no pc games have special controllers?

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For the ps2 you can have a chainsaw controller, for the gamecube you have bongos, for the deamcast you have a fishing rod etc...why is there NOT ONE SINGLE pc game that has ever been released that requires a special controller? I dont mean flight sim games and flight sticks, but a game specifically designed to have a unique controller bought with it to provide a unique gameplay experience?

WHY??
 
I would imagine it's just doesn't make financial sense. Console games tend to sell a lot more units than PC ones do, and sales don't get hit nearly as much by piracy. I imagine it wouldn't make financial sense to tool up a factory to make a toy chainsaw controller for a game that might only sell 50,000 units.

Plus the fact that (correctly or not) games like these are seen as kids' games, and more suited to consoles that PCs. It's probably true that your average PS2 owner is younger than your average PC gamer, and a lot more likely to be swayed by the inclusion of a cool controller.
 
But, if the game only worked with that controller then it wouldnt have piracy issues. The controller dosent have to be kiddy, use your imgaination...what would a WOW controller look like or even a silent hunter one!
 
Well, with most PC games (FPS's, RTS's, MMO's, RPG's) I'd much rather be using a keyboard and mouse. There's really not many PC games at all that could make good use of a specially designed controller.
 
You can/do get a lot of specialist controllers for the PC, but they tend not to be as widely available as the PS2 etc ones (partly because you don't generally need them).


You can get special headsets for flight sims that allow your game to track where you are looking
You get all sorts of joysticks right up to the top of the range, replicas of the controls from fighters.
You can get various dance mats
You get assorted specialist mouse type controllers (iirc MS dabbled in them, Strategic Commander etc)
You get all sorts of specialist keyboard setups.

I'm fairly sure there are even fishing rod controllers available in Japan.

But mainly you don't need special controllers for PC games, as the keyboard/mouse (with the possible addition of a basic stick) will control almost any game, often with a much higher degree of accuracy and versitility than almost any console controller.

About the only console controller i've seen that matched (or even beat) a good keyboard/mouse/stick combo was the Steel Battalion stick for the X-box.
That was a very specialised one for 2 games, it had 2 sticks, foot pedals and a load of buttons which enabled it to give a very good control system for the games (in fact it reminded me a lot of the setup I was using 10 years ago for Mechwarrior 2).

I wish there was a way to hook it up to the PC and use it in games like MW4 with all the buttons on the controller available.
 
If they made a game where a custom controller is absolutely integral to gameplay, by that I mean the experience using a mouse and keyboard would be significantly worse than using the custom controller, then piracy would be seriously diminished. The only way to pirate it would be to hack it to use a standard controller (which not many people would do since the game wouldn't be anywhere near as good) or make cheap knock-offs of the controller.

In theory this is all well and good, but who knows how to design a game like that?
 
Hah beat this!

I used to have Quest for Fame by IBM years back

It was a game with a big 'plectrum' which plugged into the parallel port. You used to get a tennis racket and strum air guitar in time with Aerosmith!!

Damn I miss that :(
 
Densya De Go ;)
Brill little Japanese train-sim that normally comes bundled with a USB drivers desk. (Or was it serial......)
There's also RailDriver, again a train-sim controller.

-Leezer-
 
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