This is the old home version, I love this version. The sound effects are so satisfying, except when you accidentally hit the wall. 

The old Atari joystick was crap. The plastic contact ring would fail after vigorous use, I would take mine apart and epoxy that ring together again. The contact pads would sometimes crush as well, in which case you were ferfuckled and had to buy a new 'stick.

But hey. the were pushing kit and it lasted a little.

Best joystick ever for my money was the Saitek 290. Rugged, dependable, and assignable functions -- and the tactile feel was on-point.

(June 26, 2024 at 1:59 am)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: The old Atari joystick was crap. The plastic contact ring would fail after vigorous use, I would take mine apart and epoxy that ring together again. The contact pads would sometimes crush as well, in which case you were ferfuckled and had to buy a new 'stick.

But hey. the were pushing kit and it lasted a little.

Best joystick ever for my money was the Saitek 290. Rugged, dependable, and assignable functions -- and the tactile feel was on-point.

I find the joysticks that are loose in play harder to control. The old original 2600 sticks were firm. I like the old joysticks.

(June 26, 2024 at 1:59 am)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: The old Atari joystick was crap. The plastic contact ring would fail after vigorous use, I would take mine apart and epoxy that ring together again. The contact pads would sometimes crush as well, in which case you were ferfuckled and had to buy a new 'stick.

But hey. the were pushing kit and it lasted a little.

Best joystick ever for my money was the Saitek 290. Rugged, dependable, and assignable functions -- and the tactile feel was on-point.

‘Ferfuckled’. Yeah. Stealing that word.

Boru

(June 26, 2024 at 1:54 pm)Brian37 Wrote:

(June 26, 2024 at 1:59 am)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: The old Atari joystick was crap. The plastic contact ring would fail after vigorous use, I would take mine apart and epoxy that ring together again. The contact pads would sometimes crush as well, in which case you were ferfuckled and had to buy a new 'stick.

But hey. the were pushing kit and it lasted a little.

Best joystick ever for my money was the Saitek 290. Rugged, dependable, and assignable functions -- and the tactile feel was on-point.

I find the joysticks that are loose in play harder to control. The old original 2600 sticks were firm. I like the old joysticks.

If you can find a ST-290 online affordably, get it. They are certainly firm, and just as certainly more rugged than the Atari stick

https://www.ebay.com/itm/204184006846?ch...jAQAvD_BwE

I've discovered over time that what makes games fun is when they challenge you. A game you easily win is no fun. So the idea that if it's hard to play it's not fun is both true and false. If Galaga and Donkey Kong weren't hard, they'd be no fun. So I think it's more that people don't like challenges which seem unfamiliar, than that it's the difficulty which they don't like. When I started gaming on the PC, I had some pretty set ideas about what games I could be good at and which ones were too difficult and challenging for me to enjoy. In particular, I expected to hate platforming games because I thought the emphasis on timing was something that with my handicap I wouldn't be able to master. However I bought one of the new-fangled XBOX controllers, thinking that even if it was hard, it might at least be tolerable. Surprisingly it wasn't as hard as I expected, and I found the challenge of platform games a lot of fun. I'm still somewhat of a button masher, so some games will be harder for me than they would be for someone with fingers, but that doesn't mean I enjoy them less. There are certainly some games that aren't for me. Games like Battlefield and Call of Duty and The Division are likely to always elude me to an extent, as they require coordinating 3-4 movements / button presses for the main actions, but even those can be some fun. I just have to play to my strengths and avoid styles of play that emphasize quick targeting. Starting from being a person who had played very few games before I lost my fingers, I've been very surprised at what games I eventually came to like. There are games that I play for which I wouldn't have dreamed that I could play and enjoy them. And instead of difficulty, I see challenge. For some reason I haven't got the right timing down for making my character roll away from danger, which is an essential skill in Elden Ring, but if I ever master that, there's a lot of fun to be had, even though it's what people call "a hard game." The difficulty is mostly ignorance and unfamiliarity, both of which can be cured by playing.