NES Controller and Modern Controllers - Differences and Similarities

          Do you remember when you were a kid and you had to use those controllers that were incredibly uncomfortable? Well, probably you are thinking on the NES controller. That joystick was designed with a rectangular shape and the directional buttons were really little and hard to use, the only buttons that were comfortable were the B and A buttons. Well, with that in mind think now about modern controllers that are used now, those joysticks were created in order to feel really comfortable when we using them, and they have at least 10 buttons in order to have all necessary actions in our disposition.

           

           If we think about the differences we can name a lot of them, but if we think about similarities we can say only a few, so, firstly, I will talk about the similarities. First, they both have buttons, those buttons are used to manipulate a character, actions or menus. Both, the NES controller and a modern controller have the same 2 main buttons: the “select” button and the “start” button, those buttons are fundamental in order to play properly. And that is all that I can say about similarities.

             

          Now, if we talk about differences, there are many, but I will talk about a few of them. First, The NES controller is anti-ergonometric, and a modern controller is ergonometric, while the NES controller was a rectangle with buttons, a modern controller fits completely with your hands, I do not really know what they were thinking were they developed the shape of the NES controller, it was uncomfortable. I think that when my son sees the NES controller he will not believe that I used that rectangle to play videogames. Another difference is that while with an NES controller you only use your thumbs, the left thumb to control the directional pad and the right thumb to use the B and A buttons, with a modern controller you use practically all your fingers, but it is easy to use and easy to remember the position of all buttons. Finally, an NES controller cannot be connected on a computer, there is not an adapter to connect it, while a modern controller can be easily connected on a computer in order to play any games, even an NES game, with an emulator of course.

             

         As you can see technology has evolved greatly, it took many years to see how controllers have evolved and now we can enjoy of all their comfortableness.