Lost annotations: -For the CharacteriSticks, he mentioned a fourth model based on Batman -For the Konix Speed-King, he mentions that the one in the video IS an analog stick that he didn't know existed.

who's also watching this for the eleventy-billionth time?

This is by far my favorite Ashens video. He knows all about what he's talking about, and I trust his opinion on joysticks completely.

"set phasers to butt-plug " I fucking lost it lol

Psychologists - "Hoarding is very unhealthy mental practice" Ashens - "I know, I studied it at uni. Anyway, would you like to see my vast collection of 80's joysticks?"

The fact that Ashens tore down those joysticks just to show us the difference between the circuitry is why I love this channel.

The clicking of a microswitched joystick is super satisfying... Can't just be me.

Something about this video is incredibly intriguing, I just keep coming back. I must have seen it upwards of 50 times now, I can't get enough.

I snapped so many joysticks playing Daley Thomson's Decathlon. Good practice for when puberty hit though.

00:59 - Binatone Colour TV Game 03:50 - Amstrad JY-2 05:52 - Sinclair SJS1 08:18 - Spectravideo QuickShot II 09:26 - Cheetah 125+ 10:10 - Spectravideo QuickShot IV 11:34 - Cheetah CharacteriSticks (T2, Alien³) 14:52 - Konix Speedking 16:40 - Konix Navigator 17:30 - Cheetah Bug 18:23 - Spectravideo QuickShot Maverick 19:38 - Kempston Competition Pro 20:25 - Powerplay Cruiser 21:36 - Zipstick 22:30 - Fantastick F3 23:17 - Gravis Mark VI 24:29 - QJ SuperStar 25:13 - Spectravideo QuickShot VII

I had a terminator grenade joystick until my cousin stole it and took it into a school fancy dress day. It being essentially a hand grenade with about a metre of cable attached it took about 0.005 seconds for him to throw it at a classmate and swing it around like a ball and chain. This lead to it being cracked and broken, confiscated for almost a year and some kid loosing three front teeth. Ah.... nostalgia...

“You’d have to waggle your joystick as fast as you could” Well, I’m sure many teenage boys were experts at that maneuver

"Set phasers to buttplug." - Dr. Stuart Ashen, 2013

Fun fact; Rheostats are almost the same as variable resistors but are rated for much higher current, so they are in fact not the same thing.

Back when the couch didn't look like it was about to disintegrate!

For some reason this video calms my panic attacks, no idea why. Thanks for making it.

I watched this on the bus home from uni today and found it really difficult to not laugh out loud because of: A) that Terminator joystick's face and B) "Set phasers to buttplug!" ...I think I love you.

25:50 on the left side of the screen a little white thing falls onto the sofa (probably a chip from the ceiling)

to defend the Maverick a bit (as well as the same feature in the NES Advantage), the two-player addition is probably good for certain games that allow for two players to take turns playing a one player game (like Super Mario Brothers). The controllers are good, and therefore expensive, so instead of getting two for each player, one player has their turn, then switches to the second player and passes it on. Of course, this doesn't help for co-op or versus games...

"The Cheetah Tortoise". What a contradictory name...

When it's late at night and I can't fall asleep I come here and it helps me fall asleep. Good night!

Since every episode of Good Eats was removed from youtube, I have started watching Ashens videos while eating. I made a good choice.

I'm surprised you didn't talk about any of the... HORRIBLE mercury switch joysticks, which didn't have bases, and were just a stick with a button on the top, and you just tilted it, and a bit of MERCURY on the inside would move around, and connect two contacts for what direction you want to move in. YES, these exist. Look up the "Le Stick" (yes, it is the stupidest joystick name ever, especially since it wasn't French developed or manufactured)

Something about the click of the micro-switches seems oddly pleasant, somewhat satisfying to hear.

Ohhh QuickShot Maverick 3 that brings back memories. Those were highly sought out and loved in the fighting game community. The reason it had 1 and 2 player switches was for training. Old school fighting games didn't have a dummy/training mode. It was either fight the CPU or fight a friend. If you didn't have a second controller you could use that to enable 2 player if you wanted to fight against a dummy to practice combos. Fighting games now have dummy mode, but before they did we had the Maverick.

Man, I really love the sounds of the joysticks with the microchips. I'd just go to arcades and move the joysticks around even if i wasn't playing a game.

