Controller Evolution

RowdyRodimus

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Fappy said:
I don't know if I would go as far as to say gaming continuity is easier to get into than comic book continuity. Although this may be the case for some games, generally its not very hard to say, track down and play the entirety of the Halo franchise (sorry Bob!) than it is to understand every nuance and character arch associated with the current members of the Avengers (oh yeah, and which team?) without research the characters' pasts and recent universe events.
Something that is missing from todays comics (and can be applied to games as well) is Stan Lees motto that "Every comic book is someones first comic book". You don't have to have a five page opening detailing what happened in the last 40 years, but add little dialogue boxes that reference the past and people catch on pretty quick.
 

sleeky01

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In the original post James Portnow said: "Different input devices lead to experiences (I'm convinced this is why space pilot games disappeared: the death of the PC joystick)."

I'm not sure this is really the case. It seems to me that a traditional console controller should be not barrier to the much missed space pilot game.

With a right analog stick to control X and Y and the left stick controlling how fast you move through Z. The two trigger buttons and your set for a basic control map for a space pilot game like something from the old X-Wing/Tie Fighter games.

Since I haven't played it, what was the control set-up for the space fighter portion of Halo Reach? Was it similar to what I posted above?

In a related question: How *CAN* one use a motion controller like Kinect in a space pilot type game? Seriously, how does Joker do it on the Normandy 1 and 2?

I wonder if perhaps something like the Peregrine gaming glove might be a bridge for Kinect in relation to space pilot games.

 

Ari Brown

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May 30, 2010
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Yahtzee said:
Yes, controllers are complicated enough now that they make it harder for potential new gamers to get into. You can observe this at any time by sitting your mother or spouse or other total non-gamer in front of GTA4 and seeing how well they do. Generally it's a surprise if they can manage to walk down the street without staring at the floor and blowing their own nuts off. Hell, I remember when I first tried using console controllers, having previously gamed on C64, Amiga and PC with joystick, mouse and keyboard, I was tying my thumbs up in knots. Navigating an avatar in 3D space would be disorienting at first even with the world's most intuitive controller.
What about navigating semi-autonomous machine in through a building? The contemporary 360/PS3 controller is intuitive enough to allow interface for all kinds of real world applications. My biggest and best examples are things like bomb disposal robots and new mobile armament systems for the military. In these cases you'd see in an operator in the field watching a video feed on some kind of monitor or the device itself as the robot moves, all while the operator is holding a gaming controller. Brushing aside things like Paintball and Airsoft, controlling these machines and watching their video feeds is what I think we should call "Real Life First Person Shooters" if only because we still find ourselves detached from the action and controlling an avatar of some form. Paintball and Airsoft (or "Action Sports" as I have heard them be called) should earn the titles of combat simulators because the human element far more vital than hitting a a button to perform a predetermined and repeatable action that humans can't reproduce. Funny and ironic point, this concept was somewhat explored in that terrible movie "GAMER" using human beings as avatars instead of robots and instead of a controller, the protagonist uses one to one based motion controls like the kinect. Yahtzee does have a good point though, because in order to effectively operate these devices, you need to be trained on just about every detail of the robot's functionality unless you want to blunder into a minefield and blow up a ten million dollar piece of equipment. I wonder how MovieBob's "first wave" gamers (people like me) would do trying to operate these things with no official training whatsoever. Just making you think. That's why I do it.

.02
 

lozfoe444

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I think motion controls can be immersive in some ways. Pointing at the screen to paint in Epic Mickey did a pretty good job of getting me into the world. The remote shaking, not so much.
I also think that it's a shame that the classics aren't more readily available to those who want to know more about gaming's past. It's sort of like how the first few decades of cinema are lost forever. And gaming's only in its third decade. Think of how many games will end up lost in the next few years.
Then again, even if they were available, I'm not sure if anyone would be interested. My family still refuses to watch Citizen Kane.
 

