Along with the forthcoming adaptor that will let people play Super Smash Bros on Wii U with their old GameCube controllers, the peripheral company PDP is making some custom GameCube-style controllers for Nintendo’s new console. We saw them today, and they look just lovely.
Stephen Totilo and I found the three controllers, officially named the “wired fight pad”, on the show floor at E3 today. They were on display with matching wiimotes, though the wiimotes are official Nintendo products, not made by PDP.
The wired fight pad comes in three varieties. There’s Yoshi:
Mario:
and Peach:
Vital stats: The PDP reps said that all three controllers will be a limited run, and will be available for pre-order at Gamestop starting now. I can’t find them on the Gamestop site, so who knows how limited they are or when orders are officially open, but it sounds like it will be soon. The PDP site lists them as going for $US24.99.
The controllers differ from a classic GameCube controller in a few ways – they have two matching thumbsticks, they have two shoulder buttons and a “home” button, which will let them work much like a Wii U pro controller. As for the wiimotes, the Yoshi wiimote will only be available in Europe, and the other two will be available in North America at least.
I’ve been holding off buying a pro controller, and now I’m glad I did.
Comments
19 responses to “The New Wii U GameCube Controllers Are Super Hot”
It’s a pity these are not officially made by Nintendo. We kinda need some official Wii U Gamecube controllers. These look nice and all but something about them doesn’t seem right, and I’m *always* wary of third party console controllers.
Yeah I wish Nintendo had chosen to make a gcn controller 2.0 as the wii u pro controller instead of what we have now. Add a charging cable that doubles as an input wire and voila. Instead we have controllers galore now…
Couldn’t agree more. The controller situation is a shambles. That said, I love how many options we have so I can’t really complain.
i think they would sell a crap ton of these if they were official merch. looks awesome. GC controller is still one of my favourite peripherals of all time, just after Sega Saturn.
Like Original Saturn or Saturn 3D Controller?
i was a 2d fighter fan, so the original Saturn controller with an awesome d-pad and 6 front buttons + 2 shoulder buttons.
yeah great controller 🙂 preferred the clickiness (is that even a word) over the MegaDrive 6 Button
Really? Wired controllers? REALLY??
Wait so they’re wired up to the Wii remote?
So they’re just Classic Controllers, not Pro Controllers?
Yeah, this is what I was thinking.
I guess it’ll be okay if they still functioned as Wii U Pro controllers, but if it’s just a new looking Classic One …then no deal!
Yes.
They’re not even the wiiu pro controllers :/
Ewww @ wired to wiimote
Am I the only one that hated the stupid ‘trigger’ buttons? That huge amount of springy-ness that did nothing, then the familiar ‘click’ when the button actually engaged. Granted, I didn’t own one, but using the controller at friends house was always a pain.
Yeah triggers are the suckiest part. Apart from that though, my WaveBird rocks.
I loved the dual-function analogue/digital shoulder buttons.
Are you just talking about using them in Brawl though? Because yeah, they sucked for that. In Melee, the shield would engage as soon as you depressed the shoulder button at all, increasing in strength (but wearing down faster) the more you pressed it in. But in Brawl they didn’t use that at all, and only the digital click at the base. Which sucked, I could never time the landing recovery properly any more.
The dual function was good though, adding a secondary action to the controls. Eg in Eternal Darkness, you’d use the analogue portion of the button to lock on to an enemy, but then you use the click to switch aim to another enemy, all without having to take your finger off. I was really happy to see them bring the same triggers back with the original classic controller, but then hated that they took them out in the CCPro. And even more disappointed not to see them return on the Wii U – or any analogue triggers at all. Really got used to having them there for lateral drift in F-Zero.
Yah most of my experience was with Brawl. Didn’t know they acted as analogue/digital combos, cool.
yeah, they were really clever shoulder buttons. awesome for playing need for speed – where throttle control was a must for take offs in the drag races and such. more games made use of varying degrees or pressure, but thats the most notable one i could remember.
I know I shouldn’t swear but……
FUCK
YES
$50 AUD
https://ebgames.com.au/wiiu-203017-WII-U-Smash-Bros-Controller-Mario-Wii-U
(Hopefully that is only pre release price)
I know what’s off about them – these are almost the exact same as the GameStop knockoff GameCube controller (that you can still buy in stores today)! I am so highly disappointed. If any of you have ever used this controller, then you know how terrible they are. They do not even hold a candle to the official GC controller.
I actually preordered one at GameStop, thinking this was Nintendo brand – but I may have to cancel that now. It will be the only way to use a GC controller on the Wii U for anything other than Super Smash Bros., but I’d bet they could fix that with a patch allowing the GC adapter they are coming out with to function as a classic controller.