With the (long overdue) decoupling of the Xbox One and the Kinect, with the Kinect not helping sales due to it possibly being HAL 9000, let’s look at 5 other accessories which were also doomed to fail when launched.
5 – Gamecube Chainsaw Controller
This controller came out at the same time as Resident Evil 4 did, acting as a cool collector’s item for any fans of the series. I remember using this controller at a friend’s house and it has to be one of the clunkiest and uncomfortable controllers known to man. The button configuration is really odd, the controller is hard to hold on and it is attached to a massive base plate, making it a trial to use to for long play sessions. While a nice collector’s piece for Resi fans, it is a terrible controller and with a £30 price tag, a waste of cash.
4 – Sega Activator
The Activator was trying to be the Kinect before Microsoft really got into the gaming business. The way this controller was supposed to work is that each side of the octagon corresponded to a distinct input on the Mega Drive pad, and you had to punch or kick in a specific direction and height to use that button. As you can probably guess, it didn’t work very well. To play a game like Sonic the Hedgehog, you have to continually swipe your hand forward to move and awkwardly kick to jump, making you not only look like you were having a fit, but also tiring you out just trying to complete the first level. Moreover, you’ve have to assemble this giant plastic shape every time you wanted to play and spend time calibrating the controller at the start of every session. An unwieldy and ugly accessory, which should have warned future companies about the folly of motion control.
3 – NES Roll ‘n Rocker
Another early form of motion control, the Roll ‘n Rocker could be seen as the Wii Balance Board’s ancestor. The way this controller works is you stand on it, and rock back and forth to emulate the directions on the NES D Pad. As well as looking like a complete pillock, you’d still have to use a standard NES controller to press A and B which makes this accessory completely useless. Each game reacts differently to your inputs, with some games not even working with this abomination and you need to weigh less than 7 stone in order to not break the damn thing when you try and use it.
2- NES Laserscope
Now we’re getting to the real tat of the game accessory world. This headset for the NES had you aim at the screen by using the laser-guided crosshair that covered one of your eyes and shouting ‘Fire!’ into the microphone in order to shoot. The headset looks awful to start off with but the microphone would react to any background noise, randomly firing at even the slightest sound or word. Unless you wanted to look like a trainee at an intergalactic call centre and fail to shoot things on screen whilst playing Duck Hunt, this accessory was about as useful as a chocolate teapot on the surface of the sun.
1- Atari Mindlink
This accessory was so bad that it wasn’t even released to the general public. This controller for the Atari 2600 tried to utilise you moving the muscles in your head to move characters on screen. Needless to say, it was an absolute failure. Testers complained of getting headaches whilst playing the games developed for the Mindlink and one Mindlink game claimed to use ESP to predict what card you were thinking of while playing. Also, the technology was so amazing that only a few people within Atari were actually allowed to view the prototypes and test kits that were supposed to go to trade shows were never seen. The Mindlink was shelved and none of the amazing games that were developed with it in mind were released.
So, what do you think are the worst gaming accessories? Did we leave out any obvious choices? Leave your thoughts in the comments below.
