Top 5: Weird Nintendo Peripherals

Hello again island guests, as you might now I can be a bit of a weirdo. I am into weird things like making Luffy and Naruto play Mario Party against each other instead of them having fight a Death Battle.  I prefer old games over new ones (except for maybe animal crossing) and I am very charmed by clunkiness. So what do we get if we combine those all together? Older video game stuff that is totally weird and doesn’t work all that well? Exactly! Luckily there is Nintendo who offer me the weirdest gaming peripherals out there.

Weird Peripheral Number 5: The Inflatable Kart
(WII)

It’s a strange world where someone can make a inflatable Kart that functions as an odd on for a controller and having it barely make the top of weirdest Nintendo gadgets. In fact technically it really is not, but I chosen to exclude items I actually deem as alternate controllers, otherwise the kart wouldn’t even scratch the top 10.  Anyway … since most of you are at least old enough to have played the Switch, I think most of you know that Mario Kart Wii came with a plastic steering wheel. This is about the same thing… but with an inflatable Kart Attached to the steering wheel. 

Now Pinkie lives in a 23 square meter apartment so when it comes to add-ons for or your gaming experience she is a little bit selective , yet even in a game-room of a wealthy person I can’t imagine this working out.  It’s inflatable so prone to get leaky unless you deflate it each time after use! It’s a big kart as well so that is a lot of air you need to put in to inflate it so you are going to need something to provide enough air as well. After that you get a kid sized kart , and I can tell you that sitting in a kart like that is majorly uncomfy. I haven’t sat in this one but in a similar sized one and it killed my long dutch legs!  So without a pump this can causes intense leg cramps, respiratory issues, seasickness (yes I can get seasick from laying down on softly inflate air mattress) and you kind of look stupid sitting in a plastic kart. The Wii wheel  was bad enough.. but all this thing does is make you look sad. 

Weird Peripheral Number 4: R.O.B.
(NES)

Gyromite and Stack-Up where two NES CO-Op games. Mostly the first one had some mechanics that could make for a fun puzzle game, with one player controlling gateways and the other the character. By working together you guide this little professor guy across the stages. It’s not a bad game… however it wasn’t intended to be played with a friend. Or at least not with a living one. This game was meant to be played next to R.O.B. your robot friend who could read the screen of Gyromite and Stack up and who would help you play the games.  So yes .. this is an actual robot that plays video games with you.. an actual Robot friend made for NES… that’s kinda weird right?! I mean it’s super cool but still weird. “Honey what should we hook up to our NES today?’ How about our robot friend?!

Nowadays R.O.B. I mostly know to be a fighter in smash but back in the NES era he was a true friend! Playing games with you.. however R.O.B.’s gaming skills leave a bit to be desired. First of all setting up R.O.B.  already takes about as long as beating your average NES game (once you know how to do it) so you spend 20 to 30 minutes setting up all the parts, positioning him to a screen, using the C batteries (I think it was four of them)  setting up the gyroids or the stackable blocks and then you also have to activate him. Now ROB is a 90’s robot so he is incredibly slow. Imagine Super Mario Bros world 1-1 with a question mark block this time being a gate ROB needs to open for you .

Now.. Rob doesn’t press buttons he picks up a gyro from a docking station and puts it on a scale this scale will then push A or B on Robs controller, this determines which gate is opened, the Red ones or the blue ones. .. now to switch Rob doesn’t pick up the gyroid from the controller and puts it on the other spot … no.. Rob picks it up , puts in back in the docking station, then makes another capture of the screen sees what is required of him and he moves the gyro from the docking station to the new position. So there is roughly a minute .. if everything goes well between each Mario Question block.. this is the pace that Rob holds.  And it doesn’t always go well.

ROB has butterfingers he constantly drops the gyro.. and if he does you need to make sure the gyro spins again. In Stack up where he builds coloured towers to mimic the screen he is even worse. Yet who cares you have a robot friend to play with. Now I bet GeekGirlJoy could build us another robot that does do its job better than ROB but until then either you have a gaming friend or a fairly low Tier Smash fighter.. either way if you are truly into a fluid gaming experience ROB probably should be avoided. Still a robot gaming friend.. is a pretty zaney idea for a peripheral.