caviar1

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maybe someday steam and netflix and gamefly will have a threesome and i could rent a new game i wasn't sure about, buy a classic for very little and have these things delivered to my house for a monthly subscription fee. I love hearing the escapists heavy hitters throwing sharing their ideas together, great idea for a segment.
 

caviar1

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that is the coolest thing! that could bridge a gap between the hardcore and the newcomers, easy to use because the hand movement skills are already there and more practical than a keyboard, hell if this really takes off, i'd console game with this bad boy. i dont have to flail like with the connect or even stand up, to use Yahtzee's example, i could "read a good book" and still use a motion controller.
 

terror_ninja

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Cloud gaming? Like On-Live? Because im not too happy with the idea of using On-Live but I do wish there were digital downloads of my favorite PS2 games for my PS3.
 

commodorejohn

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Okay, could we please have a moratorium on the use of the term "the Cloud?" Please, please, pretty please? "Gaming-on-demand" at least makes sense and conveys meaningful information; "the Cloud" is just a God-damn Wired buzzword for people who think that distributed computing runs on pixie dust and leprechauns.
 

acsoundwave

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What? You make it sound like there's something wrong with wanting a skip button, Bob. I have to disagree strongly: a skip button is what makes everyone happy.

If the tutorial is mandatory for everyone each time you start a new game, people who already know what they are doing are going to find it annoying.
If the tutorial doesn't exist, no players are going to get frustrated and turn the game off.
If the tutorial is there, but you can choose to skip it, experienced players can skip the tutorial and just play, while new players can take the extra time to pick up the basics.

With a skip button, everyone is happy. Every game tutorial should be skippable. It's just something that should be in every game these days, like an option for subtitles, and an in-game brightness adjuster so we don't have to change our TV's or monitor's settings if one game decides to be too dark or too bright by default.[/quote]

Quoted for truth, Bob. Let's think of it this way: what if there were a new release of the original 8-bit Super Mario Bros., and it had an unskippable tutorial level telling you how to jump? I can't speak for, say, a new gamer who had never played a platformer, but regular gamers would be annoyed.
 

Thespian

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Holy crap I love this series, it's awesome. James Portnow is an excellent columnist. Great flow, great content.
 

rembrandtqeinstein

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With the arcade heritage a distant memory games have only gotten easier to play. As extreme examples compare Mega Man 1(or my favorite Contra) with Kirby's Epic Yarn.

Mega Man 1 was MADE to make you lose. In Epic Yarn you can't even die.

The xbox controller looks like crap. The pinnacle of controller perfection is the PS2/3 dual thumbstick controller.
 

Notashrimp09

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Daveman said:
In fact if we take a look at the Xbox controller more closely we can actually see it is designed to near perfection. They fixed the issue with the last controller of requiring huge hands to operate it, they added shoulder buttons because your fingers spend more time looped round the back there and you can easily control more than just two triggers. They stick to the standard layout of 4 buttons on the right which aides those familiar veterans with learning controls and a D-pad thrown in in the corner for easy access though it does not require a great deal of use due to the dual analogue controls. These two sticks are at different angles so in your mind they are much less likely to get mixed up due to the angle at which you hold it. These two thumbsticks have also evolved from dual joysticks as the joystick reuires much greater movement which is slower to respond which leads to frustration.

Basically, modern day controllers are actually pretty damn awesome and user friendly, having evolved from simple controllers, which only allowed simple gameplay, to more complex ones allowing a range of gameplay styles to be accomodated.
I'm glad someone finally mentioned controller design. Though not unexpected, I'm a little disappointed it didn't really get mentioned between the Big 3.

However, I'm going to disagree with you, Daveman. The controller design, particularly for the 360 is not pretty damn awesome, or user friendly -- to someone like me. I've got really small hands, and as much as I enjoy the 360, it's controller is often problematic for me when it comes to games. I can't imagine what it'd be like for me to play on the original XBox, dealing with an even larger controller.

