and that's the desire to evolve.
The first console I ever played with was an old Binatone machine, it played ping pong and had a light gun, the second was the Atari VCS, it had a joystick, this was better at doing somethings as it allowed you to move in more dimensions, I don't think it was any better at Tennis.
Thereafter, down the years I have used many controllers, I play a lot of PC games and have both an old fashioned Sidewinder for playing some sims (I loved the SW FF btw) and a Thrustmaster FCS for playing some sims more properly, both are great at sims but would be rubbish at Tennis.
The only console I own is a Wii, the Wiimote is great at Tennis and with the nunchuk and the Zelda Crossbow plastic extension it also makes a great gun. If you make a Wiimote look like a wheel with another bit of plastic then that works fine as well.
I'm not sure we'll ever see one true controller as I think the controller is part of the immersive gameplay experience so it needs to have a character that matches what you are trying to achieve, both in order to feel right and also in order to work well. The wiimote is good at achieving this as it's different sleeves allow it to very effectively bridge the gap between what it is and what you want it to be like for a particular game.
I'm afraid I've never really been into fighting games so can't empathise with the loss of being able to make your favourite combo, I did really like my MS FF though and I've not found anything which felt quite as good since for the purpose of flying helicopters in BF1942 so I guess that's kind of similar. It was rubbish at Tennis though.
Motion control is useful in and of itself but more importantly, it has the potential to be a universal control system. Ideally any sort of control scheme could be emulated through a sufficiently sophisticated motion control system. Analog controllers, steering wheels, fishing poles, even d-pads and buttons. Are we there yet. Hell no. It's even still easier to use an old-fashioned controller than it is to use the steering wheel option in Mario Kart. But it's not exactly an impossible dream. Right now, there are several forms of control that can be successfully emulated by the Wiimote. I don't think the Wiimote will carry us to the end game of motion controls but it's not like the PS3 uses a one-button digital joystick made for left-handed people.
It's the interface. A controller is only half the story, and usually a lot less than that.
I'm not suggesting we go back to the Atari 2600/C64 era joystick, but it does have some lessons we should learn from. Some of the best interface design comes from embracing the limitations in the format. There were many C64 era games that, if they didn't use the keyboard at all, had to be somewhat creative on the control side. Four directions, one button, make it happen. Now, the trend seems to be that we need a discrete, separate button for every function a game has, and button combinations that are completely unobvious and arbitrary are a good thing.
As the Atari 2600 was my last console, after which I got on the 8-bit computer bandwagon, I say the following without any platform bias: The Sega Genesis system had it right in the first generation: stick and three buttons. http://www.thosewerethedays.de/items/joysticks/sega_genesis/fighter_stick_md-6_asciiware.JPG is similar, but is the 6 button version. I used this on the Amiga (which only supported one button, but very few games were programmed to use three, since the Atari and Sega joysticks had compatible connectors and pin layouts). It had heft, it was accurate, it was solid. With three buttons, you had to create a control mechanism, but you couldn't go down the road of arbitrary button hell. That's what the modern console controller feels like to me: hell, and inaccurate to boot.
Everyone nodding their heads in agreement should read Malstrom's articles. Pre-1985 everyone knew the standard controller was a joystick. Then Nintendo released the button controller, and it became the standard. The joystick is still around for some specialist games like flight simulators, but new games have replaced it. Ironically, buttonpad games may soon be confined to the PC.
---- "XML is like violence. If it doesn't fix the problem, you aren't using enough."
Like any tool, the more you use, the better you get at using it. I too had your same skepticism when it came to playing console FPSers after playing computer FPSers for so long. It takes a while, but after a few months, you get good at using the analog sticks to aim. Really good. Then you realize you have a lot more fun playing on your couch, reclined, with one controller in hand than you ever did sitting at your computer, back straight, staring at the comparatively tiny screen, using a few keys on one instruments to move around while the other controls your Z axis and firing. You're stuck to that computer. If I'm playing Call of Duty on my couch, and I want to switch to the other couch, or recline on my couch, lay down on my couch, or use my recliner, I can. I can stand while playing. My once gamer PC now sits in my room; I've since ditched windows on it in favor of Ubuntu, but I still only use it a few times a week. Most of my time is spent in my living room on my Xbox or using my MPC. But I do agree with you on one point: RTS on a console just doesn't work.
this is:
http://blog.newsweek.com/photos/levelup/images/original/The-Atari-2600-Video-Computer-System-controller.aspx
Stupid kids on my lawn~
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
I can see one with a built in motion pointer like the Wii. That's would be kick ass.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It's a legitimate worry. People keep assuring gamers that the two control systems will exist side-by side. They have a right to be skeptical.
