The Story Of: 5 Completely Crazy Console Controllers
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- Опубліковано 23 лип 2024
- In this video I look five completely crazy controllers designed to work with home consoles.
Video Links:
Cancelled Console Expansions - • The Story of: 5 Cancel...
Project Puffer Page - www.atarihq.com/othersec/puffer/
Atari Mindlink Page - www.atarihq.com/museum/2678/mi...
Tumbleweeds Prototype - www.atariprotos.com/5200/softw...
Jungle Cruise Prototype - www.atariprotos.com/5200/softw...
Sega Activator Info: segaretro.org/Activator
Support my creative work on Patreon - / lairdslair
#sega #retrogaming #atari - Ігри
@13:55 I love how they just start mercilessly shredding on the guitar from this point until the end of the commercial.
I have a Sega controller chair. It's actually quite fun for when people come over and don't mind looking daft. If you combine it with the 3D glasses and use it to play Space Harrier 3D on the Master System, you win the retro hipster gold medal and absolutely do not question your life choices :)
Wow, that's really cool! I have never seen one!
@@TheLairdsLair it's an odd one because despite being an official Sega peripheral, it has no Sega logo. I got it years back on Ebay, just sold as a 'chair controller'. I was quite into daft stuff like that at the time so I bought it. It's basically a fibreglass chair stuck on top of a metal frame with what is basically a giant version of the bottom of a four way stick under, well, your bottom. There are two handles with buttons and the whole thing feels like your sitting in some kind of weird mix of a bobsleigh and a C5 :)
The second one I heard called an UNroller controller. It was a trackball that didn't roll. But you push the ball to move. I thought, "what's the point?"
Great video, thanks. I was an electronics junkie back in HS when I had an Atari VCS (2600). I built a Decathalon controller using a SPDT mercury switch from "The Shack" (remember when you buy those off the shelf) and put it into a small box you could shake back and forth, then I set up a foot pedal for the action button. We ran up amazing scores in Decathlon with that setup. I also built an Asteroids 5 button controller using an old wooden cigar box and some buttons from an electronics surplus store. It also worked great for Space Invaders. Though I did fail trying to build a true to life Defender controller using a relay trying to simulate the reverse button and thrust button as opposed to left and right stick movement.
The Game Handler for the NES used the exact same tech that was in Atari's Le Stick. It's like they had enough of the components left over to sell it as a NES controller. It at least came with a VHS that taught you how to use it!
I didn't know about that, thanks for pointing it out!
9:37: "Datasoft released games like "Bruce lee and the Goonies"" Wow, best crossover ever! I want to play that game so bad now!
Loved the video. Love the channel. I found a Turbo Touch 360 controller for Sega Genesis at a thrift store for cheap and bought it not knowing exactly what it was. I just knew it looked cool. I fell in love with it. It actually works surprisingly well although it took a bit of getting used to.
I worked in an SEN unit that used Quickshot Ball (or more specifically the Sigma badged version) controllers connected to BBC Micros. They were really effective for kids with limited motor control who couldn't use conventional keyboards or joystick controllers. The suction cups made them ideal for mounting on desks, and tray-tables on wheelchairs.
The controllers worked well as a pointing and selection device, although I can't imagine they'd be much use for fast-paced arcade games. I wonder if they decided they weren't selling enough of them in the educational/disability support sector, and decided to rebrand them as a gaming controller?
Interesting, especially as my wife is a SEN teacher. It's certainly possible, although doubtful as Quickshot designed a lot of really bad and impractical controllers. It seemed they had a strategy of just throwing everything at the wall to see what sticked (excuse the pun!).
Atari Mind Link seems kinda the craziest of all the console controllers 🕹️ in this video 😹.
And if i could find Track Ball,
i would definitely switch it into my Amiga 500 and play MARBLE MADNESS 😺👍🕹️.
The Atari Trackball works on the Amiga; I bought one expressly for MM on the Amiga! (I don't recall exactly, but you might have to change the mode using the switch underneath.)
We had a Quick Shot Ball for the Spectrum, and it was absolutely terrible! Apart from anything else, it seemed to be permanently stuck on auto fire, despite what position you had the switch in.
I had a quickshot ball, it was not that bad. There are just microswitches under the ball and you push the ball in the direction and it press the microswitch underneath. At begin it was strange but after some time it was okay.
I didn't get the puffer. But I did get The Fluffer. Invigorating for sure!
I've used Le Stick. The button was really nice quality. The joystick function, not so much. if you didn't hold it perfectly still it it would trigger movement somewhere. So, most games went like this: No, No, No, No, NO, NO, NOOOOO!