Let's look at Guitar Hero for a second. It was a lot of fun at first, but I got bored after I started mastering songs on medium, but couldn't perform anywhere near as well on hard, let alone expert. No, it has nothing with my ability to play rhythm-based games -- I wouldn't have been able to get into my college's music major program if it were that. I had to pass exercises speaking one rhythm and tapping out another in a completely different meter, Guitar Hero is easy by comparison. However, in Guitar Hero, reaching that dreaded orange button required a physical shift of my entire hand (instead of a couple fingers) in its direction, and that few seconds of disorientation is costly mid-song. In this case, practice mode only gets you so far. There was a dissonant gap between what I could mentally understand the game asking me to do, and what I physically had to perform to do it successfully.

Look at something more recent. (For me and my preferences) Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is the most fun I've had gaming in a while, but I also have it on the 360. Having not played the previous installments, I'm having to learn everything from scratch -- and the challenge is also part of the fun. But it's another case where I lose time on some of the technical executions. Again, not because I'm incapable of "getting it," but when some of the more complicated button patterns involve moving all over the controller, it involves my entire hand moving all over the controller. My hand stretches to curve around the bumpers instead of resting there naturally, which means there's a lot less maneuverability in-between. (And at the moment, I don't have the money to invest in trying a stick.)

Now, before accusations start flying along the lines of why don't I play on a different console, or something with half-formed logic: I don't believe that my console preferences should be completely limited based on someone's size. That, and consoles are expensive -- If I already invested time and money into one console, I'm not keen on dropping a bunch of money I don't have to reinvest in everything because I enjoy one or two games that might be a little extra harder for someone like me to play. That's silly. I still have fun gaming, though it might be something to keep in mind for if there's ever a next-next-generation.

My question is this: is it far out of the technological realm for controller designs to go the line of baseball bats, bowling balls, and stringed instruments and be sized? Controllers, now in S, M, and L!
 

EscapingReality

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Fronzel said:
EscapingReality said:
Motion controls have really revolutionized gaming into making well thought out motion mechanics for people who are used to kinectic experiences. That is people who have most likely never touched a traditional controller. Case in point: My father. He gets dizzy with Tomb Raider and I couldn't get him into Smash Bros, but he is fucking crazy about Wii Sports.
"Revolutionized"? Really?

Maybe it's because my Wii mostly collects dust, but I can't name a game where the motion controls really make it much better.
Yes it did. Motion controls makes games what they used to be in the arcade: You pick up and you play em. Everyone can play them, and only few can really master them. Simple mechanics make for a great gameplay.

I don't see you complaining about how clusterfucked the Xbox 360 controller is, and believe me that can be a hell of a learning curve for someone who hasn't touched a controller forever. Case in point (again) my father: He's a pro on flight simulators with the traditional PC joystick of the medium, stick him with HAWX and a 360 controller and he goes apeshit for around 30 minutes before figuring out the rudder and the thrust engine button.
 

GeorgW

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Aw man, I want James as an uncle!
I liked that Yahtzee said what I've been saying for a while. Just wait a while and all the haters will die off.
 

EscapingReality

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Fronzel said:
EscapingReality said:
Motion controls makes games what they used to be in the arcade: You pick up and you play em. Everyone can play them, and only few can really master them. Simple mechanics make for a great gameplay.
Examples, please?
Mario, Asteroids, Pacman, Breakout, Donkey Kong, Angry Birds, Solipskier, Canabalt (simplest game ever), Audiosurf... I could go on forever and fill the page. Wii Sports is a prime example of simple mechanics/great game experience because you don't really need to learn to play. You just need to fucking play. In the words of MovieBob in The Game Overthinker: "Hitting a baseball with the bat shouldn't be the challenge because the bat is wrapped in barb wire; hitting the ball IS the challenge."

The gameplay mechanics are simplified by making you move something in par with the character in the screen. The translation of your ego (that is you) to your alter-ego (the character in the game) is seamless in the case of Wii Sports/Wii Sports Resort.

Not so much with third party games because they do not play test the games enough and thus make crappy controls for games that are not sport simulations. I played Indiana Jones and the Staff of Kings for the Wii... I regret ever doing that.

