Ten Weird and Awful Gaming Accessories

These accessories are just too extra.

A video game is played with a controller. That’s how it’s always been, and until full-immersion VR is a thing, that’s how it will always be. But gaming, especially in the last decade, has been an industry of experimentation, and as it goes on, there will always be smart-alecks, both first and third-party, who are going to try to reinvent the wheel.

Power Glove 

If the Power Glove’s rudimentary motion sensor actually, like, worked, it might’ve been kind of neat.

Resident Evil 4 Chainsaw Controller 

How are you supposed to hold this horrendous thing?

Skywriter Stick Station 

I’m not even going to pretend I know what the purpose of a joystick in a block of wood is.

Namco NeGcon 

It’s a controller built for driving games. You twist it to steer. Neat, except you’ve got a perfectly good D-Pad right under your thumb.

R.O.B. 

It’s honestly a shame that the original NES R.O.B. was such a bad accessory, because I love him in concept. At least he’s a decent Smash character now.

‘Homework First’ Video Game Lock 

I don’t know what kind of child-hating butt would make a lock-bar for a NES, but I sincerely hope they didn’t have kids of their own.

E-Reader 

People don’t really like having to buy more things after they buy a big thing, especially when your incentive to buy more things is playing NES games on your Game Boy Advance. Woo.

Gamecube Broadband Adapter 

Don’t know why anyone would own one of these; you can count the games that could use it on one hand.

Kid Icarus 3DS Stand 

Kid Icarus: Uprising was a really fun game, but boy, was it not ideal for the 3DS. So what did they do to alleviate the problem? Include a dumb stand and send you on your way.

Kinect 

I get it, Microsoft, you wanted in on Nintendo’s crazy Wii dollars. But that dumb camera had few if any games worth playing, and they barely worked. Just make regular games, you’re good at that.