I got my kid a cheap generic gamepad that I like a lot for its features (and price!) And was thinking of getting another one and modding them with hall effect sticks, so I stopped to actually look at it to consider if it was worth it and noticed it doesn’t have triggers, the L2 and R2 are just buttons.
Which got me thinking, do analog triggers matter all that much? I don’t really like racing games in general and since I’m a PC gamer I don’t even consider the gamepad for precision shooters (if I feel I need precision aiming I just do m+k). I can’t think of many situations where I don’t just bottom out the triggers on my xbox gamepad, to the point where I get surprised if in the middle of a game I find out I can do stuff like a weak shot with a bow or a weak anything.
What situations, other than throttle and break in vehicles, do you find yourself making real use of the analog triggers? Do you think you would miss them if you didn’t have them? Why? Maybe I’m just not noticing when I use them, it’s nice to have, sure, but can’t say more than that.
Yes, it can make a big difference in some games. The 8bitdo 2C is a nice inexpensive controller with analog triggers.
The game I played that I feel needed them the most was F-Zero GX. So, obviously it’s still racing, but they’re not used for throttle or brake, they make you slide laterally.
As well as accelerate and brake, they’re very useful for aircraft rudders or some directional thrusters in spaceships.
I can’t think of much beyond that though. I think the analogue up-down-left-right sticks are a lot more commonly used - if only for moving a character in 360° rather than 8 directions only.
Since the Switch Pro 1 and 2 don’t have analog triggers, I’ve noticed how much analogs get in the way of the games I actually play on PC (all using them as buttons only) with a XBOX Elite 2, which I have setup to have the triggers as “buttons”, but I still miss the clicky feel.
GameCube games like Melee definitely need analog triggers for shield control
https://github.com/xemu-project/xemu/issues/2609
This guy apparently was making a list of XBox games that use analog triggers for an issue on an emulator. Each entry lists what function the game uses the analog trigger for.
It looks like:
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Acceleration (and, I assume, brake). By far the most common. Not always ground vehicles; spaceships and such.
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Rewind/fast forward in some sports games.
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A mining game that used it for drilling.
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Lean in some first person shooters.
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Sidestep in some first person shooters.
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The only thing I have ever played, aside from racing/driving games, that really made use of the analog nature of the triggers, was Metal Gear Solid. Squeezing the trigger really lightly just held the gun up. Holding it a little harder activated the laser sight. Pulling it all the way fired your gun.
That game made use of every feature of the controller back in the day, which was also one of the only games I’ve ever played that used Playstation’s pressure sensitive face buttons. AFAIK, they don’t even have pressure sensitivity anymore, like the original DualShock controller did.
I pretty much never see the analogue triggers used beyond a basic 1/0 switch outside games with vehicles (and sometimes not even those). There’s no degrees of actuation unless using them to accelerate and brake. And I’m not sure what else you could really use them for besides feeling like an actual trigger when using a gun in the game (which the adaptive trigger system does really well).
GTA and Gran Turismo (and most racing games on the PS2) used the pressure sensitivity on the face buttons. The DualShock 3 was the last controller to use them. I don’t think it was used much on the PS3, so they removed them for the PS4.
Hah, I distinctly remember the first time I discovered the pressure sensitivity in MGS 3. I was hiding inside of a locker, and pressed a button to lean towards the grate and peek out. I lightly pressed it, and Snake barely leaned at all. I couldn’t really see what I needed to. So I mashed it harder. But I pressed it so hard that Snake slammed his face into the metal locker door with an audible thud. The noise alerted the guard and I was caught.
The fact that they even thought to program in a “slam face into whatever you’re peeking out of” mechanic has me rolling now that I’m thinking about it. It really is peak Kojima.
FYI: If you do the same thing in a locker that has a poster of a woman in it, Snake will smooch the poster instead of slam his face into the door. Don’t remember how many were in 3, but there were a few in 2. In 5 you can paste them to your box and lure guards like Bugs Bunny in drag.
If you want to emulate Gamecube games, there are a couple where it’s needed (Mario Sunshine comes to mind), or some older games that make use of six axes (the Descent series can make good use of 6). But my experience matches yours–very few need them, and the few that do probably have workarounds.
I’ve been playing a Gamecube game (Spiderman 2 (2004)) on original hardware lately (slight lie - playing on a backwards-compatible Wii, but with an official Nintendo Gamecube controller) and the analogue L/R are quite annoying. Given that the analogueness doesn’t do anything in the game I’m playing unless you fully press it, it’s more like a non-analogue trigger with a ridiculous depression distance.
For a few specific genres, they matter a lot, and if you play those games it’ll suck to not have them. For everything else though, I’d actually prefer a digital trigger.
great for racing games and GameCube
I don’t think i ever played a game that provided such option, but then again i don’t play racing game much and i don’t play fps with controller, so that elimitate most of the use case.
The only time i use it is with steam option to program half press and full press, so i can use my pc desktop with a controller and browse with it, half press to mouse wheel up/down, full press to page up/down so i can get varied scrolling.
It’s rare to need the analog input of triggers, but it is needed occasionally. I set my controller to trigger buttons and haven’t changed them back in over a year.
I can’t imagine a controller being cheap enough to be worthwhile modding to hall effect joysticks and that being worth the price+work. The GameSir Cyclone 2 is the controller I have and it is top tier. TMR sticks and microswitches L2+R2 option. Secondhand this often comes up on eBay for £25.
Gamesir cyclone 2 at 100.000 ars + shipping (around 30.000), this generic controller I can buy at 35.500 ars with free shipping and the sticks are at 11.500 a pop, plus I know for a fact that the wireless works painlessly in my case (I have some issues with xone and xpadneo and haven’t read anything that makes me think the problem doesn’t persist with other controllers that use xinput) and it has a few cool features like mapping touch controls in android without an app.
I wish I had the same availability as you, though.
Still, I made the post for discussion, not purchase advice on a gamepad.
It seems like you’ve already answered your own question lol They wouldn’t really matter at all if you aren’t playing any games that need them.
