Tuesday 3 February 2009

Remoulding the mould

Illusion of control is the tendancy for human beings to believe they can conrtol, or at least influence, outcomes that they demonstrably have no influence over. That won't be games then!

I thought it would be a good idea to give a nod to the controllers of the Saturn. Sure, Segata carries a massive white (mark II) controller (the holy grail of controllers in fact), but let us not forget the other models:

Name: Saturn 'Mark I' Controller
Regions: USA/Europe
Advantages: Big
Disadvantages: Feels cheap, unresponsive D-pad, not the Japanese controller

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Name: Saturn "Mark II" Controller
Regions: Japan (original), Europe and USA later
Advantages: Widely regarded as the best controller ever made; Great D-pad, 6 button controller is great for Capcom fighters, nice clicky triggers, lightweight.
Disadvantages: Wasn't available on Dreamcast



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Name: Saturn 3D Control Pad
Regions: Japan, USA, Europe
Advantages: Amazing analogue sensitivity. Great for; SEGA Rally Championship, NiGHTS. Excellent triggers.
Disadvantages: Wasn't used to full potential...




The only known project to utilise the pull-out connector was for "Air NiGHTS" but apparently, the Wii version should do the same thing as it's had 11 years to improve... hmm, don't know about that. 

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So, there we have it. Not really a comprehensive list, but I covered the main three. Stay tuned for more, this Saturnalia!


8 comments:

Tom Charnock said...

Reading this blog makes me want to get hold of a Saturn again. I've had both the top pads in my time as a Saturn owner, but never the NiGHTS pad. I saw one at a carboot sale once a few years ago, complete with a copy of said game, but the guy selling it wanted 30 quid. Who takes 30 quid to a carboot sale?! Also just discovered a little games shop near me selling Saturn games for 3 pounds each...I think a purchase may be on the cards soon...

PS - the blog still seems broken - what's the deal?!

elend said...

Oh, the Saturn's EUR Joypad. What a big pile of crap it was. Play with it for a mere minutes and your thumb will fall off. I still don't get it, why they approved that pad. Did they think "Oh.. Yes.. it's good!"? Did they actually play with it? Oh my..

Good that Japan came to the rescue and the best pad of them all came to the european market. Even in a very nice black finish. Woo!

Animated AF said...

What the? I didn't know the analog controller had a pull-out-y bit!

NiGHTS Wii didn't even try to do motion control, they gave you a shit pointer based control, and gamecube/classic controller options. This is probably because it was apparently planned as a PS3/360 game. Shame.

Ujn Hunter said...

Wow, I've owned the Analog pad ever since Nights came out... and didn't know about that pull-out thing either! :P

マーティン said...

a) Get your Saturns out guys!

b) I have no idea how to fix the blog as I can't edit it

c) The pully out bit was one of the first things I noticed about it when I got it out of the box in 97

:)

NebachadnezzaR said...

I never tried the mark 1 controller, but I always loved its design. The d-pad looks like crap, but the overall round shape looks really good in my opinion. Too bad that it apparently sucks at what's most important.

The mark 2 pad on the other hand is just awesome. That d-pad is still probably the best ever made (oh, if only the 360 had a d-pad like that...), and the disposition and shape of the face buttons is also pretty good.

I would love to have a 3D pad, but they're so expensive...

fatherkrishna said...

The mark 1 controller is horrendous.
The first Saturn I had, came with mark II controllers. I actually phoned Sega Europe in about 2002 and they sent me "brand new" Mark 1 controller boxed up, as well as a boxed up TV connection lead.

I thought the Mark 1 was a Mark 2, 'cos I'd never seen one before (are you following?) though it got used once and never again by me, I would give it to friends during two player bouts so I would have an immediate advantage...

Now what's all this about the 'Yard being broken? I'm looking at it through Firefox and it looks absolutely fine...

マーティン said...

It seems the site is currently ONLY working in firefox. Safari and IE aren't rendering it any more?! how weird.