4-button Layout Question

[Exophase]

Whats wrong with just A B C D ? N S E W would just suck IMO. "Press A to continue, B to cancel" sounds much bettwe than "Press N to continue, S to cancel".

..A
C..B
..D

Why not the usual A B X Y? What do people have against it? In the same layout as SNES though, not GP2X..

 

[A_SN]

NSEW is the best idea I've ever heard, really, I can't believe others went with ABYX or even funny signs instead of that, as it's the only choice thats not Up/Down/Left/Right that's intuitive. Plus it sounds like NSFW

Also, make it DS style. It's pretty much the de facto rule on the GP2X anyways.

 

[C B Felterbush]

I could care less, it doesn't matter one bit what squiggle is on the button. I think the only thing that matters is if they are colored or not.

I think a nice darker tone color scheme of a really clean green, red, blue, and super hot neon lemon-lime are the obvious choice.

 

[Orkie]

Why not the usual A B X Y? What do people have against it? In the same layout as SNES though, not GP2X..

Bah, A B C D are normal. All my arcade boards specify them! I think we should have a 6 button arcade style layout, with two sets of controls for multiplayer.

 

[Exophase]

Fine, A B C D or A B X Y. No N S E W please. Familiarity is a good thing too sometimes. Just please put B and A in Nintendo order because a whole lot of Nintendo platforms do it that way, not just SNES.

 

[C B Felterbush]

in truth I think we should go the way A B X Y it is a videogame staple. Nobody would think nice ummm, what is that? They would think WoW is that a DS on steroids?

 

[Chip]

Fine, A B C D or A B X Y. No N S E W please. Familiarity is a good thing too sometimes. Just please put B and A in Nintendo order because a whole lot of Nintendo platforms do it that way, not just SNES.

The problem with familiarity is that there are two different ABXY layouts, and you are only likely to be familiar with one. If you spend most of your time gaming on an Xbox, then you will take some time to get used to the "backwards" Nintendo layout. If you spend most of your time with Nintendo, you will be less comfortable with Xbox. You quickly learn that the top button does one thing and the right does something else in a particular game, but when you try a new game and it says "Press X to Jump", you have to look down and figure out which one is X. It is not debilitating, just annoying.

What the NSEW does is reset everybody to "unfamiliar", but at the same time give the buttons meaningful names. If a game tells you to press UP to climb a ladder, you don't have to look at the controller. Up is a meaningful direction. Similarly, if the game tells you to press E to shoot, you know which direction east is. You know to press the button on the right. You don't have to take a second and figure out which button has the particular arbitrary letter printed on it.

This may sound like overthinking a minor issue, but the point is valid. If you ever watch a casual gamer try to figure out a new game, they will frequently ask which button does what. When you answer "Y", they will almost always follow up with "which one is that?". NSEW is a more logical layout. As long as you know the buttons correspond to the cardinal directions, you know which is which.

 

[fusion_power]

Before speculations about Button layout reachs the sky, maybe we should ask Craigix if they have a final Button lettering or not and if so, what will the Pandora have for a Action-Button-Layout? The render pix show us a GP2X layout. Is this final?

 

[Exophase]

The problem with familiarity is that there are two different ABXY layouts, and you are only likely to be familiar with one. If you spend most of your time gaming on an Xbox, then you will take some time to get used to the "backwards" Nintendo layout. If you spend most of your time with Nintendo, you will be less comfortable with Xbox. You quickly learn that the top button does one thing and the right does something else in a particular game, but when you try a new game and it says "Press X to Jump", you have to look down and figure out which one is X. It is not debilitating, just annoying.

But people are going to be emulating Nintendo platforms, not XBox ones. I know you don't want this to be limited to an emulation machine, but when it comes to gaming on it that will be a major facet. This is why familiarity is relevant, IMO. Besides, the Nintendo version was much more used than the XBox version anyway.

I just don't like NSEW because the letters themselves have little flow and congruence with each other. I'd rather have arrow shapes pointing in the different directions than that, but I'm sure others wouldn't like such a thing.

 

[AnonymousTipster]

Even though I play on my XBox daily, and would prefer that style of layout, Exophase makes a good point. The most used app for the pandora is most likely going to be a SNES emu, so making the face buttons match it as closely as possible would be a good idea.

