Not that the gimmicky controller was the sole preserve of the retro gaming world. As consoles have become a hobby of grown men with much-too-vast disposable incomes more than kids who have to beg their parents for an advance on their pocket money in order to rent the Legend Of Zelda for a weekend, the over-the-top ridiculousness and expense of those peripherals have skyrocketed too. On paper, the Steel Battalion controller fits the game perfectly: it's a perfect model of the cockpit of a mech suit, as piloted in the game itself, with lots of dials and levers and pullies and joysticks and the like. That sounds pretty rad, right? Obviously it's a premium item, bundled with the game for a cool $200 (around £130). The controller has two control sticks and around 40 buttons, and you can't actually play the game without it. Yep, it's designed to be a totally realistic simulation of a totally fictional mode of transport, and it's about as unwieldy and fun to play as an other sort of simulator. Except you have to shell out for a massive control, with which there isn't really a comfortable way to sit with, and makes the game near-impossible to play. You have to got through a series of complicated procedures to even boot the giant robot up. If you turn too quickly, it falls over. If you don't hit the eject button fast enough, your character dies and the game starts again. Fun! Expensive fun!
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
