The point of the Wii U is that it has a fancy, touch-screen controller. That may not be suitable for all titles, though. Especially ones being ported from other consoles. For that, much like the Wii, the Wii U will have a Pro Controller, one resembling those of Nintendo’s competitors.
Nintendo Unveils Hardcore Wii U Controller
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47 responses to “Nintendo Unveils Hardcore Wii U Controller”
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ZapSo do you have to buy this separately to play the ported games?
Or will it work with the tablet?
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StephoIt’ll work on the WiiU gamepad but this is just for people who want a more mainstream controller.
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Zap
So….does that mean the expensive tablet controller will be a gimmick that developers don’t actually need to bother with?
Flamebait language aside, that kind of seems what is happening here.
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Some_GuyDerp, there was the classic controller pro for the Wii, you know. But no games actually required it. It was an optional alternative for people that simply didn’t care for the WiiMote, or its controls for a particular game.
This seems to just be a better version of the classic controller pro, with added buttons for WiiU functionality.
I’ll be very surprised if even a single developer just abandons the tablet in favour of an optional controller. Imagine how pissed off you’d be if you bought a game and couldn’t play it due to not owning the controller.
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Zap
I should have fleshed that out a bit more – you raise good points, though.
What I am getting at is that the games can be played on either the tablet or the Pro controller. They have exactly the same buttons, so both will work – however, the tablet has the screen that has been a central plank in “explaining” why the WiiU isn’t just a late-coming Gen 8 console.
However, I would assume that any developers that can simply port a game to the controls – and ignore adding in WiiU specific screen data – will likely do so. Much simpler and cheaper to make one game from three consoles that is more or less identical.
To me, that would suggest that a developer would have to be really invested in the WiiU, or be first-party, to really make use of the screen.
That seems a shame, and would pretty much relegate it to being a gimmick.
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AstairThis controller has all the same buttons as the tablet. I assume It’s simply for people who prefer to use a controller like this for games that don’t require the tablet screen.
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TheLastQuestionI would be very happy if the stick and the buttons on the right hand side switched places. Gamecube controller meets Xbox 360 controller = perfect.
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Blake*picks up 360 controller*
I actually don’t think button placement will matter much here, my left thumb on the dpad feels more comfortable than my right on a stick. I think it’ll be fine there.More importantly, all games should now implement a lefty flip for all those lefty’s out there.
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StevorooniThe face button placement looks a little awkward, but still it looks nice.
Also I hope this also means that there’ll be a black WiiU at launch.
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PowalenAt first I thought the thumbstick placement was stupid but… I don’t know. I could see this working. Will have to try it and see.
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RizeThat looks like a much more comfortable set up over the 360 controller (for me, at least). Happy they understand some people will want a fully featured controller before launch.
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Lactose The IntolerantIt looks like a cheep thrid-party xbox controller. I also don’t see this bringing in all the burned hardcore gamers that got treated like garbage early in the original Wiis life cycles.
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AzzaI am a “hardcore” gamer who was very aware of what direction Nintendo was taking the Wii and despite loving a lot of their IPs, I still knew it wasn’t for me. If they can pull off a decent controller and get most of the bigger titles that are usually reserved for just X360 and PS3, then I am interested. My only real concern will be the actual life of this system, it will potentially only be relevant until the X720/PS4 come out.
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Jordaan MylonasButtons should be above the thumbstick on the right hand side. Otherwise, looks comfortable enough.
Seriously though, just clone the Xbox 360 Controller, it is at maximum comfort. -
yawnStart, Select, Home and Power? Seriously? Completely unnecessary.
Hardly anyone uses the D-pad as primary controls these days so why is it aligned with the buttons? (Sony only gets away with it because of it’s legacy) Very poor design Nintendo. Still not getting it are you.-
Rize
Excluding power, the PS3 and 360 controllers have the same buttons (under different names)…
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yawn
I know they’re there for Wii compatibility but I would hope they’d at least have removed the power button. Also I can’t remember the last time I used the Select button in a game so would like to see all manufacturers remove it.
