Manufacturer Microsoft Generation Sixth generation era | Type Video game controller Successor Xbox 360 Controller | |
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Release date NA: November 15, 2001
JP: February 22, 2002
PAL: March 14, 2002 Connectivity Xbox controller port
2× Analog sticks
2× Analog triggers
6× Pressure-sensitive buttons
2× Digital buttons
Digital D-Pad | ||
The Xbox Controller was the primary controller for Microsoft's Xbox console and was introduced at the Game Developers Conference in 2000. The standard Xbox controller (nicknamed the "Duke") was originally the controller bundled with Xbox systems for all territories except Japan. The "Controller S" was the standard controller in Japan, and was later released in other territories by popular demand and by 2002 replaced the standard controller in the Xbox's retail package, with the larger original controller remaining available as an accessory.
Contents
Compatibility
The controller itself uses a proprietary USB interface, and through user modification and third party drivers, can be used as a standard USB controller.
Neither the original Xbox controller nor Controller S are compatible with the Xbox 360, and the Xbox 360 controller is not compatible with an original Xbox.
History
The Xbox controller featured dual vibration motors, two analog sticks, a pressure-sensitive directional pad, two analog triggers, a Back button, a Start button, two accessory slots and six 8-bit analog action buttons (A/Green, B/Red, X/Blue, Y/Yellow, and Black and White buttons). The standard Xbox controller (originally nicknamed the "Fatty" and later the "Duke") was originally the controller bundled with Xbox systems for all territories except Japan. The controller has been criticized for being bulky compared to other video game controllers; it was awarded "Blunder of the Year" by Game Informer in 2001, a Guinness World Record for the biggest controller in Guinness World Records Gamer's Edition 2008, and was ranked the second worst video game controller ever by IGN editor Craig Harris.
The "Controller S" (codenamed "Akebono"), a smaller, lighter Xbox controller, was originally the standard Xbox controller only in Japan, designed for users with smaller hands. The "Controller S" was later released in other territories by popular demand and in 2002 replaced the standard controller in the US Xbox's retail package, and Europe in 2003, with the larger original controller remaining available as an accessory.
Memory Unit
An 8 MB removable solid state memory card can be plugged into the controllers, onto which game saves can either be copied from the hard drive when in the Xbox dashboard's memory manager or saved during a game. Most Xbox game saves can be copied to the memory unit and moved to another console but some Xbox saves are digitally signed; each console has a unique signing key, and some games (e.g. Ninja Gaiden and Dead or Alive Xtreme Beach Volleyball) will not load saved games signed by a different Xbox, limiting the utility of the memory card. Some game saves can be tagged as uncopyable or simply padded to over 8 MB (Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic). The signing mechanism has been reverse-engineered by the Xbox hacking community, who have developed tools to modify savegames to work in a different console, though the signing key of the recipient Xbox (the "HDkey") and the ramped-up title key of the game (the "authkey") must be known. It is also possible to save an Xbox Live account on a memory unit, to simplify its use on more than one Xbox.