13 Best Xbox One Game Joysticks

Bestselling Xbox One Game Joysticks in 2023

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Nintendo Invented Your Xbox Controller: Gaming Would be Lost Without Nintendo

The next time Nintendo comes up with another hare-brained hardware idea, don't be too quick to nay-say. Because no matter how outlandish it may seem, a few years down the road, everyone might be doing it.

These reactions, to be honest, dropped my jaw. How tightly must you shut your eyes to miss the fact that you can't bundle the Power Glove, the Virtual Boy and the Wiimote into one package called Nintendo's Risky Ventures? Or, rather, you can do that, but the package is going to be full to bursting with all of Nintendo's risky ventures. For Nintendo, original and unfamiliar hardware design has always been the name of the game. In fact, if you go get one of your Xbox 360 controllers, I think you'll find that it's built almost entirely from ideas that were thought up at Nintendo Headquarters.

Look at the shape of it. Held in two hands, with the thumbs doing most of the button work. This was introduced with the Nintendo Entertainment System, over a decade ago, back when people were used to joysticks and paddles. Not to mention the eight-direction control pad, which is still there on your Xbox controller, hipper looking, but unaltered in function.

Moving up the controller's plastic body, you'll find the shoulder buttons, controlled by the pointer fingers, and introduced with the Super NES, back in 1991. And you'll also notice the SNESesque four-button diamond, on the right, which is still (and I can barely believe this) designated with the A, B, X and Y letters, though in a different order.

There are two thumb-sticks, which take me back to the days of Goldeneye 007, on the N64, the system that pulled the joystick out of the museum, and altered it to be practical with modern controllers. And the trigger buttons on the back originated in the very same system. The vibrating motor inside started as an N64 peripheral. Not to mention, if you follow the cord down to the Xbox, you see four controller ports, as introduced with the N64, back when people were buying four-player adaptors for their Playstations. I wonder just what our Halo and Gears of War experiences would be like if it wasn't for that influential system.

And, to think about how all modern game controllers are built around Nintendo's ideas, I have to laugh out loud when I see the Wiimote. Not because there's anything wrong with it, but because Nintendo took the standard they created, and that every owner of every console was used to, and threw it out the window for a one-handed controller which is, yet again, unlike anything that came before it. (I should also mention that the controller doesn't have a "start" button, an artifact that had somehow made it into the design of practically every controller since the NES.)

Now, don't get me wrong. I am not putting down Sony's or Microsoft's consoles. Both companies are great at what they do, and way ahead of Nintendo in a lot of respects. Their machines are stronger, and faster, and built for the hardcore gaming experience that a lot of us ex-gen-Xers play for. Both companies have plenty of innovations of their own, (a good cd drive, and memory cards, from Sony, a hard drive, from Microsoft, just to name three) and they know just what gamers want. I applaud the Xbox 360, and the Playstation 3. I truly do.

But I'm not talking about the quality of anyone's console, here. What I'm talking about is risk-taking, and innovation. Nintendo has been pushing boundaries successfully, and doing it's part to shape the gaming industry, for twenty-two years, and it's the oldest console company that's still around.

So, the next time Nintendo comes up with another hare-brained hardware idea, don't be too quick to nay-say. Because no matter how outlandish it may seem, a few years down the road, everyone might be doing it.