Would you buy a Microsoft SideWinder USB game pad for any reason other than nostalgia?

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samduhman

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I saw one of these controllers in a thrift store for a $1 and instantly bought it without thinking, nostalgia. Now that I've had time to look at it and checking eBay I see people are still buying them and I'm asking "why?" Why would you buy one of these when modern controllers are so much more functional? I feel I'm missing something or maybe it is just older games picking them up for nostalgia reasons.
 
I picked one up at a thrift store not too long ago. It's not bad for games that don't need analog sticks. Can't go wrong for a buck.

Would I pay $10-$20? Heck no, lots of better options for that money, even if it's just an adapter to use a console controller I have sitting around.
 
samduhman said:
I saw one of these controllers in a thrift store for a $1 and instantly bought it without thinking, nostalgia. Now that I've had time to look at it and checking eBay I see people are still buying them and I'm asking "why?" Why would you buy one of these when modern controllers are so much more functional? I feel I'm missing something or maybe it is just older games picking them up for nostalgia reasons.
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Speaking of modern controllers, have you ever seen one of these?

tik tok: azeron cyborg
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. .


View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2QIHMCzVwe8
 
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USB? No.
Old Game Port versions? Yes.

If I'm building a retro PC with a sound card from the 90s era and I want that game port experience, I'm going to want to ignore USB options if I can.

Would I notice a difference? Probably not. But if I'm going for that authentic experience, it's game port over USB any day.
 
The Sidewinder was pretty comfortable and the six face buttons ( ala Saturn) was a nice touch.

The Sidewinder Game Pad Pro was hot garbage, though. Worst dpad I have ever used.
 
Used to love the High Heat Major League Baseball game series. (circa 1998-2003) still in my heart as the best baseball arcade sim for the PC I ever played.

I could only play them with a MS Sidewinder Game Pad Pro. IIRC, there was a special config for HH just for that specific game pad. Once 3DO went bankrupt and let the series die, I stopped using the game pad.
 
SeymourGore said:
The Sidewinder was pretty comfortable and the six face buttons ( ala Saturn) was a nice touch.

The Sidewinder Game Pad Pro was hot garbage, though. Worst dpad I have ever used.
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I had both. The Sidewinder Game Pad had a true d-pad. I don't remember it being of good quality though say compared to an OG XBox gamepad, but it was good enough. It had good software support which made remapping buttons a godsend on PC. I used mine mostly for emulators at the time (NESticle anyone?).

The Sidewinder Game Pad Pro was a weird one. I don't recall it being useless, but its directional pad took some getting used to. Its d-pad wasn't really a traditional d-pad though. It was more like a mushy analog stick. It could do more than 8 directions, nearly an analog joystick. It's impossible to describe how it feels because it has no modern equivalent other than analog sticks. Anything from PS2 era and later are vastly superior. So yeah, it's a dinosaur.

I think I still have both lying around here somewhere. I definitely kept my SideWinder 3D Pro joystick. Also had a SW Precision Pro joystick, but meh not as good as the OG. I have nothing but good memories of the SW3DPro (1000s of hours of Descent multiplayer).

I never owned the Sidewinder Freestyle Pro gamepad nor the Dual Strike. Always wondered how goofy those were to use.
 
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Sorry I thought you meant the sidewinder stragetic commander. I used to have one. Still have it somewhere actually. I did fine some workaround drivers for it somewhere at some point but meh.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KLd8Y7aWWY


I used some other gameboard at some point but found it too small, then a g13 game board with the gamepad stick on it, eventually a 1/2+ mx red mechanical koolertron keyboard on the side just for gaming.
https://www.howtogeek.com/336754/pc-gamers-give-left-handed-gamepads-a-try/

Just recently I got that Azeron Cyborg linked in my previous reply. It's awesome. It think it's the pinnacle once the shape is customized enough to your hand and you set up good enough profiles and macros, and take the time to learn it. The stick can pan just as well as the old ms sidewinder strategic commander and it has a ton more buttons and things it can do.

I had been playing 3rd person rpg-adventure games like elden ring with a xbox controller on my pc but now I'm playing with the cyborg and prefer it because there is so much more I can lay out on it.

. . .

One thing I remember the actual sidewinder game pad being good for was motorcross madness, because it had tilt control. You could steer the bike with the tilt, and tilt forward to stand the character up on the handlebars which was advantageous for some landings.
 
