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Print 22 comment(s) - last by Alexvrb.. on Sep 3 at 10:14 PM

D-pad in "normal" position

D-pad in "raised" position
Looks like good news all around in the controller department

Microsoft is eagerly eying ways to make its console business unit even more profitable.  Yesterday, the company announced its decision to bump the yearly subscription fees for the various tiers of its Xbox Live Gold service.

Today Lawrence "Larry" Hyrb, Director of Programming for the Microsoft gaming network Xbox Live and better known by his Live gamertag "Major Nelson", gave the world a sneak peek of Microsoft's upcoming revamped wireless controller, which Microsoft hopes will spur accessory sales.

The controller comes pre-packaged with Microsoft's Play and Charge kit, which current retails for $19.99 USD.  The price of the bundle is $64.99 USD, a relative deal, given that the current controller, sans Play and Charge retails for $49.99 USD (for a total of $69.98 with Play and Charge). 

There are definite improvements to the design of the controller itself.  The D-Pad can be raised about a quarter of an inch by twisting it (this video better explains this feature), making it much more usable.  The analog stick is more thumb friendly in that it's slightly more concave.  And last, but not least the ABXY buttons have been changed from colored to monochrome translucent.  And the entire controller is cloaked in a stylish silver matte.

Microsoft has yet to reveal whether the controller is going to be bundled with any of its consoles.  In all, though, the upgrade looks like a welcome improvement at a fair price.

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Button Colors
By Aikouka on 8/31/2010 2:58:52 PM , Rating: 5
I wonder if they thought about the fact that their menus and such all use the button colors on them... but now they won't match. It probably isn't a big deal for most of us, but it does seem to reduce the intended usability.




RE: Button Colors
By MrBlastman on 8/31/2010 3:43:19 PM , Rating: 2
Good point.

The only thing I'd really like to see them improve with it is the 360 Controller drivers for the PC--the wireless controller can not be used if you plug other, non-microsoft controllers into your PC, nor can be again until you reboot. I have no idea what causes this bug, but it happens and is frustrating.

The wired 360 controller, however, doesn't have this problem. Only the wireless one does. Go figure.

All in all though, I've been otherwise happy with it.


RE: Button Colors
By S3anister on 8/31/10, Rating: 0
RE: Button Colors
By chizow on 8/31/2010 4:44:36 PM , Rating: 2
Agreed, I would have liked them to keep the colored buttons because similar to Sony's symbols the colors are somewhat synonymous with XBox to me. Plus they do serve as nice color cues in-game for contextual actions for those who find it easier to abstract colors rather than symbols.

Otherwise, the D-pad change will be a WELCOME change as that was really the only glaring flaw with an otherwise excellent 360 controller. The D-pad is completely useless in fighting games and even games that toggle 8-way directions for abilities/weapons are overly difficult with the old floaty D-pad.

The article doesn't mention anything about availability though, when can we buy these? I'd like to replace the wireless controller for my PC eventually, after it drops a bit in price anyways.


RE: Button Colors
By KentState on 8/31/2010 7:09:56 PM , Rating: 3
Not that I have any reason to buy a new controller, but I will skip on these due to the monochrome button colors. I know in sports games like NCAA Football, Madden, etc, I use the color queues for actions and not the letters. To me this is taking away a pretty standard feature that makes it unusable.


RE: Button Colors
By keitaro on 8/31/2010 8:08:39 PM , Rating: 1
While I can understand that the color cues is kind of an important aspect to both the game design and controller design, I do want to point out that at some point, people will get used to which color or button is located where. Long-time players will not miss the color orientation that much. Still, all it takes is a bit of time of handling the controller and its button arrangement.


RE: Button Colors
By The Raven on 8/31/2010 5:06:28 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah and I wonder how I'm going to play games with my toddlers now...
I guess I just have to teach them to read lol.


RE: Button Colors
By SixSpeedSamurai on 9/1/2010 10:20:53 AM , Rating: 2
Yeah, I play with my kids and I often am saying "hit the green button" etc.


RE: Button Colors
By jvillaro on 9/1/2010 3:53:30 PM , Rating: 2
In a few years or even months it will be the other way around don´t worry about it ;)


Story in the bottom of the article
By skiboysteve on 8/31/2010 3:07:42 PM , Rating: 3
Why is it that every time I read an article on Daily Tech I have to breeze through the first few paragraphs. I clicked the article because of the title, not the background... but that isn't addressed until the 3rd paragraph.