Kinect doesn't have that. Since you do not have any physical conection with the videogame as you play it, the control schemes are much more complicated. The Kinect in and of itself is a wonder of hardware engineering (just look at the things people have done with the free libraries for Linux) but as a peripheral and the games it comes attached with it sucks big balls. I have seen the Kinect and tested it myself to see the technology wasn't implemented correctly in the Microsoft Kinect games (which is ironic), and it just feels AWKWARD. It feels awkward to move your body around pretending you are holding a racket to play ping pong, when in the Wii you have a physical object (the Wiimote) that actually maked you feel you're holding the racket and thus you don't have to LEARN HOW TO PLAY you just gotta PLAY.

That is the analogy with ye olde arcades. You just pick up and play.
 

dreamcastgamer

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I personally take the view that games seem to be splitting off into two major categories: Gaming sports and gaming experiences. More conventionally, they would be Multiplayer and single player, but arcade games could also come into the sporty category with high scores.

Sporty games, like CoD online play, are all about you gaming skills, so for these it makes sense to add a controller that replicates a real life experience to prove that your better at it. No one really plays the wii alone, it was marketed as a family console because of this aspect here

Gaming experiences do not need or warrant motion control. These are the type of games Yhatzee compared to a good book. In these games, because you need to coach the player through the experience and require much more concentration on the situation not the activity, having a control method with little to no effort is beneficial.

I like both, which is why I am happy to see motion controls continue to grow, but as with have all heard from Zero Punctuation someone like Yhatzee does not like the competitive side of games, does not want the title as the best gamer around. I personally think this is one where yes we press forward with motion control, but it can never take over from conventional methods.
 

alphaxion

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EscapingReality said:
Kinect doesn't have that. Since you do not have any physical conection with the videogame as you play it, the control schemes are much more complicated. The Kinect in and of itself is a wonder of hardware engineering (just look at the things people have done with the free libraries for Linux) but as a peripheral and the games it comes attached with it sucks big balls. I have seen the Kinect and tested it myself to see the technology wasn't implemented correctly in the Microsoft Kinect games (which is ironic), and it just feels AWKWARD. It feels awkward to move your body around pretending you are holding a racket to play ping pong, when in the Wii you have a physical object (the Wiimote) that actually maked you feel you're holding the racket and thus you don't have to LEARN HOW TO PLAY you just gotta PLAY.

That is the analogy with ye olde arcades. You just pick up and play.
I spent the christmas period temping on the games counter in a large highstreet retailer, we had a kinect demo set up. The amount of times I had to go over and handhold people on what is going on an what is expected of them was insane for something that is meant to be intuative.

In fact, the majority of them walked over to the controller to try and use the machine instead, adding further problems. As it is, the implementation isn't spot on... however, I fully expect that to improve as people are increasingly exposed to this tech and it evolves along with them.

We're still gonna miss the predicted timeslot of 2015 when people think of using your hands on something physical as babyish/old hat. <3 BTTF ;)
 

Daveman

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Jan 8, 2009
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Notashrimp09 said:
Daveman said:
self-snip
I'm glad someone finally mentioned controller design. Though not unexpected, I'm a little disappointed it didn't really get mentioned between the Big 3.

However, I'm going to disagree with you, Daveman. The controller design, particularly for the 360 is not pretty damn awesome, or user friendly -- to someone like me. I've got really small hands, and as much as I enjoy the 360, it's controller is often problematic for me when it comes to games. I can't imagine what it'd be like for me to play on the original XBox, dealing with an even larger controller.

Let's look at Guitar Hero for a second. It was a lot of fun at first, but I got bored after I started mastering songs on medium, but couldn't perform anywhere near as well on hard, let alone expert. No, it has nothing with my ability to play rhythm-based games -- I wouldn't have been able to get into my college's music major program if it were that. I had to pass exercises speaking one rhythm and tapping out another in a completely different meter, Guitar Hero is easy by comparison. However, in Guitar Hero, reaching that dreaded orange button required a physical shift of my entire hand (instead of a couple fingers) in its direction, and that few seconds of disorientation is costly mid-song. In this case, practice mode only gets you so far. There was a dissonant gap between what I could mentally understand the game asking me to do, and what I physically had to perform to do it successfully.