Once upon a time, all movies were silent, and then someone invented the talkie. Great, now we can have silent movies AND talking movies! No, the reality is we only have talking movies. Eventually nobody makes silent movies anymore.
Same thing with black and white. Someone invents color film, and people thing WOW, great more options! Now we will have black and white and color movies! But the reality is we only have color movies after all. If you want to see a black and white movie you have to watch on old one or an independently produced one. Nobody makes them because nobody thinks they will sell, and only weird hardcore artsy people would value such an obsolete aesthetic on purpose.
Same thing with 2D sprite-based games. 3D comes along, and people at first thing Great! This 3D stuff is neat, now we can have 3D and 2D games. And good thing, because entire genres of games and styles of art are built around 2D graphics. There's no way people will just stop making 2D games. But the reality is that they do. After a while we only have 3D games after all, and 2D games are not taken seriously anymore.
I think that gamers are entirely justified in worrying about losing button-based gameplay when they see the hoards of casual gamers and advertising hype around motion-based control. In technology as soon as something is viewed as old-fashioned the perception is that it won't sell, whether it's black-and-white film or 2D graphics or button-based gameplay.
I have always maintained that people have unrealistically positive judgment about artifacts of their youth. Like you with the flat brick, too few buttons and purely digital goodness of the SNES controller.
Like me with Dual Shock. Though in this case...for some reason every next generation of classic controllers from competing manufacturers were becoming closer to Dual Shock, even though they really tried to be different at first. DS otoh - virtually unchanged since...1996? (Dual Analogue Controller, Japanese version with rumble) There is a reason for that...
You might love Nintendo more than SCE, but there were sound reasons why the latter kicked N ass for almost a decade. I'd say SCE had indeed created the best "classic" console to date with the driving concepts behind PS1 (and PS2 to a lesser degree). That includes the controller.
One that hath name thou can not otter
Nintendo is coming out with New Super Mario Bros. Wii, a brand new side-scroller (3D graphics, but 2D gameplay). They're also coming out with Super Mario Galaxy 2. Personally, I'm much more excited about the former.
That's one major "innovation" I see the Wii bringing to gaming: we're finally getting past the point where the game designed to suit the technology available (i.e., "we've just come out with 3D, so everything must be 3d!") and to the point where the technology is designed to suit the game. And that's something to be happy about!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I appreciated one argument that was made in the article: that the human mind is very good at abstracting the actions of the game onto a generic controller: many controls make for multiple applications. Having an action-specific controller might actually limit the development of games that experiment with more bizarre modes of play.
Specific controllers bog down the gaming impulse, too. It would suck if, to play the baseball game, I had to break out the Baseball-o-tron, to play the racing game I need the Steeringwheel-o-tron... I guess it's a good way for companies to sell more accessories. And crap: if I wanted that much exercise, I'd just go play frisbee. I actually *like* the big blue room.
The Wii controller strikes a nice balance and is a flexible piece of tech for what it's called on to do. Motion sensing is great in the sports games since it can emulate just about anything you can swing or throw, but it *also* acts as a classic pad for the abstracted "jump, punch, run" sorts of action games.
I remember laughing watching my friends and sister play Super Mario for NES for the first time. Every time they wanted to jump, they'd press A and pull up on the entire controller. Like they were trying to use motion controls when they weren't even part of the game! I understand that buttons will never go away, but motion controls can provide some nice additions to gaming.
I swear that Mario jumped farther when you flailed about madly when he was in the air. (at least my 5-year old mind thought so) When I first played Super Paper Mario for the Wii, and you used motion controls to combo hits on enemies, I laughed out loud. I remembered my first experience with Mario and how it had all come full circle.
It's not that motion controls are better, that isn't my argument. They're just much more intuitive.
I can't stand playing shooters with a console controller, I need a mouse and keyboard.
By "shooter" do you mean only first-person shooters, or do you also mean shmups like Galaga, Zero Wing, and Ikaruga?
Like Steel Battalion: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steel_Battalion
...when people talked about controllers having "precision". I mean what happened to the good old keyboard and mouse? The de facto bastions of input precision? Did we forget about them?
