By using this site, you agree to our Privacy Policy and our Terms of Use. Close
Otter on 08 April 2020
Edit Thread
NightlyPoe said:
Xxain said:

Elaborate.

The analog stick is the default control option for 3D games.  It's in the inferior secondary position.

The original Playstation controller was basically an SNES with a grip and extra couple of buttons in the back.  Perfectly functional in the 2D 4th generation, but then the N64 controller came along and made non-analog controllers obsolete as gaming headed into 3D space.  Instead of rethinking their controller design from scratch, Sony's response was to basically to slap a couple of analog sticks at the bottom of their controller.  This left the 2D control scheme the dominant default and the 3D scheme secondary.  Good for retro games that wouldn't see a resurgence for about 15 years, but a poor design choice for the majority of games.

I've expressed this opinion a few times around here.  The Sony controllers' backwards design have always bugged me.  So many people have grown up with the controller always like that, though, that it's just a design flaw that most people don't think about and even defend.

"Dominant default" is entirely subjective to how users learned to hold controllers. If people are comfortable with the placement of right stick used consistently for the majority of modern games which rely on camera aiming. Why would mirrored placing of the left stick be a problem. Also by this logic should the right stick and buttons be swapped since the generations biggest games rely more on camera control + shoulder buttons/trigger buttons more then face buttons?

People learn how to hold controllers differently which mean that even through user research, user bases will have different preferences. You'll be astonished by how some people hold controls (there is no right or wrong). Playstation has biggest user base, they should keep listening to that userbase and I would assume their user research did.

What is so wrong and uncomfortable about what the right hand is doing? If there is no problem, I'm not sure a symmetrical design is an inherent flaw versus a personal preference.

To me the only difference aside from your habit of how you're used to holding the control is if you prefer symmetry or no symmetry. I've had all consoles through generations, fortunately I've never had any annoyance jumping between symmetry/no symmetry. The biggest problem for the dualshock was poor quality thumbs sticks and they fixed that with DS4's revisions.

Anyway for people who hate the symmetry, hopefully is a third party control for that. 

Last edited by Otter - on 08 April 2020