Wii Shaft: the arcade-style joystick for virtual console titles

We have to believe that the name of this arcade-style joystick was chosen more for hype and less for, well, anything else, but nevertheless, it's yet another way to add even more retro to the virtual console experience. Slated to arrive just in time for the holidays, The Shaft will be available in arctic white, coral pink and midnight black, and it will darn near take up your entire lap, too. The oversized creation sports a customizable turbo function along with six control buttons, but we could certainly see this thing becoming an excellent chew toy for Fido if left unattended for an extended period of time. The 'stick can be pre-ordered right now for $39.95, or you can appear infinitely wise by snapping up two for "just" $69.95.

[Via Digg]

[reticulate @ Nov 12th 2007 4:29AM]

I can't believe they called a controller the Wii Shaft.

This is wrong on several important levels.

[UKNigel @ Nov 12th 2007 12:16PM]

I wonder if it has some force feedback vibration action going on too...

[Paul S. @ Nov 12th 2007 4:37AM]

Hmm... Interesting. In both name and product, that is.

While it looks like a decent arcade stick, I think I'll wait until there's a review or two on it before purchasing. I don't want to end up with a nonfunctional piece of plastic.

[Reader @ Nov 12th 2007 4:45AM]

I can only imagine this meeting...

Random Guy 1: GUYS!! I just thought of an amazing name for the new Wii joystick. The Shaft!!!

*laughter*

Random Guy 2: Seriously though... What are we going to name this??

CEO: I like it...

[Bernhard @ Nov 12th 2007 4:57AM]

Lets hope people don't buy it for use as a sex toy

[MR @ Nov 12th 2007 5:04AM]

Besides the sex jokes, they should've at least tell us the size of the, well, thing.
Yes, size matters a lot for a fighting stick too.

[haracas @ Nov 12th 2007 5:29AM]

Yes, size really does matter in many cases. Have you seen cock fights before? The larger bird always tends to win.

I couldn't help myself XD

[Sageco @ Nov 12th 2007 5:37AM]

Well, and there they have it, Nintendo wins me over. If this is a functional arcade stick, I'm buying a wii. :P

[Alexander @ Nov 12th 2007 9:55AM]

Since Nintendo didin't make this (3rd party) then... well. Don't bleed all over the bathroom when you go cut yourself. :P

[Mike - Digitalismo @ Nov 12th 2007 7:23AM]

A great retro design, great bottoms and shape.


the shaft.. well..

[Mike @ Nov 12th 2007 7:44AM]

oh geez. It'll be available in pink, too...

[phrank @ Nov 12th 2007 9:50AM]

And don't forget midnight black! Once you go black, you never go back...

[James @ Nov 12th 2007 8:23AM]

I'm a tiny bit concerned -- how do we know e.g. Brawl won't want you to have at least two analog sticks or an analog stick + d-pad? I bought a PS2 arcade stick way back when, thinking I'd have a spare controller for when people came over, but it needed extra directional controls for many (most, eventually) games.

Buyer beware!

[allaina @ Nov 12th 2007 11:29AM]

check the smashbros.com site.

brawl can be played in a number of different ways (4, to be exact) wiimote style like zelda, with a classic controller, with a gc controller, or with the wiimote on it's side like some of the classic games allow.


check before you ask your questions, maybe somebody (in this case, nintendo) has already addressed your concerns.

[John @ Nov 12th 2007 9:11AM]

Today is a good day for elementary school humour.

[Ian @ Nov 12th 2007 9:18AM]

This is 3rd Party hardware and, as has already been stated, it'll be best to wait for the reviews before jumping on it for $40. My experience with some VC games (such as Pac Man) is that the analog stick on the Classic Controller works only semi-acceptably - difficult to change direction with arcade-like precision. The question I have is whether the range of motion of the joy stick on this after-market controller would be any better than the analog stick on the Classic Controller. I'll wait...

[rav97 @ Nov 12th 2007 9:47AM]

It also comes in black!!!

Who's the black plastic stick
that's a wii controller for all the chicks?
(Shaft!)
Can you dig it?

[Alexander @ Nov 12th 2007 9:54AM]

Been here, done this.

Already modded one classic controller into an arcade stick. And I can say with authority:

The classic controller (CC) sucks balls for fighting games.

Not all the blame rests with Nintendo however. They had to design a generic controller that would play NES, SNES N64, Genesis, TurboGrafx-16, and Neo Geo...

All with one controller.

And they did pretty good. It works, but fighting games for long periods of time make your hands hurt. Nothing like gripping some real plywood on some real arcade buttons on your lap.

Not to mention those analog sticks are wasted on the other 94% of the games out on VC and get in the way for real button-mashing.

All in all, the controller that they put out is REAL hackable. Nice big PCB, fat traces, and the pins on the chip inside the CC are nice and big too--so soldering wires to it is a snap. Here is a picture of what I am talking about.

http://bayimg.com/gaHCFaAbP

It's easy enough to ohm out the traces, to find out where buttons go. And then you just connect them up. Done and done.

[Dotelpenguin @ Nov 12th 2007 12:32PM]

I'm curious who Nintendo has naming there stuff.

[phrank @ Nov 12th 2007 2:04PM]

Please, please tell me it has vibration feedback!

[yecart1976 @ Nov 12th 2007 9:11PM]

I think this looks alot more fun to use than the CC. The CC is just too small makes you get a hand cramp if you play too long.

[XenoX101 @ Nov 15th 2007 7:43AM]

Wonderful, and I just bought another classic controller :(