7 years after and I keep coming back to this video again and again... The memories of an old man is the magic touch that turn something apparently common into something amazing. Thanks Ashens✊

I never get bored by these.. Its like an experienced grandpa veteran telling his kids stories of the good ol days

dark souls with 2 buttons on an un responcive controler: challenge accepted

This is weirdly relaxing. If you have a weird dream and watch this on your phone everything is instantly less creepy for some reason.

I can’t believe it’s been 8 years since the first time I watched one of my favorite videos on KZfaq. Thanks Stuart👍

Actually, the Genesis and 2600 used the exact same cords. In fact, you can use a Genesis controller on an Atari.

I don't know what it is about this video but it never gets old for me. Anything else similar to this you could do in the future?

I believe the ability of switching between Player 1 and Player 2 was for games like Track & Field, where you took turns instead of going simultaneously.

19:30 Switching between player 1 and player 2 would be useful in the atari 2600's Indiana Jones...

Ashens really knows his Joysticks. Makes you wonder how old he is.

The first controller shown, and the fact you could daisy-chain them together, kind of reminds me of the Panasonic 3DO, because you had to do the same thing with the Amstrad CPC controller

3:14 You actually can plug a Sega Master system controller into an Atari, and it will work. I don't think it works the other way (again, one button and joystick for the Atari).

The Gravis mk6 was analogue. My brother had one for PC and played many hours of various Wing Commander games on it.

ASHENS. DO MORE VIDEOS LIKE THIS! The tone, the knowledgeability, the sincerity, and resulting humour; it’s a cut above all else you’ve done. I suppose you could say I’ve been a ‘fan’ of your videos for over a decade now, and even met you at an Irish bar in London ~7 years ago; indeed we were about to go in for a selfie and then I found my phone was dead, my great regret in life. Anyway, I digress, but what I want to say, is I know criticism sucks to hear sometimes and I don’t really mean it because you’re still on top of 99% of content out there, what you do is GOOD. However, having watched this I think even you don’t realise how much you fuel have left in the tank, this is GREAT, it’s some of the best content I’ve seen on KZfaq. I nearly didn’t click on it because, ok the title is niche and blends in with other things you’ve done, some of which tbh I now find samey and predictable as with the humour. Perhaps that’s why it hasn’t had the traction I think it deserves. But omfg, this is electric, you’re on fire. Do more like it for fucks sake man!!!!

"Speedking" was the most awesome joystick (with micro switches) you could feel the quality click every time, whereas all the other sticks you would waggle, gave off a creaky squeak. It wouldn't diminish over the years either, never broke. Everyone would fight over it when it came down to who'd get what stick for a round of Summer Olympiad or Hired Guns. Two games so many years apart, testament to the quality of that stick. Everything else, joystick wise, died around it. Oh god how I loved that stick.

This is the most decent showing a good amount of classic joysticks video just a few videos about this were uploaded to youtube.

As others have pointed out, the Gravis was an analog joystick, and that travel adjustment it has actually made it one of the best. Longer travel = finer, more precise control, shorter travel = quicker control. And the buttons do actually all do different things. One of the best analog joysticks ever made in my opinion.

The saga is complete after almost a decade

The quickshot 2 Turbo doesn't actually use micro switches, but actually just has springs with slightly different contacts underneath. A disappointment I just discovered opening up mine to try and fix it. Also, the dual controller ports on the maverick are good for switching between Port1/2 for C64 games.. Seeing as devs could never make their damn minds up which one they wanted to stick with.

I've watched this video almost yearly since it came out and it's still entrancing.

Press my buttons and work my joystick~

I am probably no1000 that says -"Hey! What about the best of the best? The indistructable TAC-2? Loved it and still have it to this day. Bloody beautiful and it still works as intended 35 years on.

How to make a joystick 1. Take a screwdriver and a piece of wood 2. Smash the screwdriver right through the piece of wood 3. Profit

I so loved my Cheetah Bug; great for Amiga shmups. Probably set me on my journey to being obsessed with traditional arcade sticks and modding them. And if anybody fancies some game controller jargon pickiness; the term for the sticks movement distance off centre isn't 'travel', but actually 'throw'. 'Throw' is the total distance a stick can move off centre. 'Engage', meanwhile, refers to how far you can move the stick before the input registers... so a 'long-engage' stick means you can move the stick a fair bit before input engagements. I happen to prefer 'short-throw, short-engage' sticks for my style of shmup playing. I won't start defining stick 'resilience', 'resistance' and 'restriction', as this comment post of mine is already getting dull! Great video ashens!

