Spot the differance!

This is something that's annoyed me about Sony and Nintendo.

Nintendo released the SNES controller that fit comfortably in your hand while gaming for hours. It was a good controller which I thought Nintendo could build on for the release N64.

Snes Controller:


Then Sony released their controller for the release of the PSX.

PSX Controller:


Now lets compare the two controllers together shall we? (Smells a law suit.)

Both controllers have two or more shoulder buttons, the 'Start' and 'Select' buttons are both in the center of the joypad. The D-Pad is on the left side. (Can't be helped.)

The buttons goes

Square = Y
Triangle = X
Circle = A
Cross = B

Maybe changing letters for symbals got around the copyright law case? Like when you change so many words in a paragraph of someone elses story which means you have the right to pass it off as your own work. Makes you wonder.

Taking away the obvious like the Analogue Sticks and the Analog Button... How many things are differant?

Err, are you a little bit mad?

Not only are the two controllers nothing alike in design, feel, build quality or function, but... well, I'll just ask you to read the first paragraph again.

Ta.

Yeah, ok. Overlook the fact that both controllers have identical layouts.

Yeah sure... *rolls eyes*

They look different to me. The similarity is that there are direction controls on the left, and action buttons on the right, with the start and select buttons in the middle. How else would you design a controller? put the direction keys underneath to avoid lawsuits and put the Start and Select buttons where you'll always be accidentally bumping them?

A lawsuit because of this is crazy - you may as well sue 100 other companies for manufacturing computer mice which look almost identicle (OH NO - MICROSOFT'S MOUSE HAS TWO BUTTONS IN FRONT AND IS SORT-OF OVAL SHAPED JUST LIKE LOGITECH'S!!!! I SMELL A LAWSUIT!!!)

Anything designed to fit a human is naturally going to be similar to something else designed to fit a human. For example, you don't sue chair compnay A for making chairs with four legs, a seat and a backrest just like chair company B. Likewise, you don't sure Logitech for making mice with 2 buttons and an oval-shaped design just like Microsoft. I'm sure there's always a limit to where you qualify as "copying" someone else's work, but this is silly.

My car's got 4 wheels that touch the road and an additional wheel to steer the car with... I noticed there are loads of cars just like that...

Ok, I'm going to use the Sony joypad. Cross out the word 'Sony' replace it with 'Jono's Pad'. Scrumb out the PlayStation logo with a coin. Then stick new symbols onto the buttons.

TADA! A new joypad! It even works for the PSX. :D

I'm going to name it The Jono Pad 3,000x. The new PSX joypad from Cubies Inc.

You do know there are dozens of 3rd party controllers for all consoles, including playstation? Oh no, Logitech is infringing!
http://www.logitech.com/index.cfm/products/productlist/US/EN,crid=2276,categoryid=285

Hell, everyone who's ever made a gamepad! No wait, everyone who's ever held a gamepad! My hands, they are illegal! AAAAAHHH!!!

So if I scratch out the PlayStation name and logo, I can repackage it and sell it as my own work? Exellent! Should make me a few quid.

Jono, there's something not wired up correctly in your brain dude!

The SNES pad is kinda like the NES pad but with rounded corners and more buttons. It's essentially a rounded cuboid design.

What shape is the PSX pad? Is it anything like a cuboid, rounded or not? No, it isn't is it? It's a completely custom shape which was researched and designed for one thing,comfort. Note the two elongated grips which fit into the palm of your hand? These provide strain relief for your fingers and overall stability to the pad whilst being used.

Notice how the direction pad on the PSX, whilst being 1 molded part actually protrudes from the casing as 4 distinct buttons? This is no accident or just something to make it look good, it is there to provide accuracy of control. The center of the SNES d-pad is actually a hinderance to accurate control, though this probably wasn't thought about at the time.

The way the buttons are laid out on the PSX pad is part of the whole Playsation design ethos. Sony even ran adverts playing on the fact that everyone was familiar with the 4 symbols on the buttons. The buttons are laid out in a square whereas the SNES pad is a rhombus shaped layout. Almost every pad with 4 buttons has laid them out in such a fashion. This is convergent design, any other layout isn't just non-ergonomic, it's unusable. The accessible arc of your thumb whilst holding a joypad is quite limited so you therefore cannot really have 4 buttons laid out in a single line. What you have to design for is a very limited sideways arc and the tilt of the last joint of the thumb. This means you can quickly access just 4 buttons without really moving your thumb very much (much in the same way as the d-pad works, but with more discrimination of which button is being pressed).

All joypads follow similar rules, they have to or they would be unusable.