The Sega Activator commercial makes me think of Keith Apicary on AVGN's christmas episode 😂
Actually, I AM surprised that most of these originated from the 80s, considering the 90s had such oddballs like the HeartBeat Catalyst that had games like Outback Joey, a *2D PLATFORMER.*
Years ago I got a load of C64 cassettes just given to me by someone as well as some random controllers. One was the Quickshot 9 and I had no clue what it was. I'll admit at first I thought it was some kind of mouse until I realised the ball had micro switches and wasn't an actual ball. I tried it once or twice and never again as I wasn't sure if it was broken or it was just really unresponsive.
I think Le Stick may be better known in North America than elsewhere. I recall a later PC controller with the same basic idea, but as an analog stick (as was standard for PC clones of the time).
Anyway, look up C64 BodyLink or BodyLog for some crazy controllers. These were more focused on exercise/health, but you actually did control games with them. Basically like Wii Fit, but 8-bit. There's an article in Internet Archive - Commodore MicroComputer issue 42 1986-July/August, starting page 73.
It even includes a headband eyebrow controller.
Looking around, evidence of the actual existence of BodyLink/BodyLog out in the wild seems very scarce. Even though it was New York based, and there were lots of ads in the major USA Commodore magazines, my quick googling around only reveals evidence of examples in Europe out in the wild.
I'll check that out, sounds very interesting, thanks!
In fact, Paperboy was born from the ill-fated Atari Puffer.
I've used that Quickshot ball. A cousin had basically everything Spectravideo released for MSX ever, including the computers themselves.
Great list Laird. I was reminded of the one handed , PS1 controller and I believe it came to us thanks to ASCII company. The thing works well enough,but just trying to do all of the PS1s controls at once is hard enough with 2 hands. So it kinda sucked, by no fault of Ill manufacturing. Thanks
The Ascii GRIP. It was great for RPGs and turn based games... especially if you were a smoker! I used it for hundreds of hours with Final Fantasy Tactics.
I got quickshot IX for my C64 and it was the same as a standard joystick. The auto fire function was also handy in some games.
That's Crazy!
How about the U-Force, NES Power Glove, The Glove N64, Hori Dragon Quest Slime, Intel Wireless Series controller, Nuby Boomerang N64, PS3 Boomerang controller (unused), Prototype Nintendo Star controller (unused), Bowling Ball Wii controller, ALT avatar motion control, SpaceOrb 360, Microsoft Sidewinder Dual Strike, Microsoft Sidewinder Freestyle Pro, Logitech Cyberman 2, Apple Bandai Pippin, Hori Super Robot Wars one handed controller, Mega Drive action chair, Nintendo roll 'n rocker, PS2 Katana Soul, Alpha Grip G5, Turbo Touch 360, Ultra Racer 64, Sega XE-1AP (it predates the Saturn 3D and Dreamcast controllers), Fragfx Piranha FPS, and Fragfx Shark?
I didn't have it in the day, but I have a Quickshot 9 joyball now, in its box. I didn't do my research when I got it in 2004, and thought it was more like a trackball. The seed of a good idea is there; us older gamers might not be able to use standard controllers as our joints age, and something that lets us control games in our dotage might be of use. Not the QS9, though.
Great and informative video, as always. Though I didn't have "le stick" nor do I remember it, I did have the later Hot Stik motion-control joystick for the NES. It seemed to work the same way as le stick but without lookiing like a willy. ha. It was a gift in 91 maybe, and, to be honest, when I first got it I thought it was pretty cool and would play games decently often using it. It was pretty janky, but somewhat worked. Even if it wasn't great, my friends and cousins and I would use it as a benchmark of skill to see how far each of us could get in games using it (T&C Surf Designs, Mario 2 and 3, TMNT 2, and Twin Cobra were some of the "true skill" testing games we'd frequent with though nearly every game we had or rented got the Hot Stik competition test). It was silly for us to think getting far using that stick was any kind of skill, since sometimes it was iffy whether it was going to register a movement or not. Then, in '93 I was a pedestrian in a car accident and have had a mild essential tremor ever since, so the Hot Stik was so, so, sooo frustrating to use after because my hands shake (regular controllers/sticks are bad enough...I have problems with analog sticks more so than d-pad/full-joystick) that that it's basically been back in the box ever since. I still have it, but the only time I've used it since was about 12-13 years ago to show a co-worked who had never heard of any motion-control sticks for 8-bit systems. I'm just glad the stick I have does not look like the "le stick"! Mom got me Turbo Touch 360 pads for the NES and for the Genesis (which I bought myself in 93 for Mortal Kombat) that Christmas because she thought maybe they'd be less frustrating than a regular d-pad for me. Those are unusual controllers, replacing the d-pad with touch pad. In some ways, the Turbo Touch 360s were worse than the Hot Stik (when it was new, and I didn't have the tremor), but they were still kind of neat though not very effective. They were probably actually worse for me because of the tremor though they were less painful for my left hand so a bit of a lose-win situation. I don't use my Genesis Turbo Touch 360 at all basically; however, I use my NES one pretty often actually. I usually use one of my Advantages or the Starmaster joystick I have on the NES both of which were picked up by me used later on and didn't have them back in the 80s and early 90s, but I do use the 360 sometimes for some games when I want to use an pad instead of joystick (I do also use my original NES controllers and an old Recoton turbo controller).
