PS2 The pressure sensitive face buttons

[Ikagura Ikagura]

Which is something that is hard to emulate and few games actually used that feature as far as I recall (like MGS for aiming while moving) but was that a good idea?

I mean analog triggers like on the Gamecube, PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii Classic controllers was not bad idea but for front buttons it seems a bit un-intuitive.

Do you have other examples to show me that worked well?

 

[cloudsets]

Which is something that is hard to emulate and few games actually used that feature as far as I recall (like MGS for aiming while moving) but was that a good idea?

I mean analog triggers like on the Gamecube, PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii Classic controllers was not bad idea but for front buttons it seems a bit un-intuitive.

Do you have other examples to show me that worked well?

If you have access to an official PlayStation 3 controller, those support both gyro controls and pressure-sensitive button inputs. I keep one around specifically for its ability to emulate this functionality in PCSX2, RPCS3, and Citra.

If you use Windows, you'll need DS4Windows, but it should work out of the box on Linux or a Mac.

 

[driftwood]

The Bouncer had pressure sensitive face button controls and worked well when I finally got used to the amount of force that counted as a weak or strong attack in its combo system.
I never tried it in emulation thou.

 

[Kamako]

The best use of pressure-sensitive buttons that I've experienced was in Fortnite surprisingly. Using a dualsense controller, feeling resistance to squeezing the trigger was pretty eye-opening, and I think (but am not certain) it also affected your rate of fire.

I've not played it myself, but I've heard Returnal is also excellent for this.

For platformers, I feel a similar effect can be achieved through extending the length or height of a jump, based on the length of time the jump button is pressed. Not quite the same, but has a slightly similar tactile sensation? To me at least.

 

[Kamako]

Also, as OP mentioned, MGS2 and 3 both included pressure-sensitive controls for raising/firing automatic weapons. Not all future consoles could emulate this, so the HD collection re-mapped the weapon raise function to R3.

 

[Ferik]

TBH I think they were the worst decision Sony ever made. The Dualshock 2's buttons feel like mush compared to the original Dualshock. Somehow Microsoft managed to get away with the OG Xbox controller feeling alright despite the pressure sensitive buttons, but if you try to repair the thing by replacing the pad with new ones it loses the pressure sensitivity entirely due to the way it works. Thankfully I think the only Xbox games that actually require the feature without a setting to disable it or the ability to play around it easily are MGS2 and Dead or Alive Xtreme so it's not too big of a deal to keep a stock controller in decent condition and only use it when needed.

 

[Phizar Phizar]

MGS 2 - 3. In MGS2 the pressure of the fire button changes how the gun reacts, if you hold it down and release quickly it fires, if you let go slower and more softly Raiden/Snake put the gun down and stop aiming. This is very useful in FPS mode for aiming, almost integral to gameplay imo. I have an extremely hard time playing these games on anything but an original PS2 controller for this reason. The original Xbox also had pressure sensitive buttons on the face.

 

[Miles Miles]

I don't like them at all. Proper analog triggers are far superior, and pressure sensitive face buttons are useless. The Gran Turismo games uses the pressure sensitive face buttons for gas and brake. I actually would rather they just be digital inputs like the PS1 GT games, because I have to put constant pressure on the face buttons, and that just makes my thumb sore. Thankfully nowadays we can use a patch in PCSX2 to have proper analog trigger support on the GT games, so it just works like any modern racing game. I think the GT games are a much better experience on emulation from proper analog trigger support alone.