Personally, I'd like to see arcade style sticks make a comeback, but that's just me :)

Hmmm... It still doesn't look look like the Sony controller! I guess there must be a few more differences you didn't notice. :)

Stole my idea. lol

I see 2 different Joypads even without my four eyes on.

actually you should have posted a non-analogue PS2 controller for a closer comparison.

> "It's better to burn out, than to fade away." - Kurt Cobain

Not on topic I know, but Kurt stole that from Highlander, which I'm sure got it from somewhere else.

and he wasn't the first person to shoot himself either.

"Not on topic I know, but Kurt stole that from Highlander, which I'm sure got it from somewhere else. "

I think it was etched onto the motherboard traces of a fair number of Apple computers, and then they were recalled, presumably to avoid an overheated law suit.

It would help if you used the original PSX controller which didn't have analog sticks. It was pretty much a straight rip of the SNES controller and then the analog one was a rip of the N64 controller. Sony's controller designs are always the same as Nintendo's but they double the number of new features.

So for the PSX they took the new shoulder button feature of the SNES pad and added two more. With the N64 analog stick they took the one and made it into two analog sticks.

Still, they are different enough that you can't claim copyright infringement.

Kurt is a really great artist, but not very bright. It's better to fade away.

He obviously didn't think so.

He coulda faded away over many years surrounded by women, fast cars and drugs.

I agree that Sony copied the controller. If you look at what game controllers were like BEFORE Nintendo invented the original pad controller, the one on the NES, they were all quite different and very unergonomic.

Take a look at how controllers evolved:
http://www.axess.com/twilight/console/

This chart clearly shows that Nintendo has been innovating, and everyone else has been copying their innovations.

First with the D pad, and two buttons, start and select.
The the shoulder buttons and four buttons.
Then the analog stick, and maybe the rumble accessory.

Nintendo sort of copied the idea of having two analog sticks from Sony on the gamecube controller, but they switched the location of the second analog stick so it would be in a more comfortable position.

I guarantee you that Sont and Microsoft are going to copy the Revolution controller's ability to sense it's position in space for their next console, if they don't come out with a plugin for their current controllers that does the same job. Sony added the analog sticks to the Playstation controller after Nintendo came out with the N64 for example.

Is there anything wrong with this copying? Not really, in my opinion. If Nintendo didn't patent the controller design they obviously don't care if it gets copied. They might figure gamers would get @#!*ed off at them if they did force Sony and Microsoft to change their design.

Oh, and btw, I found that site by accident jsut now when I was searching for photos of the various controllers to compare them. :-)

Is this what the PS3 controller is going to look like?


Because if it is, it's fugly. The PS2 controller might of been a copy of Nintendo's SNES controller, but it looked good especially on the PSone, and it felt like it had lots of money spent on research and development. I always thought that this controller should come with a repetative strain warning.

How you can go from one to another, I don't know.

HAHA! I found this picture while Googling for the Nintendo Revolution controller:



Seems there's a few people out there with a good sense of humour. Maybe nobody yet knows what the Rev controller will look like. Any predictions are welcomed.

Reminds me about the X-Box controller. I hated that controller so much.

"Is this what the PS3 controller is going to look like?"

Yes.

And that revolution controller is awesome. :-)
Though they did a poor job on the wood grain on the bottom.


"Maybe nobody yet knows what the Rev controller will look like. Any predictions are welcomed."

Huh? It's liked to right on that controller comparison page I linked to, at the bottom:

http://www.axess.com/twilight/console/detail/revolution.html




Haven't you heard about it? It's able to tell where it is and how it is oriented. You can use it like a gun and point at the screen, as a desntists drill, as a fishing pole, swing it like a golf club or ping pong paddle... even hold it like a steering wheel and drive with it by rotating it.

That's why I said others will copy it. And it's why I'm not even considering getting a PS3 or a 360.

Oh, and that jostick on the wire? That's optional, you can disconnect that box at the bottom and use it like a remote control. I imagine most games will work that way, the joystick is for... well, I don't know what it is for. Maybe first person shooters where you can look around with the stick AND point the "gun" at any portion of the screen quickly. Might also be useful in the afformentioned fishing game. Though I suspect that developers would try to avoid using it and just go with the remote. I know I would. It might get tiring holding something in both hands.

bring on the hack'n'slash games on the revolution, yah! I saw this sword controller at a game show once, you swung it around and it hit stuff on screen, no webcams, it was cool!

Yeah there's a video showing it in action, and swordplay is one of the things they do:

http://media.cube.ign.com/articles/651/651334/vids_1.html

LOL @ Jono's second picture!

With you all the way Swift... I need to save up, but I'm far more interested in the Revolution then XBOX360 or PS3. At least Nintendo try to innovate.