Weird Peripheral Number 3: LifeCycle Exertainment (SNES) 

Nintendo always wanted that we stayed fit. The NES had a mat for running, the gamecube has a very popular DDR mat, the Wii had that Yoga balance board thing to work out with and on the Switch we now have a ring! However… there is one device that easily trumps these devices and makes them seem like child’s play. There is an exercise bike add on, for the SNES or Super Nintendo. That’s right a full fledged fully functional exercise bike. It’s extremely rare to find one these days.. as not a lot of them were sold… but back when it was made the company had full trust in this. They even released two models. One for gyms which had build in monitors and the SNES integrated into the cabinet or a home user model in which you connect the bike to an add on for your SNES that you connect via a phone cable.

It was very weird back then.. but what was actually weirder is that it actually works. The bike supports two games, of which only 1 is a bike game.. the other is a Speed Racer port.. from the same system but adapted to work with the controller. While the Bike itself actually works quite well and even can detect angles in the mode-7 graphics and increase or decrease pedal resistance based on it… the controller part really fumbles. The D-pad is horrible and since the bike’s steering wheel is fixed you need to press left and right to steer in these games…which basically is barely functional. So by playing these things on easier difficulty settings you can skip steering completely and just focus on having enough power to pedal trough. However this means earning less unlock points..and thus forcing you to exercise more.. so now it’s tiring and it’s not fun?!  Sounds like actual fitness to me, and if so this thing is completely overpriced.

Weird Peripheral Number 2: Sewing Machine 
(Gameboy) 

So this one is where things really start to get weird,  this is a sewing machine you can use by hooking it up to your gameboy, and unfortunately this isn’t even the weirdest gameboy invention ever. It’s just the weirdest you can actually play.  There is a cartridge that helps you set up sewing patterns I think which actually sounds incredibly helpful for people like me! I’d love to make cosplays but I barely even know what a sewing pattern even is. I am just not sure how helpful this tool actually is.  Aside from a few cosplayers I haven’t met a lot of people who own a sewing machine and a gameboy. The two demographics don’t overlap that much, so unless this was created for a niche of a niche specifically this one seems like a really weird idea to try out.

The Singer Izek is purchasable, which put it above it’s competition the Pedistate. The pedistate was a medical tool that never got released. It was a tool for hospitals that doctors and nurses could hook up to a gameboy, put onto a kid and …..sedate children… as they play their favorite handheld video games.  Feeling it was less traumatic for kids to be sedated this way they even build it in colours to match the original purple of the game boy colour. Honestly I would have loved to knock myself out with my gameboy! Sleeping doesn’t come easy to me so that tool would have been very useful, though I doubt I would be allowed to use it unsupervised.  Maybe the idea of sewing stuff together with my gameboy is enough to put me a sleep as well. 

Weird Peripheral Number 1: Babies  (Nintendo Wii) 

The fact that I had to write this title in plural instead of singular form amazes me. There are to my knowledge..at east two baby add ons for Nintendo wii. Both come with their own game and their own baby. Baby and me takes a realistic approach and offers you a classic baby doll. To start playing you insert the wiimote…into to baby …………and start playing the game. The game pursues this realistic like style. Unfortunately with the graphic capabilities of the Wii that doesn’t always pan out.  Aside from the fact that the baby wears pink the actual baby toy you get is kinda scary looking This baby has some serious as to it. She dons a weird headband that no other baby would.  You use the nun-chuck.. which … comes out the baby to do stuff powder it’s bum and change it’s diaper all while it’s soulless eyes stare up and scream in agony for allowing it to continue it’s miserable existence. The on screen baby is even scarier. I’d honestly rather snog with Cthulhu than bear that kid’s gaze. The baby sells pretty cheaply on eBay with models going for under 10 euro so at least it’s not hard to get.

I get this was made for little girls…but you technically can do this with regular dolls as well.  These are just baby dolls  but instead of taking care of the one in your hands you take care of the one on screen…that just doesn’t really make sense to me.. nor does seeing a baby as a gaming peripheral shout good parenting to me. The second baby possibly is even weirder. It was made for a game in the cooking Mama series named Babysitting mama  in this game you control a daycare center and insert your wiimote into a plush anime like baby. By doing well in the minigames Mama can collect more babies to play with. Taking care of these babies earns coins and unlockables. Minigames include making the baby move on a seesaw or burping it. These babies all are insanely expressive  and can get super grouchy or super happy which is scary! There even is a minigame where you have to change it’s diaper which involves removing the diaper from the plush baby a putting it on again to change it of virtual baby. This version is a lot more fun to play though and requires the use of the nun chuck a lot less often. Which makes this the de facto game to go to if you want to you an actual baby as a gaming tool, all you need is to remove it’s  diaper.. take a wiimote … and you can imagine the rest…. it will even fix some sensitivity problems this game has for the force of an adult playing this.