Revolution controller revealed

Vendetta · Post by **Vendetta** » 2005-09-20 07:59pm

Praxis wrote: I don't think so; according to Nintendo it also knows the distance from the receiver, IIRC.

Reading the later updates, it looks like the controller position will triangulate from two recievers, presumably placed at the top corners of your display. There's still the aspect ratio concern though, as I would presume it creates a bounding box for the 'screen' based on those two positions and knows where in that box the controller is being pointed. It would need to know the screen ratio to work out that box, and there's still a woeful amount of widescreen support out there.

Still, the only game I can think of that I really want to use this for, Okami, isn't even a Revolution game, it's a PS2 game.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2005-09-20 08:04pm

I assume one sensor at the top and one on the bottom on the opposite side. The Revolution probably could have a setting to indicate monitor aspect ratio.

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2005-09-20 08:06pm

Vendetta wrote:Still, the only game I can think of that I really want to use this for, Okami, isn't even a Revolution game, it's a PS2 game.

It's obviously partially there for support for old Lightgun games. But the return of the lightgun is an interesting thing; the cost of creating and distributing your own lightgun has crippled this genre of games on the console for years. It would be nice if they get a return with this new development, but we'll have to see.

Of course, we see few games we'd want this for. It's gonna require unique games, and hopefully inspire them.

Adrian Laguna · Post by **Adrian Laguna** » 2005-09-20 08:23pm

SirNitram wrote:You can do a FPS with this, and even then, FPS is just one genre, and a genre with minimal impact on consoles.

One genre, yes. However, the sales figures of Halo and Halo 2 (for X-Box). As well as the inmense popularity of Goldeneye and (I think) Perfect Dark (for N64) says otherwise to your claim about FPS being "a gene with minimal inpact on consoles".

As for whether the Revolution controller will suck or rock. Until the controler is actually tested by gamers and game designers, it is hard to say either way. I'm expecting something between "crash-and-burn" and "general indifference". Any surprises (ie people in general actually liking it) would be pleasant.

BTW - SirNitram, you really should stop taking your sig ("Debator Classification: Trollhunter") so seriously. Often times you start out debating like a rational person, then it slowly but surely degenerates into a mire of insults, accusations of various debating fallacies, and acusations of trolling. It becomes very hard to separate the rational arguments form the mire. Eventually parts of your posts seem to be pure insults and no substance. For example:

SirNitram wrote:Can you read? Like at all? Because from this it appears you can't. Nor can you, in fact, resist popping into a discussion I'm having here to troll. Run along now, Spoofe.

All I can descipher from here is "You're an illiterate idiot, therefore you are wrong", "Don't butt in", and "Fuck-off". It would have been better if you had at the very least explained why the fuck he is wrong.

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2005-09-20 08:29pm

Adrian Laguna wrote:
SirNitram wrote:You can do a FPS with this, and even then, FPS is just one genre, and a genre with minimal impact on consoles.
One genre, yes. However, the sales figures of Halo and Halo 2 (for X-Box). As well as the inmense popularity of Goldeneye and (I think) Perfect Dark (for N64) says otherwise to your claim about FPS being "a gene with minimal inpact on consoles".

With no offense, the fact this list has no PS2 mention(And even Microsoft admits the PS2 is the big winner of this generation), and two N64 games demonstrates that while a very good FPS can nail the crucial fratboy demographic(Lots of money, lots of time, loves multiplayer), it's not make-or-break.

As for whether the Revolution controller will suck or rock. Until the controler is actually tested by gamers and game designers, it is hard to say either way. I'm expecting something between "crash-and-burn" and "general indifference". Any surprises (ie people in general actually liking it) would be pleasant.

The original articles had some positive stuff for it, but I'll wait until actual games come out, yes. It's a refreshing idea, though.

BTW - SirNitram, you really should stop taking your sig ("Debator Classification: Trollhunter") so seriously. Often times you start out debating like a rational person, then it slowly but surely degenerates into a mire of insults, accusations of various debating fallacies, and acusations of trolling. It becomes very hard to separate the rational arguments form the mire. Eventually parts of your posts seem to be pure insults and no substance. For example:
SirNitram wrote:Can you read? Like at all? Because from this it appears you can't. Nor can you, in fact, resist popping into a discussion I'm having here to troll. Run along now, Spoofe.
All I can descipher from here is "You're an illiterate idiot, therefore you are wrong", "Don't butt in", and "Fuck-off". It would have been better if you had explained why the fuck he is wrong. It also helps if you add the insults at the end your paragraph to make reading easier.