No one ever thought of the Wiiremote & Nunchuck two handed style in those days? Would have been perfect! Thumbstick in one hand and the fire button in the other. I could have made a million if I came up with that idea when I was 5.

i absolutely love the Alien 3 one. my heart aches for it.

Why are there so many variants of joysticks when I have one attached to my body?

My controller doesn't have that many buttons. It only has 492.

3:50 oh God... I think I intentionally blocked that thing from my memory. Those suction cups ensured that once you stuck it to something, it would never come loose unless you pulled it from your desk with the force of a dozen dying stars.

15:53 the way he said "hold" sent shivers down my spine

Konix SpeedKing was a bloody excellent joystick! Ideal for playing whiles sat in a comfy chair rather than at a desk. Much better. The Bug was great too.

16:47 Am I the only one that laughs uncontrolibly when he says "Ergodonomic"?

Oh that was excellent. Ann Summers are redoing the autumn / spring range. Without suction pads

The Konix speed king and Gravis MkVI were for the Apple II which used an analogue input but still often utilized a 9 pin connector (early Apple IIs never had a joystick port but the later Apple IIe did)

One of those Ashens videos I keep coming back to year after year.

Heeeey I had that Gravis stick. Endless hours of Jetfighter II... good memories.

14:02 "It's Giger - not Geiger! Every kid knows that!" says Dan

The two player thing on the large QuickShot control pad thing is likely if you only had the one controller, but wanted to play a two player game that expects two controllers, you could take turns

Many of those are familiar for me... But... Where's TAC-2? One of the most perfect joysticks at it's time. Really competitive with Competition Pro etc. And VERY durable. It was almost like a brick... Smash, bash it, throw it through the toilet wall and it was still working... Believe me... Have been throwing out some 2 pieces of Amiga disc boxes (about 380 discs or so) out of 2nd floor window.... WITH Tac-2, which was the only thing working perfectly after that... To be honest...

I always thought that the most famous joystick was the one for the Atari 2600

I never actually watch this video. Its basically the ultimate ASMR combo of clicky clicky switches along with Ashens voice. Sensory overload.

Microswitches must have been like the mechanical keys of today.

I had one of thoseTerminator handgrenade joysticks.. I used it a lot, as it looked cool as shit (I was 6 years old). It was rather painful to use that tiny stick for prolonged periods of time, however. A lot of people swore by it though, claiming it was the best Joystick ever made. You could take out the split, which would make the handle pop off, revealing the button underneath. This happened a lot, while waiting for some game to load. If I remember correctly, they were actually made in Denmark by SuperSoft.. So might be slightly easier to find one here. I'll have a look ;x EDIT: Managed to find one.. Brand new in box though, so £90. Hells no.

Commodore Amiga had the best and most durable joystick ever made by humans. It was called Pacman Joystick, it was a Greek product and its manufacturing standards were exactly the same as the coin-op machines joysticks.

I literally have watched this like a 100x idk why but I love it

i remember watching this 11 years ago and thinking "wow, an ashens video can be quite informative"

I think the Maverick had a Player 1/ Player 2 switch because some games would use joystick port 1 and some would use joystick port 2, so they put a switch to switch ports instead of unplugging the controller and swapping them

Ooooo. Yesterday, I dusted of my A500 and gave it a whirl. Had to open the whole thing and re-seat the chips. But, one of my joysticks had the two connectors, black and gray. I, of course, plugged them both in. Two players hotseat! (Hot joystick?) Didn't work too well, hope I didn't fry anything. Not that it would matter. Mice didn't work, most of my sticks didn't work, 1MB extended memory was iffy, extra disk drive wasn't working, and 80% of the games didn't function. Near 30 year old tech does that. Good times. Interestingly enough, Flashback has an option for 2 button controller. I seem to recall you could get Sega controllers to work as two button controllers, with an adapter. Edit: Cruiser was the aforementioned joystick with two connectors. Black and transparent. Also got the zipstick. And a nagging feeling I've written this exact same tirade before.

