Sunday 24 July 2011

Just fixed my Jaguar and Jaguar CD

Good news, my bargain basement Jaguar and CD expansion is now working.

I was pretty lucky when I managed to pick both these consoles up at once from eBay for just under £80, anyone who is in to consoles knows that the Jaguar CD normally goes for a few hundred pounds at least. It arrived a few months back with no PSU's, AV cable, joypad or games. A quick search on eBay landed me some PSU's, a S-Video cable and a joypad. More recently, I picked up a copy of the seminal Alien VS Predator.

If I had been given one of these, with Alien VS Predator, back in 1994, I would have thought it was the coolest thing ever. These days though, with all the wonderful HD games we get on modern consoles, I cant help but think that this is showing its age quite a bit. One thing I do want to do though, is defend the much hated on joypad - it really isn't that bad.

You will see a lot of people claiming that this is the worst joypad ever created. Now that I have used one, I cant help but think the haters may never have actually used one. Yes, it is big and yes it has loads of buttons - but is it any different to a controller on a modern console? Both the Xbox 360 and PS3 feature controllers with up to 14 buttons (if you include the d-pad), 15 on the 360 controller if you include the back button (a la Halo). On its own, the Jaguar controller has 15 input buttons.

A popular topic for debate with the controller is the addition of that keypad, people ridiculed it at the time as pointless. But, if you look back into gaming history, you will find that there are numerous successful consoles that have implemented the same button configuration. It wasn't really pointless, but instead a flashback to consoles from the 1980's. The worst thing about the controller is the d-pad - it is horrible. Very stiff and very clunky, when you compare it to a Sega 6-button pad, it is a complete fail.

Overall, I am pleased that I got this console up and running, especially for such a low price, but I don't think I will be playing it much in the future. I plan to complete Alien VS Predator and I also plan to purchase Kasumi Ninja for nothing more than the sheer hilarity of the game. But other than that, it iwill just be an interesting, albeit fully functional, curio. One thing I definitely keep my eyes out for is the official 18 button controller, it has an extra three large red buttons, probably for aspirations of getting a Street Fighter onto the console.

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