Michael Bay/Transformers vs. Pixar/Up
.
Enough said.
Here's how it works. . .
The system you grew up with has a life span which will end at some point and you will be left feeling either bitter or so old you just don't care. --Either that, or evolution will reach a plateau of suitable perfect-ness in bio-feedback device and stay there for 20 million years. I doubt even the Mouse, Screen & Keyboard will manage this, though as of yet, nothing seems to match it for getting yourself from one end of an Operating System to the other.
For games. . . Any controller which has a limit to its usefulness in moving stuff around on screen, and all controllers seem to, will irritate some engineer/designer somewhere enough to spawn some new brand of tool. The kids new to video games will be more than willing to train themselves on whatever cool new system is offered so long as it activates all their happy circuits, and whatever solution you were content (ecstatic) with while growing up will have to shuffle over to make room, and will eventually find itself relegated to a niche market. And you won't understand what your kids are talking about half the time. Welcome to parenthood. You're not cool anymore. Laugh at it. The other option is to wear leather pants and buy a sports car and look really sad and desperate.
Best to age with a little grace. Let the Nintendo button thingy go. You don't want to be the old guy saying, "When I was young, we had to play our games with a STICK! In 8 bits! And we LIKED it!"
Hm. Actually, it might be kind of fun to be that guy.
-FL
I'll accept for the moment that you find it easy to use a keyboard to play Mega Man or Street Fighter. But PC operating systems make it hard for games to figure out which keyboard a particular keypress came from. So if you're playing with two keyboards through your USB hub, you have to come up with non-overlapping keymaps, which can be a pain, and players can cheat by pressing a key mapped to the other player, which can also be a pain.
For most non-simulator games, I'd stick with mouse and keyboard any day!
Then what will players 2, 3, and 4 stick with? Yelling at you to finish playing already so that they can have a turn? That's why the kids I babysit prefer my Wii game console over my PC.
Same thing with 2D sprite-based games. 3D comes along, and people at first thing Great! This 3D stuff is neat, now we can have 3D and 2D games. And good thing, because entire genres of games and styles of art are built around 2D graphics. There's no way people will just stop making 2D games. But the reality is that they do. After a while we only have 3D games after all, and 2D games are not taken seriously anymore.
Gotta disagree with you on the point of 2D vs. 3D games. Just off the top of my head...
I could go on and on, but the point is that there are still plenty of great 2D games being made in recent years. 2D games most certainly are "taken seriously" (whatever that means—I mean, we are talking about games here).
Do not read this sig.
To this day, I think of the buttons on my PlayStation or XBOX in terms of the SNES layout. "Hit the Y button! I mean the Square one!"
Some of my friends have played games on PlayStation, Xbox, GameCube, and Super NES. The X button is in a different place on every controller. In fact, it has shown up in all four positions. So when I tell them what button to hit, and it's not the one on the bottom, I tend to say triangle, square, or O because they're less ambiguous than A, B, and Y.
Having tried various control pads over the years I personally think the PS2/PS3 controller is among the best. I generally find the placement of controls to be quite comfortable. The biggest problem I've encountered with control pads stems from poor game design, specifically function overload. Developers will overdo it with buttons having multiple functions in different scenarios, too many actions using too many buttons, and no thought given to how a gamer will interact with the controller.
However, as others have mentioned, it really comes down to the game. On the PC I primarily use the keyboard/mouse combination and find it to be excellent for FPSs, RTSs and many RPGs. Control pads are extremely imprecise and suck the fun from any FPS.
As for motion controllers, including the Wiimote and Guitar Hero/Rockband instruments, they can be great fun. The Wiimote has issues with precision, but I don't count that against it because the technology is in its infancy. The problem is, however, that these controllers clearly don't work for many games and sometimes I just want to sit and relax. I don't want the nuisance of having to wave my arms every time I play a game.
As for racing games, obviously wheels and pedals are ideal. However, a few years ago I had this controller for the PC that was reminiscent of controllers for RC cars. The wheel sat on top of the controller and the trigger moved both forwards and back. I thought it was one of the most precise controllers I've ever used for racing games. Certainly, it's not quite the same as a full steering wheel, but it made it easy to be precise and react quickly and it had the advantage of being compact.