Anyone who thinks I take anything around here seriously probably hasn't paid much attention to me. As for SPOOFE: Keep in mind that this guy is simply reacting as a clockwork. There a thread about the next gen consoles? Have I made a statement? Up he pops, assailing me incoherently. I'm not going to spare any politeness for him. I have a limited tolerance for folks who just go out of their way to stir the shit, and like he himself admitted, he couldn't resist stirring.

Medic · Post by **Medic** » 2005-09-20 08:42pm

The remote / controller definitely has potential IMO but you're gonna reach muscle failure in some games, I'm certain.

On a more serious note, seeing how expensive XBox360 and PS3 are gonna be, I think I'll buy a Revolution. My computer comes first and I don't need to burn good money on Sony or Microsoft, especially since the games I love I'll be getting for my comp. It's not like I won't get good 1st party games on Nintendo.

Still, I'm scared it'll scare off the 3rd party publishers that'll make unique console-only games that I won't find for PC.

Keevan_Colton · Post by **Keevan_Colton** » 2005-09-20 08:42pm

Removed Spoofe's non contribution and flushed it.

Qwerty 42 · Post by **Qwerty 42** » 2005-09-20 09:24pm

just doing a bit of very rough measurement by holding a ruler up to the computer monitor, but if the Revolution controller is 7 inches long (about as long as the standard TV remote) The distance between the A and X/b button is 2.625 inches.

For comparison's sake, that's only about .625 inches more than the distance between the A button and the Start button on the Gamecube controller.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2005-09-20 09:31pm

So, sounds like it can be used for something you're not pressing every second, say, a weapons switching button. You just don't want it as part of a button combo (holding X and pressing A would be a serious pain).

BTW; the patent for the Revolution controller:

Really Long Link

Perhaps we can figure out the mechanism from this.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2005-09-20 09:38pm

Okay, good luck. Let me know when you figure out what all that crap means.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2005-09-20 10:00pm

I'm afraid of it...
I'll try looking through it tomorrow.

Spanky The Dolphin · Post by **Spanky The Dolphin** » 2005-09-20 10:02pm

Yeah, patentese isn't really my strong suit. Seriously, half of it just seems to be repeating the same stuff over and over.

Lord of the Farce · Post by **Lord of the Farce** » 2005-09-21 01:54am

Qwerty 42 wrote:just doing a bit of very rough measurement by holding a ruler up to the computer monitor, but if the Revolution controller is 7 inches long (about as long as the standard TV remote) The distance between the A and X/b button is 2.625 inches.

For comparison's sake, that's only about .625 inches more than the distance between the A button and the Start button on the Gamecube controller.

In other words, it's not really a big deal. Just like the fact that the distance between the D-pad and the A button is negligible, yet it's being whined about like no tomorrow by whiners... As if you can use both analog sticks, and still reach the majority of the bottons, even the slightest bit faster on the controllers for ANY of the current systems.

=====
And this is of course ignoring the statements by people who has actually tried out the controller commenting how it (with the nunchuck configuration) feels at least as intuitive as WASD & Mouse.
=====

On that note, did anybody take a few seconds to count how many axis the Revolution controller plus analog nunchuck has (including the D-pad)?
Analog stick = 2 axis (vertical + horizontal)
D-pad = another 2 axis (vertical + horizontal)
Motion detection = at least 4 axis (vertical + horizontal + tilt + zoom)
= 8 axis in total

... Which should make for some very interesting flight sim/arcade games.

Grandmaster Jogurt · Post by **Grandmaster Jogurt** » 2005-09-21 02:36am

Lord of the Farce wrote:[snip]

On that note, did anybody take a few seconds to count how many axis the Revolution controller plus analog nunchuck has (including the D-pad)?
Analog stick = 2 axis (vertical + horizontal)
D-pad = another 2 axis (vertical + horizontal)
Motion detection = at least 4 axis (vertical + horizontal + tilt + zoom)
= 8 axis in total

... Which should make for some very interesting flight sim/arcade games.

