Fully Functional Nintendo Controller Coffee Table

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Fully Functional Nintendo Controller Coffee Table

Posted by samzenpus on Wednesday April 11, 2012 @08:12AM from the use-a-coaster dept.

techfun89 writes "Ever wished that you could defeat Bowser literally right from your coffee table with giant built in buttons? Well, your dreams have come true with the fully-functional Nintendo Controller Coffee Table. This is the creation of Charles Lushear that has combined old school entertainment with maple wood and craftsmanship. Simply plug into an existing classic NES system and go to town. The table also features a removable glass top with retractable cord to use the furniture as just a table when you are done playing Mario."

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Looks like crap. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 08:14 · Score: -1

Someone would have to pay me to put that ugly thing in my home.
1. Re:Looks like crap. by PopeRatzo · 2012-04-11 09:13 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  It would take me about 20 minutes to spill a vodka & grapefruit juice all over those controls, causing an electrical fire which would probably burn down my entire neighborhood.
  It's happened to almost every keyboard or controller that I've ever owned, so I don't see why it wouldn't happen to this ugly monstrosity.
  Still, I would SO have this thing in my living room, but my wife would throw it (and me) out in nothing flat. Funny, but she somehow just doesn't understand how cool it is that a middle-aged man is still a highly avid gamer and how my original, like new Sega Genesis and Nintendo Dreamcast are crucial design elements for our home. Some people just don't seem to get it.
  
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  You are welcome on my lawn.
2. Re:Looks like crap. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 09:31 · Score: -1
  
  Nintendo Dreamcast
  Um, Nothing to do here...
3. Re:Looks like crap. by jandrese · 2012-04-11 10:00 · Score: 3, Funny
  
  You've really gotta stop burning down so many neighborhoods man.
  
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  I read the internet for the articles.
4. Re:Looks like crap. by PopeRatzo · 2012-04-11 11:43 · Score: 1
  
  You've really gotta stop burning down so many neighborhoods man.
  Mrs O'Leary's cow thinks I'm the shit.
  
  --
  You are welcome on my lawn.
5. Re:Looks like crap. by Eraesr · 2012-04-11 18:22 · Score: 1
  
  Or just stick to the grapefruit juice and skip the vodka
6. Re:Looks like crap. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 19:17 · Score: 0
  
  It would take me about 20 minutes to spill a vodka & grapefruit juice all over those controls, causing an electrical fire which would probably burn down my entire neighborhood.
  It's happened to almost every keyboard or controller that I've ever owned, so I don't see why it wouldn't happen to this ugly monstrosity.
  Spilling liquid and possibly destroying the device if not diconnected and washed off properly, yes. Causing a fire, highly unlikely.
  The controller is powered by the nintendo systems 5V. Worst case scenario is that the voltage drop is significant enough to cause the nintendo to reset, forcing you to replay the game from start.
  If you have caused electrical fires with peripherals then you are most likely a retard.
7. Re:Looks like crap. by PopeRatzo · 2012-04-12 07:21 · Score: 1
  
  Causing a fire, highly unlikely.
  The controller is powered by the nintendo systems 5V. Worst case scenario is that the voltage drop is significant enough to cause the nintendo to reset, forcing you to replay the game from start.
  No, the 5V from the Nintendo controller caused a spark which scared the cat who knocked over a lamp whose 19th century paper shade caught a candle on the way to the woolen rug, which having recently been cleaned caused my wife to chase me out of the house with a broom, where I, drinking heavily in the garage accidentally dropped a lit cigarette onto a pile of rags sitting next to cans of paint and thinner. Thus, starting a fire which burned down the neighborhood.
  It's sort of like the old song about the speck on the flea on the tail on the frog on the bump on the log in the hole in the bottom of the sea, except with flammable materials and marital discord.
  Still, I filed suit against Nintendo, won a $14million award, bought a Maserati MC-2 which I later drove into a tanker truck carrying dimethyl ether.
  I got no luck.
  
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  You are welcome on my lawn.
This is not news by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 08:18 · Score: 0

And I do not mean in the sense that it's idle. I mean that in the sense that I've seen this kind of tables a few times already (only the NES controller unfortunately), on pretty much every 'tech' site.
1. Re:This is not news by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 08:29 · Score: 1, Informative
  
  Like this one from 2008? Or 2007?
  
  I would want this oversized NES to put the oversized NES controller in
For Sale by jgtg32a · 2012-04-11 08:22 · Score: 3, Funny

Oh, they're selling it now. I was wondering because this is years old.
1. Re:For Sale by LostCluster · 2012-04-11 08:37 · Score: 2
  
  Yep, and G4's AOTS did a similar thing when the show first started.
2. Re:For Sale by CastrTroy · 2012-04-11 08:54 · Score: 1
  
  Yeah, for $3500. For that price, the are definitely build to order. They are probably making quite a bit off each sale, but there's probably a lot of time spent making even a single table. For $500 and a lot of hard work you could easily build this thing yourself.
  
