Evolution of Game controllers

EVOLUTION OF GAME CONSOLES

 

Games platforms have evolved so much over the past 20 years. From 80’s arcade to modern high end gaming computers. One of the most important stages was the transition from cartridges to discology. When Nintendo opted to create the first new amazing consol with a disk drive, Nintendo had the leading, best selling consol at the time (SNES).

Sony were to make a disk drive for the new Nintendo consol, however complications occurred and Sony branched off a long with some games developers and created the next best thing – the Playstation. Nintendo the stuck with the cartridges and didn’t bring out another consol until the next generation; at the same time as the playstation2, Microsoft Xbox and the Dreamcast.

The evolution with controllers was pretty interesting as most of the leading consol making companies evolved the shape and feel of the controller to make game-play experiences more comfortable and easy. From the start Playstation had the classic control, and kept to the same shape as the next generations of consoles came out. The same for Xbox as it had a general shape that stayed the same and for each company the controller became a bit of a trademark.

Nintendo on the other hand never stuck to one design, each controller with each new consol was a new shape with different buttons.

When the Playstation 2 was announced standards were set with the new analogue sticks, Playstation 2 sold the most consoles (to this day) worldwide selling over 155 million. Today the leading console making companies are Nintendo, Microsoft Xbox and Sony Playstation. Both the Playstation and Xbox have evolved in terms of controllers and general features to be very similar.

Nintendo went into a more interactive and unique direction and developed the Wii, which had a completely different controller and method of interaction.  The Wii meant holding a controller and the game reacting directly to the gamers movements, this console advertised to families and widened the target audience for the next generation of consoles making gaming more of a family activity. Obviously this caught on as extensions for Xbox and Playstation. They both released add-ons to the consoles which had similar features to the Wii without creating a whole new console however neither were as successful as the Wii.

 

The Playstation move and the Xbox Kinect both had very similar features to the Wii. However Microsoft went a step further and just made a receiver without the need of a controller. However Playstation pretty much released a Wii with a different shaped camera and slightly transformed controller.

As well of the development of new features and improved controllers the overall aesthetic of the consoles themselves over the board transformed into sleek shiny boxes rather than the various shapes and textures they were before.