The motion detector should have six axes by my count: yaw, pitch, roll, vertical, forward-back, left-right.

Alan Bolte · Post by **Alan Bolte** » 2005-09-21 05:30am

The D-pad isn't pressure sensitive, is it? Unless it is, it really only counts as four buttons. An axis implies more than three possible positions. So 6+2=8 axes. Then there's 13 buttons. Without the standard attachment, you've still got 6 axes and 11 buttons. Not all of these buttons are gonna be used much in gameplay, but they are there.

Lord of the Farce · Post by **Lord of the Farce** » 2005-09-21 07:02am

Alan Bolte wrote:The D-pad isn't pressure sensitive, is it? Unless it is, it really only counts as four buttons. An axis implies more than three possible positions. So 6+2=8 axes. Then there's 13 buttons. Without the standard attachment, you've still got 6 axes and 11 buttons. Not all of these buttons are gonna be used much in gameplay, but they are there.

Ah. Well I wasn't sure about this, which was why I said "(including the D-pad)"... Except I forgot to put an extra question mark inside (D'oh!)!

Grandmaster Jogurt wrote:The motion detector should have six axes by my count: yaw, pitch, roll, vertical, forward-back, left-right.

I'm not sure pitch and yaw will be sensed separately from vertical and horizontal by the setup. But if it does, it could make for some really interesting implementations inside an actual game.

Archaic` · Post by **Archaic`** » 2005-09-21 09:43am

Lord of the Farce wrote: I'm not sure pitch and yaw will be sensed separately from vertical and horizontal by the setup. But if it does, it could make for some really interesting implementations inside an actual game.

In his keynote, Iwata specifically mentioned pitch and yaw in addition to up-down, left-right, and forwards-backwards.

Qwerty 42 · Post by **Qwerty 42** » 2005-09-21 03:26pm

there was also the Airplane Demo at TGS, where you held the revolution controller like a model airplane, and unless I'm much mistaken, it was controlled with all three axes.

Drooling Iguana · Post by **Drooling Iguana** » 2005-09-21 06:29pm

Qwerty 42 wrote:just doing a bit of very rough measurement by holding a ruler up to the computer monitor, but if the Revolution controller is 7 inches long (about as long as the standard TV remote) The distance between the A and X/b button is 2.625 inches.

For comparison's sake, that's only about .625 inches more than the distance between the A button and the Start button on the Gamecube controller.

But the distance between the A button and Start button on the Gamecube controller is horizontal, and the human thumb has a lot of horizontal movement range, so the Start button is reachable without shifting your grip (although it's inconvenient, but I suppose that was the point, since you usually don't want to be hitting the Start button accidently.) The X/b button, on the other hand, is seperated from the A button on the vertical axis, and doesn't look like it can be reached at all without shifting your grip on the controller substantially.

Darth Yoshi · Post by **Darth Yoshi** » 2005-09-21 08:08pm

It'd be about the same as going from the power button to the fancy stuff at the bottom of a DVD remote. It can be done, but it'll definitely be awkward.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2005-09-21 09:33pm

I'm all for controller innovation (although NINTENDO innovation I have a problem with: I bought a DS) but I'm seeing a boxy, uncomfortable controller. Stacking vertically like that is probably necessary for the same reason as it is on remotes - it has to be narrow enough to comfortably hold in one hand. I like the separate thumbstick (I hope there are a few triggers under there, though) but seriously, this looks uncomfortable to use. If the remote-side buttons were arrange in semicircles, or something ergonomic, it'd be fine: but they're lined up (for ambidexterity I guess) and I'm not sure how you're supposed to reach the bottom buttons without taking your thumb off the 'kill' or 'jump' button, and that's bad.

The original XBox controller sucked because you had to move your thumb so far to hit black/white: this seems like a similar situation.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2005-09-21 10:26pm

Again, I highly doubt that the X and Y buttons will even be used in most games. Maybe for online stats or something.

Remember, Halo is playable using only the X button for multiplayer stats, and leaving Y completely unused.

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