What's the worst Joystick you've used?

[mrandyman]

For me it's the following in this order:
1. Original Commodore Joystick (Vic 20/C64) It required a lot of pushing for this triangular stick and the fire button required about as much push as the infamous RESTORE key on the C64.

2. Atari Joystick...That black plastic just slowed me down...thank god it came lose after awhile (I never actually did own an atari--just played at a friends house)

3. Epyx Joystick...nice idea....but I can't hit the fire button fast enough.... Was this meant more for left handers??? Also it was quite loud...."click click"

Favorite sticks:
1. Sega Genesis: Easy to use and it worked on Sega and my computer (although only the B button worked for fire).

2. Quickshot II: great for flight sims...also you could shake it real fast for "decathlon"-type games but the joystick wore out very quickly so I bought MANY of these suckers

[Mogwa]

I reckon you can divide really bad joysticks into two categories: shoddily made crap and unresponsive bricks. The Mad Catz pad for the Dreamcast is probably the flimsiest excuse for a gaming peripheral I have ever encountered. On average, the DMC lasted about a month before one of the trigger pins would snap off. This happened to me four times before I finally gave up and decided that twenty bucks was too much to waste on the things, even if the precise control they offered was far superior to the pack-in originals.
As far as bricks are concerned, I'd have to give the nod to the original PC Gravis gamepad. It was so twitchy that using it was like trying to steer a pat of butter across a hot skillet with a toothpick. All you could do was keep jabbing in the direction you wanted to go and hope you might accidentally get there. Compared to that piece o' crap, even the Intellivision disc controller was inspired elegance.

[jamcat]

Didn't have any bad joysticks/gamepads to comment on, but I will mention 2 of my favorite.

First, the slim 6 button Sega Genesis gamepad. It feels great in the hand, and is very responsive. Currently I use the gamepad on the Atari 2600.

Second, the Wico Red Bat Handle joystick. This stick I mainly used on my Atari 800XL computer. Good sturdy stick that is built like a tank.

[Yodaporn]

The Power Glove - 'nuff said.

[Flare]

You know, speaking of bad controllers; I never got to play or see an Atari 5200 (not even today); and everybody speaks of how bad these controllers were, but I don't really know why that is.

(Bill Kunkel even said it's not fair to blame the design of this controller on drugs)

Can you guys explain me what was the problem with them? Shane and the Game Doctor were talking about the stick not being self centered or something like that. I mean, is that even possible that someone made a controller like that???

So, since to me that that sounds totally unbelivable, what was the real problem then?

[Shane R. Monroe]

Did you ever play with an Apple II analog joystick where the self-centering springs were broken? Same idea.

Hell, ANY joystick where the centering mechanism was broken. Same idea.

Along with that "how the hell am I supposed to play PacMan with this" issue, the controllers broke and failed alot. Just downright un pleasant.

Personally, I thought the Inty controllers blew goat. Pressing that disc was HORRIBLE on the hands and wrists. No one sent a memo to the ergonomics team at Mattel I guess.

I also didn't care for the Odyssey 2 controllers or the 'standard' Apple ][ controller (both felt the same way - awkward).

Epyx controller ... hated it. CLICK CLICK CLICK ... WAY too far a throw on the controller to be effective in fast action games. Wasn't all that comfortable either.

I spent my C64 heavy gaming days with a TAC-II controller. It was all about the throw ... required next to NO throw to get a direction. Fast, responsive - lasted forever too. And you could actually repair it.

The original NES controllers were no joy either. Made to fit midget hands - and the D-Pad got loose quickly.

Let's be honest. There are very few GOOD controllers through time. I'd have to say that the best controller of all time would have to go to the Sony Dual Shock controller. Its just a TAD too small, but its hella more comfortable than the Xbox, GC, Dreamcast, N64 or other controller that comes to mind.

[Flare]

I owned an INTY for quite a long time, I was very young so I don't remember ever bitching about the disc. But I rememeber once my brother and I tried to glue a small pencil to the center of the disc because we wanted to play with a stick... never worked.... :)

what I hated about the the INTY controllers was the fact that they were hardwired to the unit, and they had this phone-like cable which never stayed properly curled...

