Was anybody else underwhelmed by the PS4 event?

[dharh]

famousringo said:

dharh said:

Well here it depends on your definition of good innovation. I think a trackpad is the next logical step that could greatly enhance additional controls. I also think that a touchscreen, like that on the WiiU gamepad, is quite possibly the most expensive blunder of a controller since the Atari Jaguar's  15+ button Controller. It just doesn't even make sense.

They could not make a _full_ commitment to Move without basically throwing nearly ALL their current gamers out the window. We _don't_ want the move as the primary controller. Instead they did the smartest move they could. They integrated some of the Move functionality to enhance the DS4 at next to no additional cost.

OnLive collapsed because of many things, almost none of which apply here. We know we will eventually get PS1/2/3 games on PSN/Gaikai. They did talk about it plenty, some people were just not paying attention. We will know more at E3. They only had 2 hours to talk.

The Nintendo DS was not a blunder. Wii U's gamepad isn't the freshest idea, but at least putting a gaming touchscreen in a more balanced form factor (longtime peeve of the DS which is even more apparent when motion controls were added to 3DS) that can move independently of the top screen opens up a few new possibilities.

I seriously have no idea what you're supposed to do with the DS4 touchpad. Touchpads are kludges fitted into laptops because mice are even more awkward in laptop use cases. Mount them in a device meant to be gripped with two hands rather than laid on a level surface and it gets even worse. They might as well have added an extra thumb stick. If you have gameplay ideas, I'd love to hear them. 

The second screen on the DS is what sucks not really the lame stylus touch screen. But I wasn't saying the DS is a blunder, I was saying the Wii U gamepad touchscreen is a blunder. To me I very much care less about 'fresh' ideas and 'innovative' new things than I do tried and true input controls with iterative changes.

The DS4 touchpad has quite a bit less to do with game control than it does with OS controls. Usings gesture to navigate the OS or the web browser is a major enhancement. The Witness game with its puzzles highlights some possible in game uses of the touchpad as well.  Whereas I find having to look _away_ from the primary screen we should 100% always be looking at to be a signifigant drawback of the Wii U's gamepad. 

The two real uses for the Wii U's gamepad are alright but hardly worth a dedicated expensive control that could have just been a simple addon and could have resulted, easily, in a $100+ less expensive or a more powerful console, both would have made the Wii U a much better system. The first viable use case, Asymetric gameplay, is an interesting concept with one main flaw, it assumes two people in the same room which to me is a large assumption. Most multi-player games these days are over the internet. It goes hand in hand with Nintendo's insistence of weak online gameplay. The other use case being taking the controller away from the TV room to play elsewhere is another interesting concept that unfortunately has a few problems because of the gamepads weaknesses itself. That being the battery life, weak screen, and the limited range through walls. I imagine the Vita will suffer the same wall range problem, though it will not really suffer the same other two weakensses.

The DS4 touchpad is a minor thing, meant to be used in a few use cases. Touchpads can actually replace the desktop mouse and I know a few people who have done just that. And you most certainly will not need to lay the DS4 down on a level surface to use the touchpad, get real. I dunno about you but I play one handed sometimes, because you definitely do not always have to two hand grip the controls in every situation. Using one hand to hold the control, while using the other hand to do a quick geasture or two on the touchpad is a simple thing. A third stick would not allow you to do a 2 finger crossswipe, or a couple quick thump downswips to quickly navigate massive amounts of screen text.