Quote Originally Posted by j_factor View Post
Yeah, I always "want" to hold it like that, but I can't really play games that way. The right prong is way at the wrong angle and it just kills my wrist. Not to mention up on the stick becomes up-left.
Always a new excuse, it seems.

There are some games, such as the Saturn version of MechWarrior 2, that use d-pad and analog stick simultaneously.
If you're playing MechWarrior 2 for Saturn with anything other than the Mission Stick, I feel kind of bad for you... (the same goes for the Panzer Dragoon games)! And on the Mission Stick, the game works great (far better than it ever could on a gamepad) with just a single stick and buttons. The key is that the throttle wheel controls movement forward and back.

On that note, one unique thing about the N64 when compared to the Saturn and PS1 is that it doesn't have a pile of alternate controllers. Both of those other systems have 3-4 different major first-party controllers, each with some games that require it for best control, plus on the PS1 several third-party controllers on top of that which games require them for best control, while the N64 has exactly one controller, the N64 controller. Other than optional third party controllers which games don't usually really support like the systems' wheels and the UltraRacer 64, there is only one N64 controller. There's no joystick, no (official) wheel, no neGcon, no mouse or keyboard, etc. (Well, there is a keyboard and maybe a mouse, but it/they are only for the 64DD's online service, so they don't have much use anymore obviously.)

The negative of that is that you don't get anything like MechWarrior 2 or Panzer Dragoon with the Mission Stick, but the positive is that every game should be ideally suited for a controller which every system owner has, something VERY definitely not true with the PS1 or Saturn. Overall, as much as I find the various PS1 and Saturn controllers interesting, I think that the N64's is the better design -- one great controller, which everything works with, and is versatile enough to handle any of them. Good design.

There are also Playstation games that use dual analog rather effectively, doing back to the system's original analog joystick and games like Descent.
Sure, there are a few, but it's a very few; Ape Escape, some FPSes like Medal of Honor, not that much else. And the analog stick click buttons, are they supported by any games at all? Some PS2 and PS3 games use them, but on the PS1 they were pretty much never used. I assume that the issue was that games almost always had digital controller support (Ape Escape is the only analog-required game in the US, after all; not sure if Japan had any others), so they couldn't do that much with analog-only buttons like those... so they were just never used. You can find a way to make use of the stick in some games, but the analog click buttons? They were pretty much a waste of money on the Dual Shock 1.

Is it a lot of games? Not really, but I bet it's larger than the number of games that "needed" the N64 controller's setup. The only thing that comes to mind is Robotron 64.
As far as games that "needed" the N64's setup... considering that nobody else had an analog stick when the N64 controller was introduced, how about every single game on the platform that has analog support?

Beyond that, all the FPSes have fantastic controls because of the N64 controller. I've said it before, but I absolutely prefer N64-style Turok FPS controls (stick aims, C-buttons move) to dual analog FPS controls. I still can't quite figure those out, but Turok-style N64 controls work fantastically...

And on that note, the N64's C-buttons are pretty much a second "stick", so the PS1 doesn't have much of an advantage there. Plus if games use both sticks, they don't usually use the face buttons for much (minor functions you need to use rarely, because you have to let go of the stick to press them...), while on the N64 using the C-buttons with A and B is easy and natural. Oh, and they're also quite nice for camera control in other games, of course.

But in general, that all N64 games have the analog option was fantastic. You can't quite match that on the PS1 or Saturn, which each have many digital-only-control games. The N64's design was superior from the start, and then the others had to play catchup... but were still left with large libraries of inferior-controlling 3d games with digital-only controls.

I guess I just don't see that. I have no issue whatsoever on Saturn, Dreamcast, Gamecube, or Xbox switching between the analog stick and d-pad. I don't find my thumb to be in a poor position either way.
It's worse on Sony's controllers than on any of those four, though of them the Gamecube's is probably the worst, since that's the most Sony-like of the four controllers you listed there. Because of the somewhat odd angles involved I don't mind it much on the Saturn 3D controller either, but the Gamecube, Dreamcast, Xbox, PS1/2... yeah, both work, but the upper position is definitely more comfortable than the lower.

I really don't think that's accurate. The N64 controller is the weirdest-looking, most unfamiliar controller of its time.
Only in the minds of people who hate it. And yes, I didn't make that up -- that was a very definitely stated goal of Nintendo's from back in 1996. As I said earlier in the thread, though, they under-estimated how many games would use the d-pad, which is part of why it's on the left, along with that "make it more familiar" reason.