And those side buttons! Bad, bad design.

[patman]

The Atari 2600 stick was horrible. I'm surprised our hands weren't permanently disfigured from using them. I get cramps between my thumbs and forefingers just thinking about them.

The Intellivision controller didn't seem to good to me - I didn't quite understand what to do with it - I kept trying to spin the disc around.

Atari 5200 stick. Bad. I guess an analog stick was forward thinking but the execution was awful. I don't think anyone got the analog stick on a console controller right until the Playstation Dual-Shock controller came along.

That leads me to the Nintendo 64 controllers. I'm 6'5" and have correspondenly large hands and long fingers and I could barely reach all the controls on that thing - how were kids supposed to use it? X-Box controller suffers a little from this too - it's just too bulky.

That reminds me of the original Nintendo NES controllers - another good cramp inducer. Too thin and too not contoured on the edges.

Those analog sticks for the PC - remember the ones with the skinny stainless steel stick that weren't self centering and the motion was damped somehow? Those sucked big time. They could take any the little fun there was in playing a game on a PC at the time and kill it.

I had a pair of joystick for my C-64. I can't remember what they were called but they had a good sized flightstick-style stick with a fire button on top. One had a normal base with suction cups on it and a duplicate fire button on it - that one was cool. The other one had a round base that was no bigger around than the stick itself. That one sucked. There wasn't anything to hold on to - you couldn't get any leverage so when you tried to move you'd end up yanking the stick out of the hand that was holding the base.

I likes the Epyx controllers - I liked the clik of the microswitchs. Unfortunately, something plastic inside would always break or fatigue and stretch or something and you'd end up with one direction that didn't quite work anymore. I ended up with a bunch of broken ones. But I did have a nice collection of microswitches that I pirated out of them :)

I agree that the Dual-Shock is the best. The console makers might as well just make any new console compatible with the DS and save the money researching and developing there own controllers.

[Shane R. Monroe]

I honestly suspect that that Dual Shock is one of the 5 or 10 reasons why Playstation 2 is still far in the lead of any other console. Controls can make or break the console.

I tell you, I was playing with a Tapwave (Zodiac) the other day ... the control was a smooth thumbstick. I didn't play it long enough to know if I liked it. I think the PSP will get the same thing.

Anyone have a Tapwave?

[Flare]

Ah! I don't but I so much want one! Lucky for me, there's a COMPUSA in McAllen TX (2 hours near my city in Mexico) so this will be my next PDA. They are even cheaper than the Tungstens and CLIEs. And with 128MB it's a steal!

[Flare]

I honestly suspect that that Dual Shock is one of the 5 or 10 reasons why Playstation 2 is still far in the lead of any other console. Controls can make or break the console.

True... up until the Dualshock came along, the SNES was in my opinion the best controller out there. And I think SONY got a lot of inspiration from it (give me a modern controller that doesn't come with "L" and "R" buttons)

[Fredrik]

Far worst joystick I've used was the "slick stick" for Amiga/C64 which was a very tiny (and bad) copy of the Tac-II. Wasn't that much fond of the "ergonomic" joysticks either. Tac-II was unbeatable the best although some games almost make the thumb cramp up (like using the fire button as accelerator in Super Cars for a couple of hours ;- )

[chrisbid]

i dont care for the dual shock, i liked the original PSX controller to a degree (i would prefer six face buttons instead of four), but the biggest complaint i have with dual shock is the placement of the analog sticks, they are in a secondary position. if most games require the use of one analog stick, then the digital pad and analog stick should switch positions

my favorite pad is the original Sega Saturn pad, (the sturdier japan model). i like having six face buttons, and the d pad is not a cross, but a true 8 direction pad. in fact, all of sega's controllers had this feature until the dreamcast, which regressed to a cheap four way cross, and four face buttons

[Bryan 'KidHype' Smith]

Worst sticks ever:

NES D-Pad
Colecovision controller
Colecovision super action controller
Intelivision controller
SNES D-Pad
Atari 5200 Joystick
N64 Controller
Any PC/Color Computer joystick