Absalom said:
The Sidewinder Game Pad Pro was a weird one. I don't recall it being useless, but its directional pad took some getting used to. Its d-pad wasn't really a traditional d-pad though. It was more like a mushy analog stick. It could do more than 8 directions, nearly an analog joystick. It's impossible to describe how it feels because it has no modern equivalent other than analog sticks. Anything from PS2 era and later are vastly superior. So yeah, it's a dinosaur.
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Yeah, that d-pad was weird; I believe it had different modes to either simulate a traditional d-pad or a analogue stick. It did neither particularly well. I seem to recall the d-pad inputs were at a weird angle, so moving right felt like you were hitting a diagonal on the d-pad. I'm pretty sure that controller is still in a storage box at my parent's place - I really should dig through those boxes, bet I could find some cool junk I've forgotten about over the years.

I never tried it myself, but I always thought that Dual Strike was a neat concept and perhaps a change or two from being great. I'm pretty happy with where MS had ended up with their gamepad (Xbox controller is pretty great), but I do miss the days where MS wasn't afraid to try some very experimental designs.
 
elvn said:
Speaking of modern controllers, have you ever seen one of these?



. .


View: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=2QIHMCzVwe8
Click to expand...

My son has one of those Azeron Cyborgs. After seeing your post I asked him about it. He said he doesn't use it but also said he didn't try it long enough to get used to it to see if he liked it. He said I could try it and I think I will. The reviews for it aren't to bad.
 
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samduhman said:
My son has one of those Azeron Cyborgs. After seeing your post I asked him about it. He said he doesn't use it but also said he didn't try it long enough to get used to it to see if he liked it. He said I could try it and I think I will. The reviews for it aren't to bad.
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It was a learning curve getting it adjusted properly. My first few tries I didn't realize you could roll the towers, like a listing boat. Once I realized that and re-did the alignments, it changed everything.

There is a little square screw/nut in between the two more obvious slide fwd/back screws on the bottom of each finger rail. That screw/square-nut can be loosened so that the whole finger tower can log-roll left/right, or tilt leaning toward you away from the base plate. Then re-tighten it. I didn't know that even after watching an azeron how-to adjust video on youtube.

My pinky and ring finger, especially the sideways pinky button and the tower button for each of those fingers weren't very usable until I figured that out. That, because those buttons were off-angled so that the edge of the buttons were a slice across my finger instead of being aligned with them.

I feel like some people give up on the device because they never took the time to align it properly, and to cultivate some good button profiles and macros and memorize them.

I also saw in this forum that some people use mini rubberbands around the frontward and rearward buttons (+ the side button if on the pinky or pointer finger) to add resistance to the buttons. I haven't had a need to do that but some people like the resistance vs mis-clicking on light touch. Personally I've also always been a fan of using bumper pads (felt or vinyl) on other mmo gaming boards (g13, etc) or tiny ones on the side numpad of mmo mice, in order to delineate what buttons are what by feel. I'm probably going to put felt bumper pads on the nearest row of "trigger" keys so that I never confuse the two rows of "teeth" nearest to my palm.

There is an azeron subreddit that has some good info occasionally

. . . .

I set it up on elden ring with the stick acting as a microsoft gamepad. Having everything within reach, plus macro-ing some things, is very useful instead of paddling across gamepad buttons. I can pull of some tricky moves perfectly at a touch (reverse backstep dodge-hopping backward from facing forward, slamming 2-H weapon into the ground, etc). It's also really handy to be able to slap a finger upward on the overhead button to jump, then pull downward on the trigger key opposite of it below on the row of "Teeth" buttons to attack with 2 weapons from the air. Up-down, super quick and seems logical to lay it out like that to my brain. I also have a long press on a forward flat down button that makes me run (along with direction-wise using the gamepad-stick), and if I double tap it I roll. I use that sideways thumb-slap button alongside the gamepad stick to drink estus, and the rightmost key alongside the pointer finger to swap between estus, FP, mixed physik, etc (long press goes back to estus by default in the game). Combined with a few highlighted location side num-pad style mmo mouse buttons, I have a lot of capability. Spell casting and swaping stuff, opening map, opening and closing interfaces is way cleaner too since I put a short press and long press on the same button for all of that (why does elden ring not esc out of all menus and instead require a hotkey for some??). I could probably get away with less side buttons on the mouse now, like the alternate panels on the newer nagas that have like 5 tile buttons on them, but I don't own one of those yet. I still like keeping jump, another roll/run button, and the two main genertic attack buttons on the mouse buttons or mouse num-pad array though, at least for now.
 
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