Kotaku – In Defense Of The Classic Controller – Project Natal
Admittedly, I didn’t read this article, but based on the title, I assume that I agree. Here’s my thinking: making games accessible to everyone means that you also have to change the types of games you make. It’s the same reason why I will never own a Wii, or if I do buy a Wii, it won’t be for myself, it will be for my girlfriend or for when we have guests over. I would never play a Wii while at home alone. Never, ever. There is absolutely no fun in motion control unless it is a social situation, because it’s bad enough to look like a goofball when others are doing the same thing.
But really, it’s not even the waggle controls that get me, it’s the fact that the games created for the Wii are not fun games. Well, they are fun in extremely short bursts, when playing in a group, but I cannot imagine a situation where I would play any of those games for an extended period of time. The graphics, gameplay and story just aren’t there. Sure, there’s always Mario and Link and Metroid, but once you get past that, what do you have? Oh! Another game with Mario in it? Yippee! Fuck that. I have a PS3 because I want to play games that pull me in. Earlier today, I was playing Bioshock and I was totally immersed. When a freaky bitch threw a corpse at me to distract me as she pulled out a metal pipe and charged at me, I was honestly freaked the fuck out. If there were a similar situation on Wii, I would be pulled out of the moment, because my instinct with a Wiimote would be to swing it like a pipe to defend myself, but the game wouldn’t allow that, because as a first person shooter, the pointer would be mapped to my view, so the camera would just swing around wildly. Or alternatively, I wouldn’t be immersed in the first place, because a situation like that would NEVER FUCKING HAPPEN on the Wii. Did you read the description of what happened? A fucking crazy bitch THREW A CORPSE AT ME before she charged me with a pipe.
When you start making games “accessible” to everyone, that means the content becomes pop, which means anything truly artistic, controversial, thought-provoking or offensive (read: interesting) gets stripped out so it will be something everyone can enjoy.
Aside from that, one thing I love about classic controls is that with a simple press of a button, I can do amazing things that I could never do in real life. And this concept isn’t just limited to killing zombies, or running across walls, or throwing fireballs, but to things like hitting a golf ball properly, or pulling a sweet crossover to drive in for a layup. I have tried playing golf on the Wii and it is just as frustrating and annoying as real golf. That is not fun. Not even a little bit. And now with Wii Motion Plus, I can only imagine it would be even worse.
I play games for the same reason I watch movies or read books: it’s a form of escapism, and when done well it can be just as amazing an experience as any other well told story. Sure, sometimes I play just to have fun, but there still needs to be something interesting, and it is rare that I find anything pop to be interesting any more.
