plumpan
@plumpan

So you're telling me a sega saturn controller in 1997 could turn the TV on and change channels plus change the inputs, but it's 2023 and no video game console controller can do that?

Technology has not moved forward, only sideways.

EDIT: https://cohost.org/plumpan/post/2538758-a-collection-of-responses

Also please do me a favor and drop a like on this feature request that would allow me to completely silence notifications on this, without deleting the whole post. TBH I stopped caring about this a couple of days ago and I want my doots to be about sega rally or Dovi's ass and not someone saying Wii U again.


dog
@dog

The PocketStation for the PS1 can do this too. One of the apps you can install on it is a little remote control, which uses the infrared port the PocketStation has for some reason. And since Sony's never once changed their remote protocol, you can still use it with any modern Sony HDTV. I was really surprised when Jessica pulled out her goofy looking little memory card-sized thing, turned on the TV and started messing with the menus.


wildweasel
@wildweasel

You want to know what else can turn your TV on and off? For absolutely no reason?

Mission Impossible for the Game Boy Color. People often forget the GBC had an IR port on it, I think it was used for maybe 4 games for gimmicky little data-beaming things, but M:I can learn signals from your actual remote and then also send them to your TV, VCR/DVD player, satellite/cable box, or stereo system. It offers a surprisingly high degree of control over what signals get bound to which Game Boy button, too.

[edit] yeah the people are saying "Wii U" to me too


doty
@doty

I know they mean “modern consoles today” and that may be true but even consoles that are not that old can do this: the Wii U can do this, and a whole big chunk of the Xbox One pitch was that you would route your cable box or whatever through it and use the Kinect to change channels.

Folks have tried this a bunch of times and I think just nobody wants it.


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in reply to @plumpan's post:

The Wii U Gamepad had this as well; it could hook up to any TV and/or set-top-box from virtually any brand, and provide full menu navigation (d-pad, numpad, OK/back/info) + channel/volume changes etc.

in reply to @dog's post:

in reply to @wildweasel's post:

Yeah I vaguely remember that one and it not being particularly useful lol. The MI one is really interesting and I'm surprised it wasnt more well known (to me, at least)

I think that's more of an infrared projector/camera, like iPhone's FaceID. It doesn't just shine one light it projects a bunch of dots and takes a picture of them to get an idea of a 3D shape. You might be able to abuse that into sending infrared remote signals but probably not. It's been used in the Labo sets, though. One joycon could detect multiple keys of a piano moving, among several other things.

in reply to @doty's post:

I want to be overly wordy to make sure that I'm clear and don't come across as patronizing or dismissive or anything-- yeah for sure, I want to just pick up a controller and use it to power on the entire thing and just start playing. It's so nice when it works!

I feel like in general HDMI-CEC has replaced the whole "your controller powers multiple things" approach? The Nintendo Switch can be configured so that it will turn on the TV and change the input to the right input, and the Steam Link can do it the same way. I don't own any of the current gen consoles other than that but I would be surprised if they couldn't do it as well...

yea no it's cool, I sent this right after waking up + keep getting dings on the original post like 3 days later when I wanna talk to people about sega rally instead.

If you check the link to the responses post, a couple of people mentioned HDMI-CEC in more detail. The impression I got is that it sucks in practice; may work but likely to not entirely work.