 

[Ayla]

Why not :

....P
&......|
....A

 

[Squidge]

If your used to a snes, your not going to give a damn what the buttons say on it, your going to press what you expect the buttons to be, so as long as the emu maps the buttons in the snes standard, who cares what they say on them (CIP: GP2X has AYXB, but a large amount of people use them as YXBA to play NES & SNES). The only thing AYXB does for other people is let them look at the buttons to figure out which to press, which will only be possible for consoles that actually use those letters.

Maybe the buttons should all have small OLED displays in them which can be changed under software control to keep everyone happy?

 

[gruso]

^ Brilliant! The Optimus Maximus Pandorus. Should only add a grand to the cost. I'm in.

 

[Karel Jansens]

^ Brilliant! The Optimus Maximus Pandorus. Should only add a grand to the cost. I'm in.





Not if these new-fangled, printable OLEDs come flying off the presses, mate.

 

[C B Felterbush]

I really like the A B X Y, but I have been playing games for 20 years and it doesn't matter at all what letters or symbols are on the buttons. Hell they could really just be four matching black buttons and I really wouldn't care.
I have played Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft products so much so that they are all second nature.

 

[#1 GameMaster]

I really like the A B X Y, but I have been playing games for 20 years and it doesn't matter at all what letters or symbols are on the buttons. Hell they could really just be four matching black buttons and I really wouldn't care.
I have played Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft products so much so that they are all second nature.

A-Men brother! It really doesn't matter what the buttons are, just as long as they work.

 

[Yrx]

Whats wrong with just A B C D ? N S E W would just suck IMO. "Press A to continue, B to cancel" sounds much bettwe than "Press N to continue, S to cancel".

..A
C..B
..D

Why not the usual A B X Y? What do people have against it? In the same layout as SNES though, not GP2X..

I would prefer Nintendo-style as well.

 

[JakeK]

NSEW just plain sucks, it isn't original and looks ugly.

You may not like the aesthetics, but I'm pretty sure it is original. Do you know of a system that used this labeling scheme for the action buttons?

NSEW may not be used in a button layout but it is used for navigation and IMO that is as far as it should go. It shows no imagination and screams out "we couldn't think of anything better."

As much as the Pandora will be used for emulation the button layout shouldn't be soley based on this.

I prefer the xbox layout because of I know it well, but then other people probably prefer the PS layout or the Nintendo layout. But as someone said we should really find out if the button layout has been confirmed or not so this isn't a wasted discussion.

If it hasn't then there should be a vote.

 

[Frogboy]

Even though I play on my XBox daily, and would prefer that style of layout, Exophase makes a good point. The most used app for the pandora is most likely going to be a SNES emu, so making the face buttons match it as closely as possible would be a good idea.

True, but a lot of the software, at least initially, will be ported from the GP2X, not to mention that most of the people who buy this thing right away will have owned a GP2X so the SNES layout is a catch 22. It's going to be familiar in some ways and not in others unless I have my button layouts wrong. Position is more important for emulators though.

 

[Spectralist]

If your used to a snes, your not going to give a damn what the buttons say on it, your going to press what you expect the buttons to be, so as long as the emu maps the buttons in the snes standard, who cares what they say on them (CIP: GP2X has AYXB, but a large amount of people use them as YXBA to play NES & SNES).

Yes but the problem comes when you are used to the snes layout and then you use the system for something other then snes. The program says "push X" and i hit the top button because that's where i'm used too it being, but it meant the bottom button.

Having something entirely different sidesteps this issue completely. It only takes a little bit of time to learn a new layout if it is all new letters/symbols/whatever. It takes a much longer time to reprogram yourself to think of the same symbols in a different order. At least it does for me, and i doubt i'm particularly unique in this.

NSEW may not be used in a button layout but it is used for navigation and IMO that is as far as it should go. It shows no imagination and screams out "we couldn't think of anything better."

That could be said of any layout. Hell it was somewhat of a running joke about the PS1 when it came out. The whole system of having symbols represent the buttons is too simple for anything to seem particularly inspired, at least if you want to look at it with a cynic's eyes.