Look at something more recent. (For me and my preferences) Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is the most fun I've had gaming in a while, but I also have it on the 360. Having not played the previous installments, I'm having to learn everything from scratch -- and the challenge is also part of the fun. But it's another case where I lose time on some of the technical executions. Again, not because I'm incapable of "getting it," but when some of the more complicated button patterns involve moving all over the controller, it involves my entire hand moving all over the controller. My hand stretches to curve around the bumpers instead of resting there naturally, which means there's a lot less maneuverability in-between. (And at the moment, I don't have the money to invest in trying a stick.)

Now, before accusations start flying along the lines of why don't I play on a different console, or something with half-formed logic: I don't believe that my console preferences should be completely limited based on someone's size. That, and consoles are expensive -- If I already invested time and money into one console, I'm not keen on dropping a bunch of money I don't have to reinvest in everything because I enjoy one or two games that might be a little extra harder for someone like me to play. That's silly. I still have fun gaming, though it might be something to keep in mind for if there's ever a next-next-generation.

My question is this: is it far out of the technological realm for controller designs to go the line of baseball bats, bowling balls, and stringed instruments and be sized? Controllers, now in S, M, and L!
I totally agree with you on the size thing. I don't have especially large hands and the old Xbox was indeed unbearable to play on because of it. The PS2 controller is more my kind of thing if I'm honest. The thing is we both exist within the bell curve, for those of us with smaller than average hands there are many more who find it perfectly comfortable, so the big gaming companies don't really care about us all that much. My large handed friends express similar problems, though more often with the PS3 controller. But that said, controllers may not be perfect, but they're a damn sight better than the ones that came before them. This entire point is that relatively small physical changes, unnoticable to the average observer, do make a huge difference in the enjoyment of a game. Motion controls are a HUGE step forward in gaming, when ultimately I would have liked them to take notice of the smaller details. One thing about studying engineering is it really opens your eyes to how much work people put into products. If you look at the controller, every single dimension has been carefully chosen. On a big project like the Xbox they no doubt had at least one person assigned to how big the thumbsticks would be and the exact size of the indent inside them. It's the little things that count... like little hands.
 

Thorvan

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Raiyan 1.0 said:
Thorvan said:
My only answer to this is... so? Just because we get simplified controllers does not mean that A; we lose the more complex ones, or B; it will result in necessarily worse experiences. There are significant markets for both the simplified and the complex input devices, for a smattering of reasons; and if we pressure game developers to provide a conduit for both of these in their games, what exactly is the downside?
Easton Dark said:
Start a new gamer onto S.T.A.L.K.E.R SOC and just wait a few hours.

Heck, even I get flustered by the number of hotkeys sometimes. Can't remember what's bandages and what's medkits.
In Dragon Age II, you can either take the whole hack-and-slash route (which is more oriented towards console gamers) or the whole finely-tuned micromanaging tactical route (which is suited better for the K&M setup). Then again, it's Bioware we're talking about, who's not known for shitty ports and actually makes proper multiplatform games. But what's to say that other devs will go through the trouble to cater to two entirely different fighting mechanisms?

Take a look at Tiberium Twilight. The game was trying to cater to both PC and console (though everyone was fired before they could finish a port) through radical changes in gameplay. The result of the more console-oriented gameplay was that it destroyed the C&C series for the PC community.

For all you know, the next Ace Combat iteration might just have QTEs for performing kulbits and pugachevs to make it more 'accessible' and to become the next 'CoD-killer'... '-_-
Well, don't buy the game, send a letter to the developer, encourage others to do the same. Yes, I UNDERSTAND that it's a problem for some, but again, having both simple and complex controls is a good thing, and it's a problem WE can fix either way.