Me three. I'm going to steal a Revolution if I have to. :)

You say you want a Revolution?

I want a Revolution!

The peasants are revolting! Bring on the revolution!!!

Swift's on the money again...

There was a DVD on last months Edge mag - featuring stuff from the Tokyo Game Show.

On the section that had Next Generartion previews, XBOX2 and PS3 were showing lots of samey looking, top next gen games - which look okay but other than more on screen and slightly better graphics not much in innovation...then I looked at the Revloution showreel - what a refreshing change. (They must have had some Hieniken).

Instead of showing a load of games they just only showed the people playing them with this stunning new controller. I say stunning because YES it looks like a tv or DVD remote (boo!) but it behaves like no other controller (with the possible exception of a gyro mouse) in the world.


The tease and the fun is you have to guess what the players are playing - it's a sword, a sushi knife (lol) , a dentists drill, a gun, a squah racket, a fly swat, a baton for conducting music...the uses just go on and on.. brilliant! You wave it around and point it and the machine knows what youre doing with it...One clip shows players using it like a torch, they are creeping around the room. One guy is hiding behind the chair shooting at another guy hiding behind another chair.

TRUST Nintendo to do it again! Sheer brilliance. I think the games will look okay too btw - but this controller is worth buying a Revolution for on its own!

IPete2.

Jono, you were supposed to say:

"Well, you know
We all want to change the world"

And sing it if you could.


I've finally decided that the Revolution is the only console on
my wishlist right now. It would be stupid not to get one!

Pretty much, I'd say. I don't care if the GFX are only on a par with the GameCube, TBH.

Yuck, that's ugly


On the design. I don't know. I noticed earlier that the PSX controller is so much alike the SNES one, since I've both machines. I don't mind, though. As a matter of fact, it makes it easier for me. Same buttons so no figuring them out (like it was that hard) :P

Yep. And you can't even throw it away in disgust coz it'll just boomerang back and hit you in the head.

"Pretty much, I'd say. I don't care if the GFX are only on a par with the GameCube, TBH."


There was a quote on Voodo Extreme this morning from "a major third party source" who said it was "Not much more powerful than an Xbox... It's like a souped up Xbox."

Which is a bit dissapointing, but the resolution and the number of polygons you can push isn't everything. And Nintendo would have had a hell of a time making a system more powerul than either Sony and Microsoft.

I suspect it can push more polygons than an XBOX and has more video ram for higher res textures which should improve visuals significantly. The thing is also the size of a DVD case. It may be that Nintendo has decided to compere with Sony and Microsoft by innovating and beating them on price. If the Revolution is $250, and the PS3 is $500, and the revolution has all sorts of creative new games, which would you buy? Would you want to play the same games just in higher res? What's the point?

Interesting. Like I said, though, I'm not fussed. Seen enough eyecandy to last me a lifetime. :)

Really? Wow, I didn't realize that! I've glanced at pics of it but just assumed it was about the size of an old PSX, turned on it's side. :P

What I don't understand is that it's the video game lineup that sells consoles, at the end of the day nobody cares what a consoles specs are. Do you honestly think a child cares how many polygons a console can display at once?! Video games are what's important, I love my GameCube cos it's got brilliant games. Resident Evil, Resident Evil Zero, Metroid Prime 1/2, Pikmin 1/2, Legend of Zelda, Super Mario, Super Monkey Balls. These are the games that sell a console. Not the specs.

Games sell consoles, not the other way round.

I had almost forgotten this about the Revolution:

"Revolution will play all of your favorite Nintendo GameCube games, and deliver downloadable access to 20 years of fan-favorite titles originally released for Nintendo 64, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) and even the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES)."

http://www.nintendo.com/revolution

That just makes me drool with anticipation... all those N64 classics! Zelda, Goldeneye, Banjo Kazooie, Mario Kart, Mario 64, Donkey Kong - and more! Plus backward compatibility with the Gamecube, plus (obviously) new Revolution games. The potential for this is great - feeling broke one month? Well don't spend £30 (or whatever) on a new Revolution game, spend a fraction of that on a downloadable N64 classic and enjoy that instead!

"You say you want a Revolution?" I like that Beatles song, amongst others (lots of others)

Its not Revolution, its Hype (TM).

Nintendo(TM) Hype(TM) will bring fourth(TM) a new gaming experience(TM) unlike(TM) anything you've ever seen(R) before(TM)!(TM)!(TM)

well I like Nintendos, I might get one, we'll see. If you all buy my game then I'll get one when it comes out and let you know how it is :-)

Nintendogs.

It blew me away though, learning that Nintendo - the company was founded as early as in the 19th century.
Respect! :)

HAHAHAHA!

My turn!!!!