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  Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
3. Re:For Sale by FairAndHateful · 2012-04-11 09:23 · Score: 1
  
  Yeah, for $3500. For that price, the are definitely build to order. They are probably making quite a bit off each sale, but there's probably a lot of time spent making even a single table. For $500 and a lot of hard work you could easily build this thing yourself.
  3500 smackers? For that, I could buy a toolshed, fill it with the tools I need to do this, and still have 1000 smackers or more left over. That, and I'd still have the pride that I'd made it myself! (not to mention, being able to fix it on the fly, and, hey, I'd have a lot of power tools)
4. Re:For Sale by hipp5 · 2012-04-11 09:32 · Score: 1
  
  I doubt you could do it out of maple wood for $500. Good hardwood is frickin' expensive.
5. Re:For Sale by EdIII · 2012-04-11 09:41 · Score: 2
  
  Why does it have to be good hardwood?
  It's not a coffee table you are going to bequeath to your progeny so that in a hundred years they can go on Antiques Roadshow.
  Considering the application, I would think you could get away with much less expensive wood, stain it, and still have a nice conversation piece. Certainly not worth $3500, unless you are really really into both Nintendo and fine furniture.
  It looks to me like there is no more than $150 worth a wood at HomeDepot. Positive you could get all the wood, materials, and electronics for under $500.
6. Re:For Sale by jandrese · 2012-04-11 10:01 · Score: 2
  
  Home Depot sells mahogany?
  
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  I read the internet for the articles.
7. Re:For Sale by EdIII · 2012-04-11 10:13 · Score: 2
  
  It sells the stain. My point is not to use expensive hardwood for that kind of application. You could do it much cheaper
8. Re:For Sale by hipp5 · 2012-04-11 14:33 · Score: 1
  
  Sooooooo basically you're saying I can build myself a top-notch gaming computer for only $250 instead of $1500 if I simply switch out my Intel i7 for a celeron and my GeForce 680 for a Voodoo 2.
9. Re:For Sale by EdIII · 2012-04-11 14:54 · Score: 1
  
  Noooooooooooo
  You are using hyberbole and an inappropriate comparison.
  Hardwoods are extremely expensive. It is the difference between a multithousand dollar piece of furniture, or a decent coffee table for a couple hundred dollars. You can even go so far as p.o.s ikea crap you assemble yourself.
  If you pick up some regular wood at homedepot, say poplar or pine, and just stain it you have something reasonably nice and wont break the bank. That is real wood too, not plywood or some other compressed crap.
  Your comparison is wrong because the finished product will be quite close to the 3500 dollar version and perform the same.
  Probably cost a couple hundred in materials at the high end.
10. Re:For Sale by CastrTroy · 2012-04-11 21:39 · Score: 1
  
  Also, they sell hardwood flooring material for under $5.00 a square foot, with a table that's 3 feet x 6 feet, that's 18 sq feet. For $90 you could do the table top itself in real hardwood. Wood isn't that expensive.
  
  --
  
  Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
11. Re:For Sale by Inda · 2012-04-12 01:43 · Score: 1
  
  So the extreme is stained pine?
  
  C'mon, there's a reason for using nice hardwood. It looks nice and it's nice to work with. Nice.
  
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  This post contains benzene, nitrosamines, formaldehyde and hydrogen cyanide.
$3500?? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 08:24 · Score: 1

Make it a PS3 controller with rumble functionality and then we can start talking.
1. Re:$3500?? by digitalsushi · 2012-04-11 08:57 · Score: 1
  
  if my friend had a table with a vibrator in it, i would NEVER eat a skittle off that table. evar.
  
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  slashdot: where everyone yells sarcastic metaphors to themselves to understand the issue
2. Re:$3500?? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 09:07 · Score: 0
  
  What if your friend was hot?
3. Re:$3500?? by Sketchly · 2012-04-11 09:12 · Score: 1, Funny
  
  I have this dream where I'm lying under a glass-topped coffee table while a hot chick defecates onto it. It'd kinda spoil it if she was playing SuperMarioCart at the same time.
$3500 for that? by Keruo · 2012-04-11 08:25 · Score: 1

Seriously, $3500 for that? There really are people with too much money to spend.

Granted, it would be a nice woodworking project to build one.
But looking at the size of it, the wood would probably cost less than $200, throw in extra $100 for lacquer/varnish.

