Little More Than Before [Slip Out]

The hottest news in gaming right now must surely be Nintendo finally unveiling the Revolution controller. If some other topic relating to gaming is currently on top of your agenda, then your agenda needs altering. What follows is largely straight off the top of my head as I think and right about this announcement.

Earlier today Nintendo (NCL) went ahead and showed us what they had been keeping back. Whether they really were scared of people copying their ideas or not, it had created an aura around what exactly they had in store for us. When I read an interview with Yuji Naka a little while back and his reaction to the controller I became very interested in what had been created. He mentioned nothing specific due to a non-disclosure agreement but it was going to match NCL's recent penchant for fresh new ideas to engage old and new gamers alike.

So whilst watching a stream of the press conference, the first real thought I had was just after Iwata referred to the controller as nunchucks (with the analogue plug-in). I thought "controller-chucks, yo" but not much else formed.

After the conference was over I sat back and thought about it all.

What are NCL playing at giving us what is effectively a remote control? How the heck will I be able to play Ocarina of Time on it? Not only that but how would I be able to play A Link to the Past with the four face buttons spread all over?

Well, remote controls are everywhere. You'll have one for your TV, DVD player, VCR, satellite/cable/Freeview, amplifier/stereo system and I'm only thinking of the living room. The controller will look right at home next to your TV remote, it probably looks nicer than any other remote you have.

The controller is another in step in NCL's new thinking of making things simpler for everyone, gamer and non-gamer alike. It has taken the ideas behind the DS and implemented them into a console setting. I'm a big fan of the DS and what NCL have set out to do with the machine. Take a conventional idea/design and tailor it for gaming. The move to the DS is simple as writing and drawing with a pen is so well ingrained into us.

This time round NCL have gone a few steps farther and really worked all aspects. The remote is ingrained into us with so many devices using it. You point at the device and click away. First they've removed the traditional IR and replacing it with an RF sensor, so like the Wavebird you can go into the next room and control the Revolution. They built on this idea by replacing the IR sensor into a motion detector. You can point at the screen and the movements made on the controller translate. Forget other promises, this is true analogue control.

They've thought about the promise of allowing us access to a back catalgoue of games from all generations of NCL consoles. From the outset you can see the NES influence and you have no worries about playing Super Mario Bros but what about those who want to play Super Mario World or even Mario 64?

That's where our plug-ins come in. So the bottom of the controller allows us to plug-in an extension that gives us an analogue stick that looks like the GC one and has two buttons on the top, similar to how we have the Z-button configuration but looking like naturally fitting the grip taken to hold the stick. We're not sure exactly how we'll be able to configure buttons about on the initial controller but it seems as if we may need a few more buttons.

The good news is that it was alluded to that there could be potential for more variations of the plug-in to customise the controller. Who knows we may have replicas of the pads of old which allows us to slot the controller into, we may even get arcade sticks which allows the controller to plug into. This is conservative thinking right now, as the scope is huge for what pads we may see. The possibility is there for games to come out with custom pads should it be required that plug into the controller that builds on top of the existing functionality.

With so much to think about I am still rambling on about possibilities. My mind is still up in the air as to what NCL have actually done and I'll definitely be making more posts about the controller with a more focused set of ideas. Even so I know two things for sure. One is that I absolutely love the scope this pad has and I really wish to try this out as soon as I can.

The second thing I know for sure is that we are truly seeing a revolution from NCL.