If I had a penny for every time rumours claimed an Apple games controller was imminent, I’d have, well, a small pile of pennies. But some of them would be pretty old, because this rumour just won’t die. Each time you think it’s gone, it pops back up. This time, Apple Rumour Parper in Chief Mark Gurman reported for Bloomberg that Apple will lurk cunningly behind its Beats brand while unleashing a pair of controllers, codenamed T6502 and T1057. Or maybe they’re Terminators. Definitely one of those.
Anyway, why would anyone want an Apple (or Beats) game controller? And what would Apple need to do, in order to make one worth buying? Actually, it’s probably easier to think about what Apple should not do. And that’s – to some degree – be Apple.
People forget Apple has form in games controllers – bad form. Back in 2013, having ignored regular pleas to support controllers on mobile, Apple finally issued a spec. And, Apple being Apple, it thought it knew better than everyone else. So it helpfully confused the industry with non-standard buttons (no Start or Select) and by immediately fragmenting an ecosystem that didn’t really exist by issuing two variants: ‘standard’ (think SNES) and ‘extended’ (think DualShock).
I believe Logitech was the sole company unfortunate enough to support the former, presumably selling literal dozens of controllers. Early ‘extended’ efforts fared little better. They commanded high prices, offered variable quality and received little support. Hilariously, just to prove it didn’t know what it was doing, Apple in 2015 mandated all Apple TV games had to support the hideous original Siri Remote. Meanwhile, nobody thought to slap a filter on the App Store so you could quickly access games with controller support. Even today, the iPhone Home Screen doesn’t support landscape mode or controller navigation, which makes using a controller less than ideal.
Game on
Fortunately, Apple munched humble pie, came to its senses and baked support for popular third-party game controllers into its operating systems. The shift to USB-C connectivity for iPhone then allowed third-party telescopic controllers to support Apple and Android gear, so you no longer had to buy a Lightning accessory that didn’t work with your Android blower.
But making a good controller is table stakes. There’s plenty of competition. To stand out from the crowd, Apple/Beats must do something better. Doubly so when you factor in Apple’s high prices and one of the best third-party iOS controllers available today costing just $80/£80.
Apple could start by stealing from elsewhere. The seamless multi-device pairing of the AirPods would be great for a controller. The TATE mode from Evercade handhelds that instantly gets you to portrait mode would be a boon. And even though Apple’s not keen on one device to rule them all, one controller to rule all of gaming? Yeah!
Imagine a MagSafe connector that flips devices between landscape and portrait. Then pair that with telescopic capabilities that let the controller work like a typical gamepad when no device is attached, or with even the biggest of iPads when you feel the urge to transform Apple’s tablet into a ludicrous handheld. Heck, maybe the controller could do something that’s very much not Apple and embrace modularity, thereby making it suitable even for classic arcade games.
We probably won’t get that. Instead, we’ll get Apple/Beats takes on a BackBone and a DualShock, which won’t be exciting but will be… adequate. Which, when it comes specifically to gaming, really would be very Apple.
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