My experience with the different consoles and adapters

Hey

I want to say right off that I feel very neutral about the future of ess adapters in the OoT community. At this point I am ok with whatever the community decides and will abide by any rules that are put in place.

This is just going to be me rambling about my experiences with the different consoles and the adapter itself.


I have experience with both N64 and VC. I got into OoT in early 2015 and started on VC because I had a wii that I could easily homebrew.  I started learning No IM/WW and noticed very quickly that ess position in general was really difficult to hold.
With some digging around the internet I eventually found that there was an adapter made to fix this very issue and make the control stick mapped like N64. At this point I had no experience with N64 other than playing the game as a kid. So I just took the random people on ZSR forums word for it that it was better.

I ended up purchasing this device from Daniel Kraak in early 2015 without having any idea about the bad stigma it had around it. I came up in the OoT community in a very weird time when IRC was dying and Discord wasn't big yet. So the only way to talk with community members was in twitch chats pretty much. If/when the adapters came up in chat, streamers usually always ignored the topic.. (in hindsight, it was avoided because of the stigma it had).  I ended up purchasing this adapter not really sure how the community treated them, and didn't really know anyone to ask about them.
I received the adapter and used it for a week during my practice/learning of No IM/WW. Without even knowing about this negative outlook the general community had on the adapter, I knew that it definitely didn't feel fair to use it. I eventually put two and two together, and assumed that it must be cheating to use one. I ended up just buying an N64 that same week and making the switch. Luckily, later on I would become hooked on 100% which was faster on N64 anyway ;)

Either way, without the "bias", I guess, from the community at large I had a feeling that a device like this probably wouldn't be allowed in a competitive setting.  Turns out that it technically was allowed and that people just danced around the topic for years without ever actually trying to enforce anything.


Fast forward 3 years to 2018, after playing on N64 the whole time and ignoring all talks of the adapter...
VC is now faster for the category I love to play. Not only that, the category is also the one most affected by ESS tricks in general. Something this adapter greatly influences.
My first instinct was "Hey! I can finally make use of this thing I wasted $30 on 3 years ago". Annnd thats exactly what I did. During the 2 months of VC hundo routing I used this adapter as a crutch so that I could get things done for timings/route testing. The adapter isnt exactly the same as N64 but it is very close and let me play the same without much adjusting.  Also my feelings about the adapter were loosened from my older views, simply because the community as a whole seemed to loosen up about it. Many people were using them including some top level players and not many people seemed bothered by the idea of the adapter.

I knew the topic was still somewhat controversial, but I didn't realize how polarized the community's opinions on it were until zfg brought up the discussion of banning them this week.  I read so many peoples opinions and arguments for both sides. Both sides have great points and I have considered them all. This topic cant be solved by a simple yes/no answer and that became clear very quickly through our discussions. Other adapters came into question and even certain controllers you were allowed to use.

--

My stance on the ess adapter is neutral simply because of the amount of experience I have with both consoles (adapter and no adapter) combined with the amount of perspectives and opinions I have considered these past few days...
I've decided to myself that there is no right answer.  My gut feeling 3 years ago said it was cheating to use this adapter. Now, years later,  I see that many people use this device to just enjoy playing the game. The competitive side of me says that it shouldn't be allowed, and another side of me agrees with the more updated views people have on this adapter and how it actually affects competition.

As a side note, in the beginning of this discussion I strongly had the opinion that if the ess adapter goes, all adapters have to go. While I still somewhat agree with this, I realize that other popular adapters only provide the advantage of comfort and don't provide any huge competitive advantage that I feel should be regulated. Again, not the opinion that many others share, but that is my current take on it.


I heavily agree and disagree with all sides of this debate and figure that I will just stay out of this one and go with whatever the OoT community feels is right. Whatever rules the people want in place, I will follow. So I will wait for the votes results.

Thanks for reading this even though it probably didnt help the debate in any way :rofl:

-Fig

PS.
Ive been doing hundo runs without the adapter for the last couple of days and I'm already getting pretty decent at hessing and whatnot. Im confident that if the adapter were to be banned it wouldn't hinder my abilities as a player and I can eventually have fun to the same degree as before. At that point it's just a matter of comfort and not needing to adjust to a new way of playing the game from N64, which I am still very used to..