Go look at any article in any other print or website... they always talk about the actual title of the article immediately... and then fill in the background. any story on www.espn.com




RE: Story in the bottom of the article
By FaceMaster on 8/31/2010 4:07:05 PM , Rating: 1
I agree with you about the 'skip the first couple of paragraphs' bit. I've found myself doing that recently, too. In fact, I tend not to read anything and just to look at the pretty pictures, because I'm rather simple.


By RugMuch on 8/31/2010 4:19:47 PM , Rating: 2
I wouldn't mind doing Mick's job, maybe see what a real journalist could do with his articles.


No Reduction in Price
By adiposity on 8/31/2010 5:07:07 PM , Rating: 2
http://www.amazon.com/Xbox-360-Play-Charge-Black-C...

The play-n-charge kit with controller is currently $64.99. So there really is no reduction in price.

-Dan




RE: No Reduction in Price
By chizow on 8/31/2010 5:28:32 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah the video from XBox says it will only be available with the kit, says it 3-4x, so I guess we'll have to wait awhile for the older units to sell out before they're completely replaced by this unit.

Also says availability of November 9th.


By BZDTemp on 9/1/2010 2:56:12 PM , Rating: 2
My 360 gets little exercise these days as opposed to my PC and that has brought forward a problem. Just laying there the controller will slowly drain the battery meaning that once in a full moon when I do want to use the 360 I find myself having to charge the controller :-(

My PS3 is not used much either and it is not having the same problem so either my 360 controllers are ill or there is a problem in the design. Being the same for two controllers I'm guessing it's a design issue.




By Alexvrb on 9/3/2010 10:14:30 PM , Rating: 2
It depends on battery design. The 360 battery packs use standard NiMH, which have a decent self-discharge rate. That's why the charge and play kit is good for most people. But there are better types of NiMH batteries.

For example, Ultra Low Self Discharge rechargeable NiMH batteries. That's one thing I love about all the wireless xbox hardware - it comes with AAs, so you can just use Eneloop (or similar) ULSD AAs. No packs required.

You could probably mod the battery packs and replace the standard NiMH batteries inside them with ULSD ones - but I don't know if they'll play nice with the quick charger or the charge and play kit. Not sure how picky the Eneloops and other ULSDs are about charge rate. If someone gets really bored and has a pack with weak batteries, they should try it - just be sure to avoid damaging the temp sensor in the packs.


By The Raven on 8/31/2010 5:08:56 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
Xbox 360 Live Service is Improved, Drops Slightly in Price


The Hardware dept gets it. Why doesn't the Live dept get it?




Obvious questions...
By Wolfpup on 9/1/2010 5:01:44 PM , Rating: 2

My question is, did they actually FIX the d-pad? I don't care that it twists and can feel different, I want to know if it actually works now. I can just? see they release this new design and it's STILL broken, just broken + it changes shape for no reason.

And assuming it is fixed, why wasn't it fixed in 2005 before the Xbox launched? Why is it 5 years late?

And for that matter, is there going to be a wired one? Is this replacing the stock controller entirely? If not, why not?

I'd rather have the colored buttons (grey is sooooo boring, and I love the SNES and Super Famicom buttons!) but I can live with that change if I have to...




Controller button colours
By wallijonn on 9/1/2010 6:01:00 PM , Rating: 2
You can bet your bippy that someone, somewhere, is working on coming out with coloured button stick ons which they'll sell you for $9.99...




Gets a...
By ClownPuncher on 8/31/10, Rating: 0
Huh
By RugMuch on 8/31/10, Rating: -1
RE: Huh
By clovell on 8/31/2010 3:04:55 PM , Rating: 1
Kind of a non-story - seems like a cosmetic change more than anything. I liked the colored buttons, too - came in real handy when I was trying to tell my g/f how to use netflix.


"Intel is investing heavily (think gazillions of dollars and bazillions of engineering man hours) in resources to create an Intel host controllers spec in order to speed time to market of the USB 3.0 technology." -- Intel blogger Nick Knupffer











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