Still, if I were to choose a controller that was the best all-around for the widest variety of games it would have to be the traditional control pad. The mouse and keyboard combination is close behind and surpasses everything else in certain genres. Motion controllers are great for only a limited set of games.
Back in my day we'd punch out the actions we wanted on a punch card!
And get off my lawn!!
Have you really read what I wrote?
Console games are not dumbing down your PC games. The things you talk about are hybrids. They are also awfull from the point of view of old console gamers - they might just as well call them "PC games", because their awfullness stems directly from the fact that they are targeted for the simultaneus release on a PC. But you wouldn't agree that's an accurate description of reality, right?
Just so it will be more clear, let me rephrase what you wrote from the point of view of consoles:
Mind you, PC games are fine, but I wish more dev time were spent on true console games. I feel that gaming as a whole is suffering a bit right now, between the shift of focus to primarily PC-style games, casual games, Peggle, and (especially) the cancer that is DLC (//FFS, MAN, YOU REALLY THINK THAT CONSOLES BROUGHT MODS/DOWNLOADS/PATCHES TO GAMES?! REALLY?!?!). In the long run it'll probably be fine, but I'd love to see what would happen with more (not all, just more) titles being aimed at the platform that brought us so many amazing, deep games.
I know it's a futile wish, but it's what thing would be like in the world in my head where we all ride unicorns that fart rainbows and shit gold. Anyway, like I said, I'm not worried about PCs killing deeper gaming long-term (hell, my recent purchase of gaming PC has shown me first-hand that consoles and PCs aren't so different any more--I had to put the fucking DVD into the drive each time I wanted to play!)--DLC might do it, but PCs themselves won't.
...and it's still BS
Games have become less "hardcore" (whatever that means...) simply because they are not driven anymore by wishes of early adopters - they've become mainstream on both consoles and PCs (because the platforms themselves have become mainstream), so the gameplays is obviously also more mainstream...
Plus, thank MS for bringing development of games for both platforms much, much closer - PHBs running game publishing companies think it's "obvious" to target both platforms. When in reality it's a horrible idea. You end up with...hybrids that are a product of compromise, that loose strong points of both platforms.
Speaking as a long time gamer on both types of systems (I care about the game, not so much about on what it runs), so I might have a better grip on reality... (if you wonder - nowadays, on PC, mostly Galciv2 and Stalker, also constant addiction to Fallouts, Diablos, *shocks)
One that hath name thou can not otter
So now Console gamers can bitch about the same thing that PC gamers have been bitching about for years!
http://i.cubeupload.com/T6cyLu.png
There's still a massive demand for 2d jump & runs, IIRC New Super Mario Bros sold 18 million units so far and is still selling years after its release. It's successful enough to make Nintendo admit that there might be some demand for a 2D Mario on the Wii too.
Either way I do think the Wiimote has the potential to greatly improve many genres provided their designs are adjusted to actually utilize the ability to freely move the controller instead of still thinking in a simple FSE with transitions triggered by motions instead of buttons. Motion controls are analog, that can be used for many things (e.g. in sports games the whole inaccuracy in your movement).
Come to think of it, sports games were the most improved by it. That's because they're based on real lifeactivities that involve motions too. Many other genres are about made-up actions which seem to be made up around the old control paradigm. Sports games had a design that was based around motion control right away and only worked around with buttons, other games have a design that's intended for buttons. In my oppinion games need to be redesigned to really utilize motion controls because they have to get rid of all the things that were added to make them work on buttons.
Justice is the sheep getting arrested while an impartial judge declares the vote void.
To quote Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation about motion controllers: "People plays games to unwind and no one unwinds by coming home and waving their arms like air traffic controllers covered in beetles." And that said it all
I think GP was referring to the period when 3D console games first reared their blocky heads (circa Playstation 1, IIRC). 2D graphics still hadn't reached their peak, but ugly, gimmicky 3D junk flooded the market and (a paltry few exceptions notwithstanding) 2D was relatively done.
And it wasn't as though it was just a graphical shift. Compare Street Fighter EX Plus alpha to contemporary 2D versions, for example. Whereas it took stunning graphics and tight gameplay to make a standout 2D game at the time, people seemed willing to suffer through awful looking and playing 3D games because their very 3D-ness was novel.
Moreover, 2D and 3D are suited to different types of games -- hence the popularity of simulators and then FPS over platformers and arcade style fighters (possible chicken v. egg there, but that's my opinion anyway).
