Monday, February 20, 2012

GOTD Hall of Fame - Cool and Unusual Controls

This GOTD Hall of Fame is for interesting control schemes.  Whether it's a new spin on an old idea, or a different way to figure out how to shoot or aim at things, there are really no parameters.  They are just great GOTDs that are distinguished by a cool control design.  (In no particular order).  Click on any to see the full GOTD post and learn more about the control scheme.  New games will be added when appropriate. Some guys have asked about more famous games not being on this list...Keep in mind, this is only for games that have already been "Games of the Day" on my blog.  I don't make the most famous games GOTD - there'd be no purpose to that, I'm trying to help folks find new games they may not have played before or have forgotten about.

 1. Riot
 Cross-Hair shooter with buttons for foreground and background shooting
 2. Forgotten Worlds
 JS to move, spinner to aim - horz shooting goodness
 3. GunSmoke
 Three buttons and combos of them control the direction you shoot!
 4. Title Fight
 Dual JS Boxing game - lots of combo moves - use an Xbox controller for full fun
 5. Mad Planets
 Unbelievably fast old-school JS-move/Spinner-aim madness
 6. Argus
 Trackball to fly your Superhero and save lives
 7. Gyruss
 Tempest meets Galaga
 8. Tac/Scan
 Completely odd but awesome - spinner to fly thru and shoot enemies
 9. Skull & Crossbones
 Combo of JS moves and buttons control swordplay
10. Crazy Fight
 Six buttons in this electronic version of Whac-a-mole
11. B.C. Story
 Caveman version of Track & Field, but you use buttons AND JS in unique ways to compete
12. Soukyuu Gurentai
 Second button brings up wireframe hemisphere that paints targets for missile launch
13. 4-D Warriors
 Not so much the controls, but the physics of the game change with each level
14. Hellfire
Second button selects direction of gunfire - no other weapons
15. Gunlock (Rayforce)
 Move cross-hair over (many) enemies to target them for guided missiles
16. Bal Cube
Arkanoid type game in which you control the ball and not the paddle
17. Black Widow (representative for ALL dual joystick games)
Dual JS greatness in the awesome shadow of Robotron 2084

5 comments:

  1. Would be great to see pics of all the controls on the main page, the click to see game information.

    Nice list ;)

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  2. How about a list of some games which become interesting with 2 players due to the way you can interact with each other.

    Blasteroids and Dogyuun are good examples, these games allow you to join the 2 ships up to form a super ship

    I can't imagine those are the only games with special co-op features like that

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  3. That's funny you should mention that... I almost made Dogyuun my Valentine's Day GOTD just because of the co-op super bomb - kinda like holding hands.

    I'm actually working on a special Hall of Fame for two players (vs or otherwise) - (not including fighting games since they are all great for two players)

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  4. Konami's laserdisc game 'Badlands' should also qualify - it only had one button for control, which you hit to fork the story. Get the timing right and the story advanced; get it wrong and you died.

    As far as I'm aware there are (literally) a couple of other games which shared this control arrangement, but this one was likely the first. It also probably offered the least amount of interactivity for your button press amongst all the ones that shared this control arrangement, too.

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  5. That sounds cool, but it can't be in the this Hall of Fame until it is first a Game of the Day. I'll certainly have to check it out.

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