Sony has said that it doesn’t see the point in elbowing traditional gamepads out of the equation in favour of motion-exclusive controls when it comes to working on a potential follow-up to the PlayStation 3.
Speaking during an interview with Gamasutra, Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA) head of research & development, Dr. Richard Marks, reckons there will always be a place for regular control pads on the market.
"I don’t think that makes sense," said Marks. "I said that pretty much from the beginning that we’re not trying to get rid of the gamepad.
"The gamepad is a really good abstract device. It can map to so many different things. It doesn’t map one-to-one to those things, but it doesn’t need to for a lot of game experiences."
Marks conceded that while some people may find bog-standard pads off-putting, it’s better to have both options available rather than give one the chop. And in the case of PS3, Sony offers two control types – DualShock 3 and PlayStation Move.
"It is still intimidating to some audiences, some people. And so, those people might like Move better. So, I think having both offered to people that want to play is the right choice right now.”
"I think the DualShock, it’s just better for some experiences, but the Move is better for other ones," he explained. "There’s just no way to combine them and just say one is the right thing to have. I don’t mean there’s no way to combine them. I mean just throwing one of them away is not the right choice."