Favorite Sticks
Atari 2600
NES Advantage
SNES Advantage
SEGA Arcade Stick for DC
Mad Catz Stick for the PS1
Mad Catz Steering wheel for the DC
GBA/GBA-SP D-Pad
Lynx D-Pad
X-Arcade Controller
Stick-it
PS Dual Shock

[btribble]

I'm surprised my most hated joystick hasn't even been mentioned yet... the Atari 7800 "Proline" or whatever they called it. I grew up playing with the 2600 joystick with no problems, even though it had its limitations. I could only play the 7800 stick for a half hour or so before my palm was totally cramped up, though. There was just no base to get any kind of torque on the stick. To add to the problem, the button was in a horrible spot. There were even some games where you were theoretically supposed to use both of the buttons on it...?

I always liked the Jaguar D-pad, though. I think maybe just because it was so big. Granted, the keypad was useless for most games, though I always thought the idea of a default "music off" button was a nice touch.

Another nice controller is Namco's neGcon, from the PS1 era (worked especially well on Wipeout). I'm surprised this didn't become the new "default" controller for racing games. If you've never seen one, imagine a cylindric controller, cut in half. You grip each half and can twist the whole thing about 180 degrees or so to steer left or right. I've never used Namco's followup Jogcon, but it didn't look as interesting.

Finally, one controller I've always been curious about - Broderbund's U-Force. It looked really cool from the advertisements, like a "virtual cartesian grid" you could wave your hand around to control stuff, kinda like the power glove but you didn't have to wear anything. Yet, it made the #1 spot of worst NES peripherals on this web page: http://www.gamer-talk.net/feature46.html. :D Anyone own this?

[Aaron Doughty]

I'm dating myself here, but does anyone remember the original TRS-80 COCO sticks..the ones that didn't self center? Those were some terrible sticks. The "deluxe" models were better, but broke fast.

Another candidate in my mind is the Odessey 2 sticks...the sticks were ok, but man when they broke..ugh..no way to unplug them..they were hardwired into the O2...so you hadda void your warrenty or get this fixed at the store.

And of course Intellivision Pads were straight from the devil's ass.

[Bryan 'KidHype' Smith]

I'm dating myself here, but does anyone remember the original TRS-80 COCO sticks..the ones that didn't self center? Those were some terrible sticks. The "deluxe" models were better, but broke fast.
I never found a good CoCo stick which is why i love playing most video games with a keyboard and a mouse. To me, PC controllers didnt get good until about 6 years ago when i was able to get a arcade style 6 button controller that actually worked in the game port. I have the stick around here somewhere but i can't remember the name of it. It came with Mortal Kombat 2 or 3 or something. I need to dig it out and use it on my Dell.

[Danny]

Atrai Jaguar pads suck so royaly in my opinion, they were like telephone dials because they had so much buttons on them lol

[Deanster]

any heat senstive control pads where the worste they would go bezerk even if you didnt touch them....

[Danny]

Yeah those sucked soooooo much. I remeber having one for the Snes (That is the one you're thinking off right?)

[Deanster]

yeah, one of my friends farted on it for a joke just to see what would happen lol :S

[babydoggen]

Far worst joystick I've used was the "slick stick" for Amiga/C64 which was a very tiny (and bad) copy of the Tac-II. Wasn't that much fond of the "ergonomic" joysticks either. Tac-II was unbeatable the best although some games almost make the thumb cramp up (like using the fire button as accelerator in Super Cars for a couple of hours ;- )

yeah but for things like combat school or any "joystick waggler" it rocked -

Talk of the "slick stick" brought back so many memories then mmy friend using his zipstick and me with the slick stick.

God only knows How much I hated the Zip stick.

Really hated it.

When I got a 600 again a few months back the guy tried to sell me a zip stick I think buy the look of disgust on my face he decided to throw in the "BUG" joystick. Now that is a choice bit of kit

[JayP]

It's been a while since I've handled a real 2600 stick- but I used them from approx 1981 until 1990 with various VCS-Vic-C128s. Maybe I didn't know better but they worked great... until the rubber boot slipped out of the handle.

