If you think back to the glory days of the Super Nintendo, you might recall how there were two versions of the system available. Even now, the unique controllers are still used to debate which one is the best.
A recent post on Reddit has brought attention to the fact SNES controllers include assembly instructions on the inside of the case. As can be seen in the photo below, there’s the purple and lavender colour for the North American line and the trademark blue, red, yellow and green markers for the Super Famicom and PAL iteration. These markings also suggest the same case was used for both versions of the controller.
While the original and more colourful Super Famicom version of the controller is arguably the favourite, as US Gamer notes, the North American release featured concave X and Y buttons.
Have you ever looked inside your SNES controller? Which controller do you prefer? Tell us below.
[source usgamer.net]
Comments 32
The US controller's concave buttons are horrible, just feel so wrong to me, also that controller is disgusting inside
@NintoRich Probably because it’s a US controller lol. I didn’t mind the concave button’s though. Once u get used to them they’re really quite natural. I grew up with that layout.
@ReaderRagfish
https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2017/08/video_the_snes_mini_controller_is_not_entirely_identical_to_the_original
Concave Buttons > Multicolored Buttons
USA! USA!
(Raises eyebrow) Fascinating.
Yuck, electronic gore! Cover the kids' eyes! think of the children!
and clean that gunk out...
That photo is disgusting.
=_= people say this photo is disgusting probably never opened a water cooler or checked what's inside their washing machines lol.
I took apart an N64 controller once. There were so many plastic shavings inside the housing for the analogue stick/Z button, it was mind blowing. It's no wonder those things wore out so easily.
Does NintendoLife have any original content NOT taken from Reddit posts?
Well, that was gross 🤢
Wash your hands after going to the toilet kids.
The multi-colored controller still looks tacky and Fisher-Price like to me. The purple SNES always looked cooler to me. And I will always associate the colored version with PAL and how crappy the console ran in PAL countries.
I was kinda hoping to see more than the back of the face buttons and a shoulder button. Maybe the title should be: 'Ever wondered what's on the inside and right side of an SNES Controller?'
@Devann Does NintendoLife have any original content NOT taken from Reddit posts?
I didn't post this post on Reddit so that's original to Nintendo Life.
I've looked in all of my controllers to clean the inputs. The N64 controller, in particular, is very interesting.
@NintoRich You sound like your region never play with a controller with concave buttons before. Just so you know the US concave Y & X buttons on the Super NES controller are actually the Famicom/NES B & A buttons. Your region got a taste of those with your version of the NES (or in this time and age, the NES Classic Edition Mini) so it shouldn't come as no surprise when you first touch a NA SNES controller. They are NES concave buttons just recolor from red to light purple. Here's picture of which innovation the SNES controller had from its predecessors at the time. Also I do agree, the inside of that old SNES controller is nasty, mine is the same as it was in my basement for quite a long time.
I've noticed YouTube folk pointing this out over the past few weeks. Mad that it was never noticed isn't it lol.
I started opening, cleaning and repairing my controllers a few years back, didn't know it was so easy, even just cleaning them. Since then, I'm very skeptical on buying different coloured controllers now, cause they are all the same, but cost a fortune to buy a different colour housing, so I just buy housing where I can for a change. Unless I ABSOLUTELY need a new or second controller. Looking at you Xbox one controllers 😄
@NintoRich I agree with the second part of your commentary...
You'd think they would at least make an effort to clean some of that up, before taking such a close-up photo, because it is indeed quite gross...
But interesting nonetheless. Controller construction for dummies, then. Unless you can't read, of course.
I’ve always enjoyed taking things apart and putting them back together. The shells of most old controllers and handhelds are usually a matter of removing a few screws. Everything is gross inside. Especially electronics that we handle. The business of conducting electricity is dusty, greasy, and grimy. Just imagine what the insides of most old Game Boys must look like. Basically a septic tank.
@Prizm Well, the Japanese version also had the colored buttons, so that actually was the original setup/color scheme. Unlike the US one, which as we all know, was especially adapted for the North-American market.
If they hadn't done so, you would have never known any better than the sleek, colorful, original model of the Super Famicom/SNES...
@bimmy-lee That doesn't look like the business of conducting electricity. That looks like the business of having once conducted coffee through a video game controller 20 years ago.
@NEStalgia - Oh yeah, I was speaking generally. That looks like a healthy patina of coffee, flop sweat, melted chocolate, fecal matter, and plague.
@retro_player_22 Ok, it's not horrible, I understand the concave buttons, I liked them on the NES, it's just the fact that only the top two are concave (X & Y) and it just felt weird to me playing Super Mario World with the Y and B where one button (run) was concave and the other (jump) was convex
Nope, I’ve seen it long ago when having to fix them. My brothers and I would often rage during difficult games or playing Mortal Kombat against each other and would slam them into the ground.
They’re surprisingly sturdy devices though.
@sleepinglion Yeah the N64 controller is definitely great to look at on the inside, had to do it when replacing the thumbstick once.
@ThanosReXXX - Yep, I'm fully aware that the original Japanese SNES had the colourful buttons. I just think it was a good decision to change the colour scheme when it launched in the US.
Sadly it isn’t uncommon to see to crud like that in a controller. I’ve got to be getting close to 1000 controllers that I’ve worked on now.
What’s fun is when you get some filthy smoker’s controller. You have to deal with all of the dirt and debris, plus the added Smokey smoke that can’t be removed from the rubber membranes. It also feels Grimes to the touch. In general if you smoked around it I can assume you didn’t take care of it.
WOW NintendoLife... so THAT'S what fairies are made of. Thanks!
@Prizm Why? If they never decided to change it, you would have been none the wiser, and the games would still have been great, and you would have quite easily adapted to the controller in its original form, regardless of the buttons being multi-colored or not concave.
For example: as an American living in Europe, I never knew anything else but that original appearance of that console, so like the one that you're used to, I got used to that one, and seeing one with purple buttons and being all bulky and square was strange to me.
Ultimately, it could have had any shape or color, it's more about the version that people get acquainted with first, which they will then often accept as the standard and/or better option.
The only thing I do regret is not having the NTSC versions of the games, so that is something that I definitely missed out on, but luckily, that isn't an issue anymore nowadays...
whoever is into retro gaming and hasnt seen the inside of a snes controller by now...yeah
Not really, I saw them somewhat frequently due to my friends penchant of throwing them when losing at Street Fighter II. Can't even fathom the number of games he could have have purchased with the money he had to spend on controllers.
No, I haven't wondered because the cords ended up getting ripped out of my controllers in my childhood as a typical fight with my sister over playing.
From what I recall one first-party controller was sadly lost after that but my asciiPad I could thankfully open up and put the cord back in very easily so it could continue to work to this day.
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