Third Party Controllers - Scott The Woz - YouTube

Hey all, Scott here! I'm on life support now! No reason, just felt like it.

I've been told the machine I'm hooked up to is doing some pretty great stuff;

It's efficient, it's useful, it's made by Mad Catz...

..I should probably start proofreading my will.

Did you know hands can hold garbage and f***ing garbage?

Game controllers are fairly understated in the grand scheme of things.

I mean as long as you can reach all the buttons at once, that shouldn't be an issue right?

They are ridiculously important to the gaming experience.

But that importance comes at a price.

As the years have gone on, official game controllers have risen in cost significantly.

We go from the Gamecube controller retailing for $19.99,

to my scheduled laugh at the Switch Pro Controller's price point.

HA!

The prices of game controllers can be absolutely ridiculous

sometimes costing nearly as much as a new game,

sometimes costing AS MUCH as a new game, MORE than a new game!

$70, man, I found a mattress for that much.

I will admit stuff like the Nintendo Switch Pro Controller and DualShock 4 have a lot of random junk thrown into them,

and at least kind of explains what the prices are so much higher than controllers in the past.

But then the Xbox One controller is pretty much identical to the Xbox 360 controller in terms of features,

and it's $65.

Did all the money go into giving the thumbsticks tire tracks?

Controllers can be expensive.

Sure, you can probably make it by with just the one that came bundled with your console,

but what if you want to play a local multiplayer game,

or what if your controller breaks for some reason?

You're gonna need an extra controller, and the official ones...

Those can be pricey. But...

You always have... other options.

They give these away with car stereos.

Third-party controllers, controllers not made by the company who makes the console.

You never know what you're gonna get with these things!

Since they're made by a company that had nothing to do with the actual console,

they don't have to abide by any rules, designs, or legal restrictions. Nothing!

Now why would you get a third-party controller instead of a first party one?

Well, I can think of a few reasons, but most of the time it's all about the price point.

These bad boys would sometimes retail for considerably less than official controllers.

You can use that money for new games and your mortgage.

However, let's not throw all third-party controllers under the bus here,

because I consider them to fall into two types:

"Big deals" or "big gimmicks".

Either the controller is cheaper and that's why you'd want it, or it features something the official controllers don't.

Like the "Quick Shot Controller" for the NES.

This isn't supposed to be a replacement controller, it's supposed to be an alternative.

If you want to use a joystick with your games, whip out the coffee table

jam the stick with the suction cups, this thing ain't going anywhere.

This works well for arcade style games, or stuff like Top Gun if you're one of those people.

But in terms of the controller, with no real advantages compared to the official controllers outside of price point,

The Hanyu Explorer I for the NES.

Literally just another company's version of the NES Advantage.

There isn't much reason for you to pick this up other than the fact that it's cheaper than the official Advantage controller.

However, this thing has some interesting features.

These top two buttons do absolutely nothing and there's a useless battery compartment-

I really have to start using this term better.

In the grand scheme of third-party controllers, these ain't too bad. Third-party controllers were more so

gimmicky back in the NES days, mainly because you needed like two standard NES controllers at the very most,

So for people to want other controllers, they needed to stand out.

They needed to have features the regular controllers didn't have.

That called for pretty much any unofficial controller to have turbo buttons like the Turbo Touch 360 for the Sega Genesis. This gives me chills.

We have switches to give any of the buttons turbo fire, but the star of the show here is the lack of a D-pad.

I'm sure tons of people who saw this in the store went:

YES!

You ever just use the Genesis controller and-

There's too much D-pad here. Now this- I mean, no D-pad is exactly what I wanted out of a Sega Genesis controller.

This is a touchpad and it senses where your thumb is.

Where your thumb is.

Yeah, this doesn't work very well. You don't get the precision of an actual d-pad at all.

I don't know if this is whacking out because of old age,

But I couldn't imagine this ever working that well when it was new.

But hey if you want a more standard experience,

Here's the Sega Genesis Owl Pad.

I'm sure somebody stood by this controller like you're waiting in the living room for your date to come downstairs, and you're talking to her

dad about how much you like the Sega Genesis controller?

We're an Owl Pad family.

What is up with the C button?

I don't know how easy it is to see, but it is significantly stiffer than all the other buttons.

The back is a soap dish.

Now if you're looking to buy retro gaming garb these days, you're likely to come across these off-brand controllers.