I have a 'red' 2600 stick in the attic. I think. I'll look but it's a heavy one, feels like a cabinet stick.

The WORST stick so far? The Jakks sticks are a new level of suck. Maybe they're for smaller hands... like my 3yr old's hand.

[Spin]

I think the Tac II was the best for durable beating.
I disagree about the Slick stick I too hated the size until I used it for a while.
It then became a favorite.
The best ever... Pack in good old Atari joystick still the best after all these years.
Pity that the comfort can’t be used in today’s generations.
Not that the Game cubes is bad. PS OK. X-box not a favorite here.
Spin

[Shane R. Monroe]

The Tac-II was my all time fav.

[jamcat]

I forget the name of the company, it's been soooo long. But I remember winning a gamepad for having the letter of the month in Electronic Games magazine. It was a very nice programable pad for the Genesis. It had 3 special buttons that you could assign moves to. Very nice.

[Deanster]

I forget the name of the company, it's been soooo long. But I remember winning a gamepad for having the letter of the month in Electronic Games magazine. It was a very nice programable pad for the Genesis. It had 3 special buttons that you could assign moves to. Very nice.

assign moves to buttons! this must be stopped!

my fave is prolly "thinks really hard" any pad over a stick coz with my big hands i cant really use them anymore. Especially the 2600 controllers they are way to small for me nowdays i get cramp playing with them :S

[jamcat]

It was great for fighting games. But I just loved the good old turbo autofire feature.

[PowerPlay25]

Here is the worst controller ever made: The U-Force for the NES. My God! I got one for christmas when I was a kid, used it for 15 mins, and threw it in the garbage! Worthless and Un-useable controller ever! :mad:

[B_Rik_Schitthaus]

The Worst- The Cheetah film specials Alien3 and Terminator joysticks. Ouch the terminators nose used to dig into your palm and the Aliens ribs made my hands itch. Terrible joysticks.

Also the pal saturn pads anymore than two hours would mean thumb cramps and wrist ache. The Dreamcast pad wasnt great either.

And what were they thinking with the Xbox pad too big, heavy and the black and white button are difficult to use.

Ive never liked the Gamecube pad. It dosn't seem very well thought out.

The Best- The Black and Yellow microswitched Zip Stick for the atariST and Amiga.

Also i quite liked the N64 pad until you put a rumble pack in then it became a bit heavy.

Dual Shock 2- Some say too many buttons, maybe. But its nicley laid out and the dual analogue sticks was a good move.

[jamcat]

Yeah, gotta say the controllers for the N64 & GameCube suck ass big time. Between the two, the N64 was the worst with that trident design.

As far as gamepads go, there have only been 2 good designs in my opinion. First the slim 6 button gamepad from Sega for the Genesis. And second, Sony's PlayStation gamepad.

[Danny]

First the slim 6 button gamepad from Sega for the Genesis. And second, Sony's PlayStation gamepad.

someone must also like the offical Sega Saturn mk II pads then... almost identical but with shoudler buttons lol

[jamcat]

someone must also like the offical Sega Saturn mk II pads then... almost identical but with shoudler buttons lol

Ah, never had a Saturn. :) But the slim 6 button Genesis pads sure beat those bulky 3 button Genesis pads.

[Galaga will never die]

Worst joystick for me is the Colecovision/ColecoADAM paddle controller - only controller to actually tear the skin off your hand and cause blisters with extended play. Runner up is probably the Apple II analog stick which was adjustable but never could be centered properly and was always too loose or too tight. Third place goes to the Epyx (?) joystick for the Commodore 64 which was red and black with a base shaped to fit in your Right (!) hand while you had to applly pressure to a pathetic plastic stick using your left hand that barely moved a few millimetres in each of the 8 directions

[jamcat]

Reminds me back in the day when lefties would bitch about why all the joysticks are made for righties. :) Then they had articles on how to re-wire 2600 joysticks for left handed play.

[Yodaporn]

The worst-
Im sorry...the gamecube controler. They took a button layout that has worked since the snes, though the ps1, n64(kinda), ps2, (gasp) xbox, and many, many genarics for the pc. Its suporters will mutter somthing along the lines of inovation, and make up some excuse why they suposedly dident like the old cross layout. I've tried this thing, and I just dont see what they are talking about.