If you think that 2D games are taken seriously, you probably weren't seriously gaming 15 years ago. Nothing wrong with that -- just sayin'.
3D games have more than come into their own at this point, but I have to agree that they came at the expense of 2D gaming.
And you can check that yourself - just relax your hand (holding arm in the same orientation like when playing on a pad). Your thumb won't be in the place of GC/Xbox/Dreamcast stick. It will be in the place of DS stick.
OTOH when in upper left you can supply greater force with your thumb more easily, so that's a good place for d-pad.
But you don't have to believe me, just look at how all joypad vendors gravitate slowly towards the layout which DualShock holds for almost 13 years...
One that hath name thou can not otter
Indeed. My family had an Atari 2600 when I was a kid, but we never had a NES. I hate those NES pads. And the world hates me, because DSLR cameras now have those.
Are you adequate?
I find that the symbols on the PlayStation controller prevent me from confusing it with the SNES controller.
Then is X on the top or the bottom?
the Epyx was my favourite gaming controller of all time. Very short throw, accurate and easy to hold. Oh..... the memories.......
With all the advances, a keyboard and mouse are still the best way to play most games.
There is room in the gaming market for both casual and hardcore players right now. It's probably not going to change anytime soon. The casual market is still being saturated, so there's plenty of room for growth. But that doesn't mean hardcore button gamers will be out of the loop. The game makers know that hardcore players simply buy more games on average than causal players. I would cite that but I can't remember the link I read it from.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steel_Battalion
The Logitech Cyberman was the best game controller ever devised. 6 degrees of freedom (the equivalent of 2 joysticks + 4 buttons) on one control in the right hand, and 10 buttons on the left. And, unlike those Microsoft monstrosities, it was very intuitive to use.
Combo-memorization is the antithesis of my ideal gaming experience. To me, the ideal game is one where I never have to think about the control system, only about the content. The Myst games are probably the best example--they'd be wonderful if I could actually spend time solving puzzles, instead of rastering the mouse across the screen, checking for cursor changes, trying to find puzzles.
Media that can be recorded and distributed can be recorded and distributed.
-kfg
UUDDLRLRBASelSta
For Real Ultimate Power, Can You Face Might?
http://rockhardest.mybrute.com
It has a cross or a times symbol or something - it's not an "X" unless you really want it to be an X.
Well, Sony wants it to be an X. This support page talks about the "X button" and the "Triangle button".
On that note: Rejected Xbox 360 logo
Then what will players 2, 3, and 4 stick with?
] connect 192.168.1.2
connected, now playing on de_dust
] votekick babysitter
Making something 'more accessible' doesn't necessarily make it better.
I disagree. More accessible is better.
However, more accessible at the expense of some other valuable quality is not (always) better.
Whether or not it is really depends on what you value. Out of curiousness, I went out and bought an FPS for my wii; Metroid Prime 3: Corruption to be particular.
By pointing the wiimote, you both reorient your view-frustum in 3D space and move your aim-point on a 2D screen. The reorientation works (as best I can tell) by adding some acceleration which dies out over time due to "rotational friction". That means that if you point the aim-point to an (x, y)-coordinate on the screen, you aim at the corresponding point in 3D space for a very short time; then, due to the acceleration introduced by moving the wiimote your character yaws and pitches elsewhere, making it hard to aim.
To compensate for this, you can lock on to targets, meaning you always yaw and pitch in the target's direction, and can point in 2D space without affecting 3D space, making it easier to aim straight.
I think that makes the business of aiming easier than in, say, quake (or any PC FPS game I've ever played, really). Does the game suffer from this? Well, given than Metroid Prime is really a first-person action-adventure, it doesn't detract from what the game tries to be, so no. But if you hope for a twitch-based FPS, you'll be disappointed (as I was, although I learned to love MP3:C for what it is rather than what I wanted it to be).
How well does this generalize? Meh, I don't know... but always consider what the core challenge is; making other things easier to do is often a win (listen hard to this, people who "designed" the GH3 user interface and menu structure).
DirectX combines the keypress and movement count data from all physical keyboards and pointing devices and presents them to applications as one virtual keyboard and one virtual pointing device. So how does the game running on a given PC know on which keyboard connect 192.168.1.2 was typed and who typed it? If you meant "on a separate PC", it's not likely that the children being babysat have brought their own PCs.