They look pretty similar to the originals, but with a few things altered so Nintendo doesn't have a f***ing aneurysm.

If there's just a blank space with a Nintendo logo should be, f***ing run.

These things prey on people looking to buy old systems who need an extra controller.

They're usually for sale at retro game shops and look almost identical to the original controllers,

but are almost always inferior in every way. Like come on, $15, that's around the same price for an official N64 controller.

But people keep buying these because they look so similar and they're brand new.

At least back in the day, third-party companies respected the consumer to differentiate themselves from the first party companies,

They made sure to add their own stupid f***ing twist to their product. Introducing the Boomerang 64.

The analog stick fell off of mine and all that's left is a stick, so I had to improvise.

Now this isn't nearly as bad as it may seem, it is a chunk fest in my hands,

But it gives you an N64 controller with a slightly more conventional layout.

It has built-in rumble if you slide some AAAs in, and there are two whole Z buttons for maximum-

But the D-Pad is stiff, the L and R buttons are in totally-out-there locations and overall, it's just an awkward controller.

Also, the name is a lie.

The Super Pad 64, now this screams "Oh f**k, oh f**k, I need a Nintendo 64 controller and only have $10".

I'm gonna be saying that on my wedding night. It's a substitute, but that's all it really is,

It doesn't excel at anything in comparison to the original. I mean, yeah, this isn't great...

But I'm used to how not great it is. The Super Pad 64 just feels weird without those grips on the sides,

It feels incomplete. Z feels like a gas station fuel button. The controller works, but that's all it really does.

It's totally just for people who needed that one extra controller for multiplayer.

The Super Pad 64 is the type of thing I think of first when I hear the term third-party controller. Cheaper in every sense of the word.

But this was made by Performance.

The COMPANY I immediately think of when I hear the term "third-party controller"...

is "Mad Catz".

If you walk into a building constructed by Mad Catz get the f**k out of there.

Get all the kids out of the room.

Three, two, one-

Jesus Christ, censor that.

The only Mad Catz product I own legitimately without thinking twice about it being made by Mad Catz was my GameCube memory card,

And I'm still happy to have it on me. Look at all these memories, an entire page of Nickelodeon game save files,

I love gamin'. But look at this, "16X". Whatever the hell that means, keep it coming,

I had so much storage space on this card!

Mad Catz was never the worst supplier of controllers, but they were definitely known for their mediocrity.

But I mean come on, has a company who made a Dallas Cowboys PS2 controller ever steer you wrong?

A lot of their controllers aren't terrible but they're on their way up there. The Mad Catz Gamecube controller, talk about under compensation.

You take a regular GameCube controller and then just warp every element of the controller until it's a shrunken, grotesque

GameCube pad.

Oh and bold up the fonts on the buttons.

Just by looking at this thing, there's something undeniably cheap about it.

Like many of these controllers it works, but so does filing for bankruptcy so whatever, different people like different things.

Well, what about the Mad Catz Arcade Stick for the Xbox 360?

With all the arcade titles available on the 360, you needed a good arcade stick to play them with.

I still need a good arcade stick to play them with. This controller is all show, no go. You look at it and go:

"Wow. this is everything a regular Xbox 360 controller is, but with controllers tailored for arcade games!"

A joystick with a fire button on top, a spinner for games like "Arkanoid", this is gonna end in heartbreak.

This is just a regular thumbstick on stilts. It has such a wide range of movement,

Most arcade joysticks are locked in a set number of directions.

Here, you have full 360-degree movement, which let me tell you now, this does not work well for Ms. Pac-Man.

The entire controller itself is too tiny,

like you want to be able to slam an arcade controller on a coffee table and not have to worry about it moving all over the place.

No, this one's too small and light to set down and play with, but it's too big and cumbersome to hold in your hands.

This is a lot of the same problems as the Atari 2600 joystick in terms of size.

I can't say Mad Catz didn't try with this controller, but they didn't.

But you want to know who did try with their controller? Nickelodeon. "Put SpongeBob in your hands".

Spongebob controllers for the PlayStation 2 and GameCube. I remember advertisements for these and yep, it is SpongeBob in your hands.

It's a good Wednesday night controller. I'm not gonna use it all the time, but one day a week I'm good with.

You get a lot of these novelty controllers made by third parties like a Dallas Cowboys controller, damn it.