My favorite-
Anyone here remember the old suncom SFX keyboard programable joypad for the PC? At the time this came out, I was still playing slightly older dos games and shareware, games that had limited to no joystick suport. So, when I got my hands on this thing, omg, I had a field day. There was not a single game this thing would not tackle. It was no longer "oh well, guess Ill just deal with bad keybord controls". I finaly started to have real fun with pc games. You know, seeing how all modern software keyboard to joy mapers dont work well, and how most modern sharware games still dont have joystick suport (just load up the games on the retro gamer mag cds), I think im gona hook this sucker back up again.

[JamesJoell]

The conventional Quikshot atari ST joysticks, welcome to the land of cramp on Lotus 3 Turbo Challenge

[Flare]

Hey, how about the Game Handler (http://www.gamersgraveyard.com/repository/nes/peripherals/images/Game_Handler,_The.jpg) controller for the NES... what a piece of crap that was... Remember how you had to actually move the thing to the sides to move the character on the screen?

[JayP]

Reminds me back in the day when lefties would bitch about why all the joysticks are made for righties. :) Then they had articles on how to re-wire 2600 joysticks for left handed play.

They had articles? I rewired mine just to aggrivate my little brother. Up was right, down was up...

[Deanster]

two words thermal joypad, enough said!

[zodiacprime]

Worst:
Onimusha Katana Sword: http://www.hori.jp/us/products/katana/ (looks pretty though)
Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw: http://gear.ign.com/articles/666/666241p1.html (ditto)
Have to agree with PowerPlay25, the U-Force is total garbage: http://www.vidgame.net/NINTENDO/u_force.htm

Best:
Steel Battalion: http://www.capcom.com/SB/ - Solidly built, feels awesome.
X-Arcade (dual, and trackball): http://xgaming.com/products.shtml - Love 'em!
Ace Combat 5 Flight Stick 2: http://gear.ign.com/articles/562/562988p1.html This baby has a nice subtle force feedback rumble when your pullin' Gs

[telengard]

For me it's the following in this order:
1. Original Commodore Joystick (Vic 20/C64) It required a lot of pushing for this triangular stick and the fire button required about as much push as the infamous RESTORE key on the C64.

2. Atari Joystick...That black plastic just slowed me down...thank god it came lose after awhile (I never actually did own an atari--just played at a friends house)

3. Epyx Joystick...nice idea....but I can't hit the fire button fast enough.... Was this meant more for left handers??? Also it was quite loud...."click click"

Favorite sticks:
1. Sega Genesis: Easy to use and it worked on Sega and my computer (although only the B button worked for fire).

2. Quickshot II: great for flight sims...also you could shake it real fast for "decathlon"-type games but the joystick wore out very quickly so I bought MANY of these suckers

The only joystick I had that I just couldn't stand was my Epyx 500XJ (same as the one you mentioned). Maybe a nice idea on paper but man, impossible to play games that required any sustained shooting.

The best joystick I think I've ever owned has to be the simple but sturdy GemStick. It's a tank.

~telengard

[Dynamite Dan]

I think in terms of a comfy rating, the NES and Master System pads were really bad, im sure i got tingles in my arms from the corners of the pads digging into my palms.
As far as Strength goes, i think the Megadrive pad was indestructable, i often threw it round my room just after being killed on the final boss of Sonic.

If i was to give any pad a Comfy prize, i would have to go with the Snes, it was comfy, sturdy and reliable, for me.

[Flare]

I think in terms of a comfy rating, the NES and Master System pads were really bad, im sure i got tingles in my arms from the corners of the pads digging into my palms.
As far as Strength goes, i think the Megadrive pad was indestructable, i often threw it round my room just after being killed on the final boss of Sonic.

If i was to give any pad a Comfy prize, i would have to go with the Snes, it was comfy, sturdy and reliable, for me.I agree with the SMS pad and its crappy "squared" directional pad; but as far as the NES one goes.... well we didn't know better back then, in my opinion.