--
There are no atheists when recovering from tape backup.
1. Re:$3500 for that? by digitalsushi · 2012-04-11 08:55 · Score: 4, Insightful
  
  If you're regularly doing stuff like this guy us, it would be a portion of that for the finishes, since he'd already have them. But the wood is definitely going to cost more than 200 bucks. That's some nice wood he used. Mahogany and walnut are middle of the road woods, like 8 to 12 dollars per board foot. It's reasonable that he spent 600 dollars on the wood, and the bulk of the cost in this is definitely his time carefully designing the piece. If you stripped the cheap electronics out, this thing is still a 3400 dollar piece of furniture, non functional. In fact, the odds are good that whomever ends up purchasing this thing will put it in a corner and never plug it into a nes. It's a really gorgeous piece of work. I am definitely not a master wood worker but I have putzed around enough to know this isn't a weekend hack job.
  
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  slashdot: where everyone yells sarcastic metaphors to themselves to understand the issue
2. Re:$3500 for that? by emudoug42 · 2012-04-11 09:05 · Score: 1
  
  Wait, you mean a product costs more than the sum if its intrinsic parts? STOP THE PRESSES!
3. Re:$3500 for that? by Leuf · 2012-04-11 09:21 · Score: 2
  
  How about we don't have woodworkers price IT projects and don't have IT workers price woodworking projects? You are apparently expecting the wood to cut and assemble itself into a finished product, not consume any electricity in the process or require any rent to be paid on the facility it's building itself in. All of the tools required also purchased themselves and did not wear at all during the process. No other consumables like glue and sandpaper were needed. Further Etsy didn't take 3.5% and Paypal 2.5% off the top. No time was spent photographing, marketing, or answering questions from potential customers either.
  All that not withstanding, that maple is highly figured curly maple (which doesn't really show in the article pictures but does in the Etsy ones) so you aren't even close on the lumber costs.
4. Re:$3500 for that? by Chris+Burke · 2012-04-11 11:05 · Score: 2
  
  You are apparently expecting the wood to cut and assemble itself into a finished product
  Which is ridiculous because Nano-assembler-board would cost way more than $200!
  
  --
  
  The enemies of Democracy are
5. Re:$3500 for that? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 21:37 · Score: 0
  
  It costs more than the sum of its parts, and the cost of buying the tools to make it combined.
Been done before by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 08:27 · Score: -1

This has been done so many times before. Why is this even on Slashdot? Is this place turning into geekologie?
1. Re:Been done before by LordStormes · 2012-04-11 08:33 · Score: 1
  
  I had a pic of that same girl playing it as my twitter avatar in 2010.
remember seinfeld? by Ajustator · 2012-04-11 08:29 · Score: 1

coffee table about coffee table anyone?
Plug it in? by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 08:30 · Score: 0

They had IR wireless for this system back in the late 80's / early 90's - called the NES Satellite. Why in 2012 would I want to plug it in? How hard would it have been to integrate the NES Satellite hardware into it?
Similar project by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 08:36 · Score: 1

Thought this sounded familiar. Similar project back in 2008: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2c3q9K4cHzY
Old by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 08:37 · Score: -1

It has been done over and over again
Daft Punk Table way better by who_stole_my_kidneys · 2012-04-11 08:45 · Score: 2

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lVsKcuUapA
Nice woodworking by DerekLyons · 2012-04-11 08:52 · Score: 1

Nice woodworking job, can't help but wonder why he skimped and put such crappy legs on it though.
Splurge by KarrottoP · 2012-04-11 09:29 · Score: 1

You look at the picture in the article and you have to wonder why people in that apartment would drop $3500 on a controller coffee table. We need a /. article about financial responsibility.
1. Re:Splurge by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 10:35 · Score: 0
  
  We also need to round up everyone who is this obsessed over "retro gaming" and have them committed.
die Firefox, die! by GodWasAnAlien · 2012-04-11 09:37 · Score: 1

oh, you said Bowser
Quite possibly the coolest thing ever... by javascriptjunkie · 2012-04-11 11:23 · Score: 1

This is awesome. It would be a great way to introduce the kids to retro gaming.
since you asked by Osgeld · 2012-04-11 13:53 · Score: 2

""Ever wished that you could defeat Bowser literally right from your coffee table with giant built in buttons?"
No, why the hell would I want to do that, that sounds like a really bad controller, and frankly its a dumb thing to ask. Ever wish you could drive a car with a 90 foot steering wheel?
1. Re:since you asked by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-12 00:42 · Score: 0
  
  what if a giant comes round to your house? HOW WILL HE PLAY MARIO????
Not too practical by manwargi · 2012-04-11 14:23 · Score: 1

As hard as NES games were, I don't see anyone getting very far with the playable function of a giant controller...
1. Re:Not too practical by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-11 18:59 · Score: 0
  
  This depends somewhat. someone like a drummer or a speedmetal guitarist might do quite well. Finally a controller biased toward me!
Totally Expecting a blank, dumb MS. Pacman table. by Anonymous Coward · 2012-04-12 00:42 · Score: 0

Subject says it all. It could double as a coffee table, too, and it would have a look and feel that folks are familiar with...hmmm....I think I'll make one...