Now you can't go talking novelty controllers without bringing up Afterglow.

Yeah, I was 16 at some point, this interests me. An Afterglow Wii Remote,

Transparent in all the right ways. Lock some batteries in, sync it up and that is fairly disappointing.

They move some button placements around, like the 1 and 2 buttons are at an angle,

That's sort of annoying. Plus and Minus are right next to the A button, honestly a pretty okay change,

But then the Home button was moved all the way to the top and you need a damn toothpick to hit it.

Well why sit here and whine when we can whine with even more style? A Rock Candy Nunchuk.

Finally a controller that answers my lucid dreams. The Nunchuk finally has an ass! It's transparent plastic as well,

But because of that, we get to see some of the iffy-looking wire in here, that doesn't look too good.

If this doesn't scream playing "Goosebumps: HorrorLand", I don't know what does.

Now what if you're playing Xbox 360 and your hands start to bleed?

Well damn, you don't want to stop playing to dry the blood off,

So introducing Airflow, the controller with a fan! You hit this button in the fan turns on.

Well that checks out.

This is a very standard wired Xbox 360 controller, but with LEDs and a fan with two different speeds.

Honestly, it's good at what it does. If you're really hankering for a controller with a fan, you can do a whole lot worse than Airflow.

Speaking of good third-party controllers, the Logitech wireless PS2 controller. Oh my God, this thing is really comfortable.

Dare I say, more comfortable and sturdier than the official controller.

The traditional PlayStation 1, 2, & 3 controllers just aren't my thing, but this pokes it up a bit and just melts in my hands.

Also, I like the blue underneath the analog sticks. Those are fun.

Here we have a few controllers for the Nintendo Switch. First up is the 8BitDo SN-30 Pro.

I've always heard a lot about 8Bitdo, doe, damn, whatever. They specialize in retro-esque Bluetooth controllers,

this one obviously taking heavy inspiration from the SNES. And yeah, it's pretty good at what it sets out to do!

I don't see this as a full-on Switch Pro Controller replacement, but as a supplemental controller for 2D platformers or retro stuff, then oh yeah it's good!

It also works on PC, Android and...

...Irrelevant, so there are a ton of uses for this thing.

But what about a controller made specifically for the Nintendo Switch?

Well just your luck, here's the Power A wireless controller! Themed after "The Legend of Zelda" specifically with some Twilight Princess art.

It's okay, I mean it's perfectly fine. It has motion controls. You also get these buttons on the back,

You can map any of the other buttons to. However you don't get HD Rumble or NFC here. For that,

You need to chalk up an extra 20 bucks for the official Pro Controller,

That's not worth it. The extra money may not be worth what the Pro Controller adds in terms of features,

But I will say the extra 20 bucks is worth the more premium feeling of the Pro Controller.

This is perfectly fine, it does the job. But at 50 bucks for a third-party controller,

I'd just spring for a Pro Controller at that point.

Here I have a bunch of PS3 controllers. Alright, first up, this is the GameStop branded one.

It feels alright, let me test out the trigger-

Oh my God...

The Tier 1 wired PS3 controller, pretty much just like an Xbox One controller. The X got rubbed off here,

That means somebody must have used this thing.

Rock Candy strikes again, this time with this tiny PS3 controller.

This feels like something I get out of a capsule machine.

Let me rewind a bit to the PS2, the TTX Tech wireless controller.

I see they had to make sure the button symbols were different enough to avoid copyright problems with Sony.

What are you talking about? That's not a PlayStation X. That's a Norse symbol.

It's feeling like one of those BEBONCOOL kind of days, you know? Here's the BEBONCOOL for the Nintendo Switch.

This hurts. Everything just doesn't feel right. These triggers, the sticks, the D-pad.

No. Okay, I've never bought into third-party controllers before because you were almost never going to get the same experience or

quality than from the first party offerings! Sure some stand out, but 90% of the time you're asking for trouble buying these things.

"Oh wow, a Nyko controller!" Might as well be saying "Oh wow, I can't just buy a pre-owned first-party controller or save up just a little more for the official one?!"

Sure, some of them have their place in the market but time and time again,

I just asked myself "Why do most of these exist?"

And on top of that, Mad Catz pulled a fast one on me!

This isn't a life-support machine!

THIS WAS JUST A BREAD BOX!