On 8/4/2020 at 3:58 AM, DY17 said:
I believe Playstation 2 controllers also use 9 connections, but have even more buttons, including the joysticks. I really like the SNES controllers A LOT, but I'm wondering why the SNES over the PS2, considering the greater number of buttons, and more modern controller. Is it a proprietary issue, cost, just personal preference?
PS2 would require more pins and have a bigger Kernel footprint. NES/SNES is Select, MISO, SCLK, while PS2 is Attention, Acknowledge, MISO, MISO, SCLK. You can do two SNES with four pins, while two PS2 requires a minimum of seven (since MISO, MISO, and SCLK can all be bussed).
"More buttons" tilts to SNES in part because they have identical interfaces from the system side, you just read 8 bits from an NES and 16 from an SNES. So you get more buttons WITHOUT using taking any GPIO away from the User Port.