I had a microsoft force feedback joystick many years ago. Despite the huge desk footprint the base took it worked beautifully and when playing microsoft games like Starlancer the force feedback was awesome.

The Amiga did support the Sega 2nd button actually, and some games (like Battle Squadron for instance) did make use of it. Also missing from this roundup is the fantastic Wico leaf-contact joystick, that thing was indestructible, it survived every other joystick that i destroyed yes even the Konix Navigator (which was ok, apart from the front button digging in my finger after a while..).

I'm pretty sure the "Gravis Mark 6" was analogue, a friend of mine had the PC version of it and we used it to play Wing Commander 2 (or was it Privateer?) Ah, good times...

Konix Speedking. Totally AWESOME piece of gear. (Micro switch version). Battered it to death for years and it was still going strong when Amiga USA crashed (cheers ya bastrds) and took Amiga UK down with it.

Wow that double cable is actually pretty cool it allows you to play all turn switching multiplayer games with one controller so you don't have to buy a second one. You can just pass the controller around to your friend.

Those character joysticks wouldn't look out of place alongside all of those weird Plug-&-Play joysticks from the 2000's

holy shit, watching this video i suddenly realized my Logitech 3D joystick has microswitches in the little joystick on top of the joystick. How things have changed..

Terminator (the grenade one) is great! I have one, and lovingly fixed and refurbished it to its former glory. I really like it.

I always wondered what a Kempston joystick was. Spectrum games always had the option and it sounded exotic, to me at least. My Spectrum+2 had two 9-pin D connections.

And now the bart, grenade, and even the bloody tortoise now are in ashen’s possessions and are in the latest video

Ashens got the grenade and tortoise! Yeiiii

can confirm, the six button Sega megadrive controller used to work with my old Amiga 500+, which my dear old mum gave away FOR NOTHING DESPITE IT HAVING A PERFECTLY WORKING POWER PACK, YOU KNOW, THE FIRST THING THAT WOULD GO ON ALL AMIGA COMPUTERS. THANKS MUM.

It's actually interesting, the reason some joysticks let you turn off the centering springs is because there was some software (Tandy DeskMate comes to mind) that let you use a joystick like a mouse, because having a joystick was more common than having a mouse back then. But you don't want to have to push on the stick constantly just to keep the cursor in one place, so disengage the springs, add a little bit of friction, and you have a joystick that's good for pointing... sort of.

What a wonderful trip down memory lane. Thank you. :D I'd forgotten most of these existed, even though I've owned most of them.

"No bangs" -Ashens (and me in my last relationship)

Ech, eh! I'm moving up now!

With the Superstar, I would be remiss if I didn't go "well ackshuallee..." and say that, from what I remember, arcade games with joysticks and buttons were not always with the joystick on the left; originally, they were on the right, with the mindset that you'd be using your more likely dominant right hand to control the action, but they decided to switch it around to make it more difficult for most of the righties to play and milk more quarters out of them, and it ended up sticking as the standard as players began adjusting their play style accordingly.

My first Speedking was smashed to pieces as a "Bola'd" it into my desk after missing a putt in Leaderboard. I loved it. It only had one button and not the switch yours has at the bottom left. When it broke I bought another. When I swapped my C64 for an Amiga ... I bought another. Loved them. Worked for years and felt very good in my hands.

The two-player switchable Joystick is actually quite clever! You only need to buy one joystick, and no need to move the control wires on the console. You can just switch the controller around.

(trying not to laugh my head off at the terminater 2 judgement stick) ...PFT ... FTPF *BOOM!

My black and yellow Zipstik is celebrating its 27th birthday this year and it's still going strong, I currently have it hooked up to the PC via a USB adapter and use it for C64 and Speccy emulation.

The interesting thing about the speedking was that there was a model which used a proper micro switched joystick like the one seen on the konex navigator except red and with a little less travel. It feels MUCH nicer

You could play the Sonic games on Mega Drive with one button so it could actually work lmao

I miss these days..... :-( Where is the crappy Atari 2600 one? Review the mouse-turtle-thingy!!!! Please!

@23:18 - Gravis Mark VI - I had this joystick, and as you rightly mentioned, Stuart, it was indeed intended to be more for flight sims! The middle toggle on the left hand side was commonly used as a throttle in flight sims!

The amount of Quickshot 2 joysticks I destroyed on Daley Thompson’s Decathlon was unreal!