[Flare]

It's funny... use the Dual Shock for a long period of time, and then try to back to hold a NES or SNES pad... they'll feel extremely weird, and tiny... don't you agree?

[Tally]

For me it was the Virtual Boy! YIKES! and
the Intellivision Controller, C64 was pretty bad till I got a good joystick for it, I am not into the Dual Shock playstation 2 controlls too.

I liked the design don't get me wrong but it would give me nasty blisters on the list above.

Best for Me, didn't bother me and worked really well.

Arcade Controller.
Nintendo Controller, SNES controller, old sega master system controller, The Turbo Graphics 16, Sega Genesis, Dreamcast and Sega Saturn controllers, Xbox Controllers, playstation 1 controller.

[davidmt]

Hah, I forgot all about those Commodore VIC/64 sticks. Never owned one, but I think a friend of mine had one. Awful.

Am I the only one that liked the Epyx XJ500? I still have it, complete with the original box. Now that I think about it, my index finger did get pretty tired after using it for awhile. Never really bothered me as a kid though.

My absolute favorite C64-era stick was the Suncom Slik Stick. It was perfect for maze games, or platform type games like Miner 2049er, Jumpman, or Wizard. I also had a Suncom TAC-2 which I also loved. I think Suncom made excellent controllers overall.

Everyone talks about the Wico Bat joystick, but did anyone have the Wico Boss? It wasn't my favorite, but I remember using it from time to time. The quality of that thing was amazing -- I think its better suited for flight simulator type gaming, which I wasn't a big fan of.

I did a quick Google search while reading this topic and found pics of most of the sticks discussed here:
http://www.pelikonepeijoonit.net/articles/joystickz.html

I think my vote for worst has to be the Colecovision controller. Ugh.

[Subarubrat]

5200 was the worst, durability and opperation alike. Now the best, for it's time, 2600 or NES. I would say the Atari is instantly recognized and an icon, but the NES was more functional.

[The Game Doctor]

You know, speaking of bad controllers; I never got to play or see an Atari 5200 (not even today); and everybody speaks of how bad these controllers were, but I don't really know why that is.

(Bill Kunkel even said it's not fair to blame the design of this controller on drugs)

Can you guys explain me what was the problem with them? Shane and the Game Doctor were talking about the stick not being self centered or something like that. I mean, is that even possible that someone made a controller like that???

So, since to me that that sounds totally unbelivable, what was the real problem then?

Shane explained it about as well as anyone can. We used to call them "dead fish joysticks" because they were about that active.

But the worst controller ever made was LeStick -- just a stick with a top-mounted trigger and a wire. It used mercury switches to control movement. Theoretically. Today, the vast majority of these un-controllers are landfill somewhere in Silly Valley. I think Datasoft made them, but I'm not certain on that.

Favorite sticks? The N64 and for retro, the Kraft 2600 stick was comfortable, durable and sweet.

[Shane R. Monroe]

Did you really like the Kraft 2600 stick? Maybe I'm remembering the WRONG one ... but if it is what I remember, I wasn't very pleased with it...

[GrilledMonkeyFat]

Worst controller had to be the one for the Sega Master System. Besides ripping off the simple design of the NES controller, the damn pause button was not even ON the controller!!! Whose idea was that??!!!!!!

Note: To those who think I'm being picky, greedy, and whiny, I say to you "Shaddup"

[Turbo2Xs]

Might have to agree with the SMS Pad; It was weak. What annoyed me the most was the mushy buttons and awkward D-Pad.

All the same, the Atari 2600 had the worst (OEM) controller in my opinion simply because of the hand fatigue that set in after a few rounds of Boxing. (That game was fun though!)

[Imperious]

The worst joystick I ever used was on my first computer, the Texas
Instruments TI99/4A, it had a small rectangular base and was extremely
uncomfortable to grab onto for long periods of time, especially after your
hands started sweating from the excess grip required. how I ever managed
to clock PARSEC with it I don't know. Possibly I achieved this in winter
when sweat wasn't such a problem here in Brisbane Australia.
The joysick which has lasted the longest has been my trusty CH Flightstick
Pro, even though I snapped it and repaired it twice it still works after about
11 years.