I just wish they’d taken more of a design cue from Apple in terms of making things simpler rather than throwing everything in and expecting us to be impressed.-
Rize
I think the point that cruXis makes below pretty much sums it up: a lot of it is there for backwards comparability. I’m OK with that, as long as all the awesome games from the past are accessible 😀
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cruXisThe D-pad is probably aligned with the buttons for Virtual Console-type games for the NES, SNES etc when controllers didn’t have thumbsticks.
Unlike Microsoft and Sony, Nintendo has a big backlog of retro, pre-thumbstick-day games that they can offer to people.
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ZevensoftSony has pre-thumbstick games, basically every game released for the original Playstation before April 1997 (The release of the dual analog controller.)
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cruXis
Admittedly, I forgot about them. But that’s what… 2 years of games compared to Nintendo’s 10 years or so?
I’m not saying that they don’t need the D-pad, just that it’s a necessary part of the controller, especially for Nintendo. yawn seems to think otherwise.
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masha2932I hope they have a bunch of demo stations at launch. I want to see how these controllers feel.
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cruXis
Haha… wut.
It’s a controller. They’ve all taken from controllers of previous generations. The original Xbox controller “plagiarised” from the PS and N64 controllers. Damn Microsoft! How dare you not come up with your own completely new controls for the Xbox!
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weresmurf
The button locale isn’t the question, each controller since the PS1 dual analogue has had two analogue control sticks and generally an 8 button layout. It’s the actual casing for it.
Are you actually *that* blind…
Spring Onion, you’re some sort of racist idiot, I wouldn’t piss on you if you were on fire mate.
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Nick LCompanies have been ripping off each others controller designs for years. I’m glad that Ninteno have used the X360 controller as a design for this. This is a must buy for me.
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DainbramageIt’s like the took the best parts of the 360 controller AMD the worst parts of the PS3 controller. Well at least I hope the position of the right analog stick isn’t going to be counter intuitive. The positions of the analog layout always was a bit annoying for me on the dual shocks.
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weresmurf
I just held my 360 controller, tried putting my thumb over where the new position of the stick is, it feels uncomfortable, hold both hands together in a closed fashion. MS and SONY both did their research to the positioning of fingers and thumbs and the best layouts to suit. This? This doesn’t.
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LachlanYou get used to PS3, but I do agree the 360 setup is better, even though I prefer PS3 over 360 (mostly for importing lol)
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weresmurf
So I’m just wondering… when is MS lodging the lawsuit… I know MS created a controller like sony did, two sticks, buttons (MS did have triggers first granted) and all that, but this… wow. This is blatant IP ripoff.
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ThomIn terms of layouts, if you agree that the major consoles need roughly the same number of buttons for portability, there really is an optimal layout, and after twenty years it looks like we’ve pretty much found it. However, the non-ergomic aspects of this design are so blatantly ripped from the 360 pad, I can’t see this ending well for Nintendo. Excusing the placement of the second stick, the overall shape is identical.
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cruXis
Non-ergonomic in what way? I’ve found the 360 controller to be much better than anything I’ve previously used.
The biggest problem I can see with this controller right now (haven’t tried it obviously so I don’t know how swapping the buttons with the thumbstick on the right side would go), is that the buttons are swapped compared to the 360 controller. So 360’s A button is B on the Wii U controller etc. I know when I first use this my brain will be wired for 360 controller use and I’ll be hitting the wrong button when try to press A.
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Thom
I don’t mean to suggest that the layout is non-ergonomic. I’m referring to the design decisions that impact the look, rather than the feel (the art vs. the ergonomics). The former is much harder to defend in court, especially seeing as there is extensive prior evidence for the ergonomics of the layout.
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cruXis
Ah, I misunderstood your post.
It will be interesting to see if Microsoft will do anything about this. Having said that, I hope nothing comes of it as I’m happy with this controller and it definitely looks to be an improvement on the Classic Controller Pro.
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AkIRAThis isbthe bastard love child of the PS3 and 360 controller. I thought Nintendo innovated game controls
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AdzaHello, the Wii U Game Pad. This is for when there are games that don’t necessarily need the tablet controller, and for two player games and co op etc. It might even work as a controller for the tablet screen when not using the TV for display. Although that might not be the best use of it. It’s definitely a step up from the Wii classic controllers, but yeah it does share a LOT with the 360 controllers.
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