Victor Omega
Member
Devil's Advocate
The steam controller was ahead of its time.
A while the shoulder buttons have evolved for relevancy alongside driving and shooting games (analog and 3d rumble) , the D pad and its keyboard like membrane has all been abandon by its most implemented genre, fighting games.
Because most fighting games have become more technical, the main bulk of fighting game players have set aside d pad In favor of hit boxes and gone back to arcade sticks.
This isn't to say all fighting games players have left dpads, but fighters have become so niche, that the players that do use them do not warrant traditional controllers to have them every generation.
This also isn't to say fighting game is the only genre where a dpad is useful. However, genres like 2D platformer and a vast majority of indie or pixel games, as simple as the D pad is, do not need a traditional d pad whereas as..... Touch based pad could be used instead.
The steam controller was ahead of its time.
A while the shoulder buttons have evolved for relevancy alongside driving and shooting games (analog and 3d rumble) , the D pad and its keyboard like membrane has all been abandon by its most implemented genre, fighting games.
Because most fighting games have become more technical, the main bulk of fighting game players have set aside d pad In favor of hit boxes and gone back to arcade sticks.
This isn't to say all fighting games players have left dpads, but fighters have become so niche, that the players that do use them do not warrant traditional controllers to have them every generation.
This also isn't to say fighting game is the only genre where a dpad is useful. However, genres like 2D platformer and a vast majority of indie or pixel games, as simple as the D pad is, do not need a traditional d pad whereas as..... Touch based pad could be used instead.
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