Game controls have always been a changing, evolving thing.
Back in the days of arcades and Intellivision, there wasn’t really any consensus on what game controllers should be like, or how players should control games.
Nowadays, things have gone through a few cycles and then settled down. I feel like they’ve been largely standardized into a couple of categories.
There are games designed for controllers, by which I mean 8 face buttons, 4 shoulder buttons, and 2 analog sticks. Every major company has basically agreed to use the same layout.
There are games designed for mouse + keyboard.
There are games designed for touch screens, usually at iPhone or iPad size.
And then…there’s everything else. VR headsets, arcade cabinets, motion controls, things that are generally for more niche audiences.
It feels like everything has settled into a rhythm. But I always feel torn on whether that’s a good thing or bad thing.
Maybe it’s just nostalgia talking, but there is something that I miss about the days when companies all had their own ideas about how controls should work.
It was interesting to see different companies try slightly different layouts for buttons. For example, the trio of buttons arranged horizontally on the Sega Genesis controller made some logical sense for fighting games that had a light punch, medium punch, heavy punch.
But beyond that, I have a fondness for Nintendo’s experimental streak. The N64 controller took a guess at how people would want to swap between D-Pad games and Control Stick + Z Trigger games. The Gamecube came up with a fun and intuitive button layout where every button was a different shape. The DS broke new ground with dual screens and touch screens (before the launch of the iPhone.) The Wii went for intuitive controls that anyone could pick up, and a focus on motion controls.
I can’t help but be nostalgic for this era because a lot of games were designed experimentally, designed in a way to work for THAT system specifically. The World Ends With You was designed specifically to work with the DS. Elebits was designed specifically to work with the Wii. Stuff like that. I liked that there was a time where making a game for the DS and making a game for the PSP were two very distinctly different things, and a developer could have fun taking advantage of that.
On the other hand…there are some huge reasons (and benefits) for the industry moving away from that.
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More standardized controls means that games are easier to develop, easier to teach, and easier to learn, obviously. Once people get used to how to navigate menus and do common verbs (“run”, “jump”, “shoot”, “swing pickaxe”, “talk”) in one game, they can carry that knowledge over to another game.
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It also means that games are easier to port. You’re less likely to have to worry if the controls and core game design will work the same when you take your Steam game to Switch and Playstation.
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Games being easier to port is good for players and for devs. On the player side, it means more games are multi-platform, which lets you pick what you want to buy it on. For devs, especially indie devs, it means you’re going to have the option to release your game on multiple platforms and sell more copies. That means you’re more likely to be able to financially survive and make another game.
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Games designed for the “standardized” controller (8 face buttons, 2 sticks, etc.) have a decent likelihood of being workable with remapped controls, or with custom accessibility controllers. At least in terms of the game design. So, assuming the developers put in options in the menus to accommodate, people with physical disabilities can enjoy them.
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This standardization also means that people, generally, don’t have to go out and buy expensive new gimmick controls or new consoles just to enjoy the new games everyone is talking about.
I'm not an expert, but that's at least my take on it. I lay these things out because I don’t want my nostalgia to ignore all of these really huge conveniences of the modern era. As fun as it would be for Nintendo to swoop back in and make a new DS, and I’d hoot and holler for that, it would also be a headache for a lot of developers and consumers. With the way the Switch works currently, it’s convenient for a game released on Steam to be brought over.
Of course, arcades still exist, and their biggest advantage is being able to design their own controllers for each specific game. Going to an arcade almost feels like a specific activity of “I’m going to go to a place where the games all have unique controls I don’t get to use at home.” They continue to be great, assuming you live near a place with decent games.
On the indie side, you can also get that arcade experience from alt.ctrl.GDC, and other such convention showcases that are designed around unique controls schemes.
Other than that…the realm of “gimmicky” controls seems like it’s become a small, niche thing. You’ve got VR headsets, for people who can afford those. You’ve got the Playdate, for people who are interested in that. We’ve all been shunted off into our little experimental silos, with games that will likely never be ported to anything else. It’s at least cool to see devs making games that take unique advantage of those platforms and their specific controllers.
We also occasionally get Nintendo experiments, like Labo and Ring Fit Adventure, but sadly they don’t seem to pursue these long enough to iterate on them. Ring Fit is so fun. I wish there were more games for that ring controller.
Another small wrinkle in this change is that I feel like, if things had gone down the path of the Wii Remote a bit more, we might have seen more interesting games designed for that one-hand-holding-a-TV-remote setup. It might have opened up whole new subgenres. It might have become really accessible for those with certain physical disabilities, if it led more devs to make games that used less buttons and less sticks. It also could have made gaming a less intimidating hobby for newcomers, who might be put off by how a PS5 controller looks.
But alas, the motion controls on the Switch haven’t been its most successful feature, so I feel like most developers don’t use them.
I wonder where game controls go from here. Will things just stick to the pillars of Controller, KB+Mouse, and Touch Screen? Will a company ever take a big swing again, and rally enough players and developers to support their control idea? Or maybe we’ll get other enthusiast platforms like Playdate, each with their own gimmick, for the freaks like me that want to see more of that in the world.
Only time will tell I guess.
