Recomend a simple joystick for small kids

Message

wazow · Post by **wazow** » Tue Nov 11, 2008 9:23 am

Hi there,

I am not quite a gamer myself, but my kids are getting more and more heavy on my laptop. Can you recommend a simple joystick for small kids (2-6 years old) for playing games like SMC, supertux and alike? It should of course work in linux!

When I google on the web I find gazillion of large complicated things that seem more suitable for flying A380 than for controlling mario in action.

vputz · Post by **vputz** » Tue Nov 11, 2008 9:45 am

Well, if you want simple and incredibly durable, you could invest in a proper arcade control (build a sturdy box and put, say, an Ultimarc U360 in it) but that's well overkill.

If they just want to control Mario, what about getting a Nintendo, Playstation, or Xbox controller?

wazow · Post by **wazow** » Tue Nov 11, 2008 11:07 am

vputz wrote: If they just want to control Mario, what about getting a Nintendo, Playstation, or Xbox controller?

(I am not a gamer) Would these work out of the box with linux? Can I buy them easily without the consoles?

I am planning to buy a Wii within a year (we do not have tv box, where we are here so we have to live with linux for gaming

). Is any of these controllers useful for my Wii next year?

vputz · Post by **vputz** » Tue Nov 11, 2008 2:13 pm

I am not a gamer) Would these work out of the box with linux? Can I buy them easily without the consoles?

Hmm, you've now gone outside my experience too (grin). I can say that a well-behaved USB HID controller should work reasonably well under Linux (I've used a Logitech USB Rumblepad for MAME, for example). For the short term, you may just want to find a used USB gamepad of some sort.

Hopefully someone else can steer you a bit more directly.

I am planning to buy a Wii within a year (we do not have tv box, where we are here so we have to live with linux for gaming ). Is any of these controllers useful for my Wii next year?

Not a Wii person here, so I can't directly guide you. I'm pretty sure the Wii can emulate older consoles (N64/Gamecube/etc) and that it has ports on top for a Nintendo Gamecube controller. And I know there are converter cables which will allow you to hook up a Gamecube controller to a USB port and supposedly gives correct HID reports.

So I'm GUESSING that you could buy a Gamecube controller and one of those cables and plug it into your linux box's USB port and get a working gamepad, and then later be able to plug the controller into your Wii to play old GC/N64 games. But I don't KNOW that. Buyer beware!

jstead1 · Post by **jstead1** » Tue Nov 11, 2008 4:41 pm

I would go to a basic electronics/computer dealer website and you will find ones for about $10 that have the joystick, a trigger and a few buttons.
I would guess the games that the little ones are playing would need one or two buttons, so they can ignore the others.

Most game systems use game pads vs. joy sticks. You can get basic ones for about $10. I have found the kids handle the game pads better. They have the pad (equal to the stick) and usually 4 or 6 buttons. Again, the ones that are needed for the game can be the easy to use buttons and the ones they don't need can be ignored.

I went on newegg and searched joystick then I searched game pad, and came up with several that would work.

I would go with the USB interface (not much else out there except for the game system proprietary stuff). As long as your kernel is setup correctly, it should handle any basic joystick or game pad easily.

As far as the Wii system, the Wii uses a very different controller that senses motion. It is completely unlike a game pad or a joystick.
You hold the Wii controller in your hand and swing it, and the bat or club or whatever on the screen magically swings.

I have only played one a couple times, but it is so easy to pick up that many of the games are fun right away. We had a party, and for part of it, people who never play video games were lining up and having a blast right away. (enough of the Wii advertisement)

I wouldn't worry about Wii compatiblity. By the time you get a Wii, and get bored with the Wii controller games, and want to use it for "standard controller" games (the Wii has some backward compatiblity with older games that use standard controllers), the controller will be worn out or broken.

wazow · Post by **wazow** » Tue Nov 11, 2008 10:20 pm

Thanks a lot for all recommendation. I will try some cheap USB gamepads for starters.

Raptor85 · Post by **Raptor85** » Wed Nov 12, 2008 6:39 pm

PS3 controllers work out of the box on linux, when connected by usb, nice durable controllers too. If you have bluetooth, they work wirelessly as well, if you're lucky you can find some used ones for cheap. (they're $50 new, but I've seen a lot of used sixaxis controllers lately now that the dualshock 3's are out.)

edit: forgot to note, for wireless use, you need to download sixpair.c, sixaxis controllers don't do standard Bt pairing, they pair over the USB cable on first use, other than that little oddity they're a standard bluetooth controller.

Cereza · Post by **Cereza** » Thu Nov 13, 2008 7:17 pm

wazow wrote:I am planning to buy a Wii within a year

I think it is a good idea to buy a Wii :) it has lots of kid games and group/family games specially oriented for people who is not a hardcore gamer. I am a gamer (and a bit old yet) but I also love the Wii kind of games (maybe because I am a woman and as gamer I am tired of games which obviously are 200% oriented to men, but anyways I play all kind of games, not only girl-oriented ones).

I like to see parents who aren't afraid of videogames. Today most of the parents thinks that videogames are the evil because violence or explicit contents, they cannot (or don't want) understand that there are games for children and games for adults, at the same way that there are films for children and films for adults, or books for children and books for adults, etc... If I have my own kids I will let them play videogames appropriated for them, and when they were mature-minded enough to known well the difference between the reality and the fiction I will let them play everything they want, in the same way I play everything I want since I was too young and I am not a violent person at all. It is all about the capability of the player to assimilate games. I am just commenting, it is no my intention to tell people how to educate their kids :)

wazow wrote:(we do not have tv box, where we are here so we have to live with linux for gaming :) )

Living with Linux for gaming it's a bit hard :lol: I presume your kids play games like tux racer, frozen-bubble or pingus, what other games do they like?

Edit: Oh, and about the topic, I also think a cheap USB gamepad is the best choice until you own your Wii, maybe a SNES console gamepad clone for PC if you want something really simple with few buttons and without axis.

vputz · Post by **vputz** » Fri Nov 14, 2008 12:40 am

Actually there is a good amount of fun to be had via Linux gaming, not just native (tuxracer, bub-n-bros, teewars, frozen-bubble, Neverball, Frets on Fire, Stepmania, plenty of FPS games) but with MAME, zsnes, PCSX, ScummVM, and other emulators there is a LOT of mileage to be gotten. I made an arcade control panel for my Freevo box and have honestly gotten a decent amount of use out of it. It's not cutting-edge, sure, but there's a lot to be done, particularly with kids.

tuppe666 · Post by **tuppe666** » Sun Mar 22, 2009 10:51 pm

I bought a dual shock3, and I have owned a stack of cheap controllers. It is simply the best controller I have ever owned. Support is in there in the kernel.