It's funny you mention the Turbo Touch 360, because they are on my list for a follow up video!
@@TheLairdsLair They are not great, but they also not completely terrible either as some online would have everyone believe...though it's effectiveness depends on the game. I certainly don't recommend anyone go out and buy one, but I much prefer the Turbo Touch 360 over, say, the NES Max, which people seem to want to compare it to but they don't really feel any way similar to use. I gravitate to using it (again, along with usually the standard controller or Recoton if I want some Turbo or the Advantage and Starmaster) probably because for a while mom insisted that I should use the two 360s, so it's mostly nostalgia of some degree. The Turbo Touch works really well though for the hammer throw in Track and Field 2 and mate toss in Caveman Games on NES!
That's crazy!
I was surprised to not see the Rock n Roller for the NES on this list. Maybe if it was a Top 10 or Top 25.
I decided to do an NES only version of the video because there were so many!
@@TheLairdsLairI'll try to keep an eye out, and save sharing my personal story with the controller for that video then!
The Atari Puffer seems like a precursor to Peleton, and therefore far too ahead of its time.
Peleton weren't the first, either. My parents have an exercise bike for the Wii.
I had a quickshot ball for my Spectrum. And yeah, it really didn't live up to it's trackball appearance, although I never did really get on with joysticks as a contol method in general. I don't remember what it came with, but I'm sure it was a free gift, probably with a magazine subscription.
I'm simply amazed you don't have these especially with what your channel content covers quite a lot of oddball stuff
Luckily, we never got any Sega Activator here in Italy! It was promoted, but we never got it in facts...
That girl looks like the mind link really penetrates her inner self.....today she has 2 gigantic tumors on each side of her head and fills in for mickey mouse when he needs a break
10:22 I'm dead 😂💀
I remember (i think on tomorrow's world) an exercise bike that linked to vertically scrolling shooter where pedal speed increased weapon power
I never got on with the N64 controller. I get that it gives you a choice of input method, etc... but I still wanted three hands.
I love how many of these would seem like obviously terrible ideas to anyone who’d ever played a single video game.
Totally!
Le Stick - I tried one of these once. It was absolute garbage.
BTW, there was another joystick substitute that looked like a trackball. It was called the Un-Roller Controller and featured what looked like a big yellow ball in a blue base, with the standard (yellow) fire button in the upper left corner. However, it wasn't a ball, it was a dome, and apparently, you pressed on the sides of the dome to input directions.
A weird controller that I DID see was a PS1/PS2 controller. It looked like a standard Dual Shock controller, but instead of thumbsticks, it just had balls in the sockets. They moved like thumbsticks though. I realize that this isn't really that strange as you could easily make this out of a normal DS by cutting off the thumbsticks and sanding the surface smooth. I just find it strange that someone would create a controller like this, especially since it was harder to move the balls/domes than to move a thumbstick. I forget what it was called or who made it. I saw it in Goodwill and should have bought it.
I know I've seen and used the quickshot ball. Can't remember where, though. Might have been given one and gave it to someone else.
I have not heard of any of the controllers, including Sega’s Activator. A couple of them were ahead of their time.
Those Le Sticks are pretty dangerous from what I heard. When I was younger I found my mom's and she was horrified when she saw I found it. She was like "get that out of your mouth!" Probably because of the mercury. I'm not sure why she had it, considering she never played Atari...
Hahahahaha, brilliant!
I forgot about owning the Quickshot 9 back in the day. Or did I wipe out from my memory 😂
Well, it is pretty traumatising!
11:00 Correct me if I misheard, but I rolled the video back a couple times, and it sounds like he says 1983 for the Activator, instead of '93. Am I going crazy, or did he just flub a line? (Which is fine, I can barely say my own name some days....)
Also, I think the Activator could emulate the 6 button controller. I seem to recall that the sensors were at least good enough to recognize a "low" interrupt and a "high", i.e., the "punches" and "kicks".
I never used one though, but that stands out being a thing I vividly remember reading. Absolutely could be wrong though.
Yeah sounds like a flub, should be 1993. Every website I found said it was only compatible with the 3 button, so I think you have imagined that.
