Xbox 360 Controller on PC

I know that I have been playing games on my computer and you just keep getting the feeling that it was designed around a console. I had no idea before hand that you could get a Xbox 360 controller and plug it into a PC and go. So I was talking to my dad about how much better NHL07 is with a controller so we went and got one. I plugged in the controller and it detected it and it worked. Went into NHL07 and it detected it and set up the controls just like you were playing on a Xbox. So I started wondering if I could get other games to work with the controller.



I downloaded a profiler designed around game controllers called Pinnacle Game Profiler. It automatically detected the 360 Controller and detected what games I already had on my system and installed the profiles with the information built in. You are able to change what each button does so if you do not like jump being Y in Oblivion then you can change it. However most of the time the game designers have come up with the easiest to use control system.

The only problem that I have found with playing FPS games on PC with a controller vs a Console was that in almost every console FPS they have Aim-Assist. What most people do not realize is how much this helps you until you play on a PC without it and you need to try and be dead on accurate with a control stick. To give you a little incite into this, out of my friends I am probably in the top 2 of them at Call of Duty and I can kill people left and right, but then I try playing Counter-Strike Source on PC with a game pad and I can only beat bots on normal difficulty and on-line play is practically impossible unless you are playing a ton of noobs.

You can get the controller to work perfectly with CSS and other FPS games however you need to be really good at sniping people without the accuracy that you get when you use a mouse and keyboard setup.

The one game that isn't sports related that I enjoy playing more with the controller is Oblivion. I have never played on the 360 however I have an idea of what it is like now that I have played with a controller, and I know that they were doing something right when they used the controller, I prefer it over mouse and keyboard 100%. The only time I do not use the controller now is when I am playing in windowed mode because a lot of people are messaging me on MSN. I used the profiler and downloaded a member of their forums unofficial button mapping which matched up with the 360. The only problem you are going to bump into is if you do not already know the buttons then when you are going through the game from the beginning then you are not going to know how to do some of the stuff.

So what do you need to get this setup? If you are from Canada then you are going to want to go to Wal-Mart and pick up the controller because they have the cheapest next to London Drugs. A computer with either XP or Vista. If you have Vista then you do not need the drivers because they are built in. If not then you need to go to http://www.microsoft.com/hardware/gaming/download.mspx and get it. Then you need to either play games that were geared already for controllers or get Pinnacle at http://www.pinnaclegameprofiler.com/ you can either use it for 30 days then reinstall it or pay the 20 dollars and get product with out the 30 days.

The Review

When it comes down to it Xbox has always had in my eyes the best controllers around other then the first one when it was like 3 sizes to big and then they made the mini version and have been on the right track ever since. They are ergonomically correct, they have a nice layout and the way that they use triggers is great (Glad to see that the PS3 adopted this). It gives it an awesome overall feel when you are playing games that require some more control over the action that is place with the triggers (Such as racing games when you want to give it just a little gas).

There currently is no force feed back using the rumble effects that you get with a 360 however I am going to be doing some more testing and experimenting with other drivers to see if I can get it going.

The great Xbox button does not work on the PC for very obvious reasons. If Microsoft wants to do us all a favor (by Us I mean people using a 360 controller on a PC) they should have that button programed to go to some menu like they have on the 360. I would personally love to see it be geared to Vista's side bar and have it just kinda appear over top of the game or application so that you can use the MP3 player or check the time or any of the other cool things that they have on the side bar.

Overall I think this was a great investment considering I love playing NHL07, it is just a much higher quality controller over the ones that I have seen come out in the past and they are practically indestructible; however I hate seeing a button not being which next to the lack of rumble capabilities is the only other downside.