Wii WAS the return to a regular controller. Put your Wii remote on it's side... And it's an NES controller.
If you put all of Nintendo's controllers in a row, the N64 controller looks like the one that abandoned "normal."
Game and Watch, NES, Game Boy, SNES, GBA, DS and Wii all have D-pad on the left, and buttons on the right, with no more buttons than ABXYLR. Only N64 and GC add the handle grips, downplay the D-pad for the analog stick, and have 7 or 8 buttons.
I hope the next console has a cross between a Wii remote and a SNES controller. Make something that can be a perfect standard for Wii Sports and Mario Bros. and I'm happy.
"[Our former customers] are unable to find software which they WANT to play."
"The way to solve this problem lies in how to communicate what kind of games [they CAN play]."
Satoru Iwata, Nintendo President. Only slightly paraphrased.
