Page 14 - Old School Gamer Magazine Issue #40 FREE Edition

the silver controller so I could
get replacements as it wasn’t hardwired. This is particularly important as Atari-influenced controller accidents happened to me more than once. Eventually,
my parents stopped replacing things, forcing me to keep a broken controller that moved sluggishly but still worked. This turned out
to be a surprising win as my Atari buddies didn’t mind playing with that wonky controller, and I had an edge in any game where extreme precision was required.
I did have one friend, Greg, who had it worse than me controller- wise, as he owned an Intellivision. Nobody wanted to go to his house to play games. Greg thought my O2 controllers were pretty nice and wished his system had the same. It doesn’t seem to matter
if you had the hand-breaker
Atari 2600, the Atari 5200 failure stick, the dainty O2 controller, the oddball Intellivision disc, or the ColecoVision telephone joystick hybrid. We retro gamers of a particular vintage can all bond over one controller trauma or another.”
Jamie Lendino: “I was generally protective of my controllers and used to get annoyed when a friend would come over and start chewing on the rubber tip of one of my Atari joysticks. So many kids basically “ate” the tops off and exposed the white plastic in the center. On the one hand, I loved having friends over because I was an only child,
common as it is today, and on the other hand, well...
“Don’t eat your joysticks, kids!”
I bought some alternative third- party Atari joysticks back then
and remember hating their designs. Wico was the high-quality exception, although I was the odd person who still preferred the Atari CX40.”
Gunther Vinson: “My most hated controller was what I called the QuickShot Shooter. It seemed to be designed for the aggressive shooter or racing game in mind, but it was clumsy and awkward. Having the A and B buttons separated on either side of the grip was a challenge to get used to, especially if you had the mechanics of a regular NES controller welded into your brain. Button mashing was incredibly strenuous at that position, which made using it for shooters almost impossible. The overall feel gave
it the illusion that it had some motion control, which let you down
constantly. This controller took
a few beatings after some poorly scored Sky Shark and R.C. Pro AM game sessions back in the day.”
“Gunther wanted to QuickShot this controller into the trash!”
Chris Tang: “In the summer of 1992, Street Fighter II for the Super NES would be released worldwide with unmatched excitement. I played the prototype at Winter CES and ordered the import to get it as early as possible. Using an SNES
controller with four face buttons didn’t seem ideal, so I had an idea to build a 6-button controller! Using my mom’s steak knives, I cut the upper right side of one controller,
“You might think he is crazy, but in my mind, Chris is a genius with this modification!”
including the X and A buttons,
and trimmed the upper right side
of another controller to match the angle. I super glued the shell parts together to form a 6-button layout and wired the cut PCB to where L and R were connected. I was a kid trying to use a soldering iron for the first time, and despite being careful, I accidentally grabbed the metal part and burned myself badly. My finger had a painful, fluid-filled blister for a week, but the job
was done, and my controller was ready long before the game came out! This was my first controller modification, and having done countless electronics projects since then, I found this a life-changing learning experience!”
John Hancock: “In my early days
of retro collecting, I was delighted
to stumble upon a good deal at a flea market, an Atari 5200 with a bunch of games for a mere $30. The seller was surprised I wanted the console so much, but he still gladly took my money. Gleefully, I went home to try a console I had little experience with in person. After setting up my new retro console for my TV set, I attempted to play some games. To be quite honest, even Pac-Man was a chore to control. The non-centering joysticks were very different from the 2600 CX40 I was
back when that wasn’t nearly as
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