For some reason I ended up inheriting the Quickshot ball. As you suggest it was totally useless all it did was click, very slowly and the buttons had a long travel meaning slow fire times. edit to add: I also used 'the stick' at the local computer shop which was pretty good for playing track and field type games.
I'm simply amazed at the amount of people in this comments section who owned one as I never saw one anywhere back in the day!
Not to mention that Le Stick can potentially be toxic due to that mercury switch.
Good point, I should have mentioned that!
I had a "Le Stick". It was truly terrible. About the only "neat" thing you could do with it was completely invert it, at which point it activated all 4 directions at once which would glitch out some games. A friend had the Qucikshot IX (He had all the quickshots he could buy) and I remeber being terribly disappointed it wasn't a true trackball. Now I'm wondering if I could build a trackball in the form factor?
My Xwife bought me the Le Shhhstick for my Birthday year's ago which i though was odd because i didn't have a Atari?
I had the Datasoft stick, it was not usable, the mercury or gallium tended to stick way too hard once it reached a contact, so it took a hard shake into the correct direction to switch contacts.
It was the biggest POS of a controller I ever had in my life!
Another huge problem I noticed about the Le Stick is that I assume the mercury switch has actual mercury in it, which is a highly toxic material. So if you broke the Le Stick in a way that damages the mercury switch, you’re going to have to evacuate yourself and your family from the household and call a HAZMAT team to clean up the spill.
I'm surprised you didn't mention the U-Force.
I actually had so many that I've spilt this into 2 videos . . . . .
@@TheLairdsLair There's probably enough wacky controllers to do a whole series. :D
Or the Roll and Rocker
I have the quickshot ball, and Le Stick
I'm very sorry.
you want some suggestions for a part 2?
broderbund u-force (nes)
ascii grip (nes, snes, ps and saturn)
pachinko controller (fc, pc engine)
mattel poweglove (nes)
hori handle (fc) aka sega handle (mk3, sms, md) (the fc lead also works with the sega handle)
Great stuff thanks!
Famicom has it fair share of random controllers, the pad for the modem system, track&field pad, hori track pad, bandai karaoke studio...
@@orkoto6057 i was just going for pads in my collection but yes there are plenty of other odd ones, the banking controller that came with the famicom modem is another i have but i've never really seen the track and field unit as anything odd, i have them for 2600, atari hcs and famicom and they do exactly the job they were designed to do, same with the ddr hand controllers, odd to many but for someone like me who is no longer able to use a floor mat as my legs don't work they become essential if i wish to play that type of game.
@@TheLairdsLair one booboo on my part the ascii grip was also made for the ps2 but that's one i'm missing in my collection, but another i thought of was the amstrad analog joystick for the gx4000, only 1 game ever used it (tennis) and even then only for player 2 since the gx only had one analog port, we did used to interact on twitter but i dont see you around on there anymore.
ASCII Grip was dope though.
Wow, these are insane but why the random photo of Arnold Rimmer?
Google "The Brittas Empire" and your question will be answered . . . . .
@@TheLairdsLair Just did and I plan to try watching it tonight. Thanks.
WoooW atari was really ahead for it’s time with their sadly hometrainer addon for their 5200,too bad they didn’t even make a special deal with fitness centers to use those systems along with those supported games and the atari 5200,that would,ve be really great & innovative back day,also because it was not untill nintendo did had their counter cross home trainer for fitness centers to better promote their snes and certain games as well,what a missed oppertunity from atari,ouch
I hate the siga activator because it kind of fucked-up eternal champions. There is a couple of moves that are just a nightmare to do in that game because they were designed to be easier to do with the activator
Interesting, I didn't know that!
that "that's crazy" bit sounds like madlittlepixel
I don't even know who that is!
The old wico joystick would last forever, but it wasn't good in my opinion, too loose.
the menacer and super scope were totally absurd and stupid to use
Although I never had a menacer I would argue that the super scope is the more absurd to use.
9:34 Is Bruce Lee and the Goonies 1 game or 2 separate games ? Please say there's a game called Bruce Lee and the Goonies!
Separate games lol
7:52 is that Rimmer?
Nope, it's Gordon Brittas!
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(same actor though!)
I remember seeing that giant trackball looking thing in the stores. I was so let down when I finally tried one at a thrift store years later. Completely useless.
NSFW: Atari Fluffer.
The Atari game dong.....wow.....yes kids mercury will kill u.....hell now your playing with power
Those quick shot controllers were not good
Is There Anyone Between The Ages of 20 to 50 Making A UA-cam Channel About The Future of Activision Games?
4:26 oh, 8 know, I know, this is AMOGUS controller, haha, ahaha, aha, what a clever freaking joke, I'm so genius ahaha
...
I mean, someone just should have said that sooner or later, that was too inevitable