The creator of the Smash Bros series, Masahiro Sakurai, has explained the lack of button re-mapping in Super Smash Bros Ultimate.
In his latest video on YouTube, Sakurai talked about the challenges involved in implementing button configuration settings. He said that the feature itself is important, but it’s always an ordeal having to implement it all over again for each new game.
As per Sakurai’s experience with Super Smash Bros Ultimate, asking every developer to create their own button re-mapping system leads to a lot more work during development. Thus, he said that it would be great if the console maker implements a system that lets players customize controls on a game-by-game basis, but that hasn’t happened yet. He added that the games he has worked on had to support lots of different controllers ever since the Wii was released, for which the development team had to make certain considerations.
The Super Smash Bros creator mentioned that the Nintendo Switch allows players to change button settings at a system level. However, that changes the button mapping for all applications, including how they work in every game. If, as a result, the player ends up with some unmapped buttons, they won’t be able to perform any of the corresponding actions required by an application.
Sakurai explained that, for game creators, making a button settings screen can be a major problem. However, he also recognized that it is a necessity for some players. He encouraged his fellow game creators to support the feature whenever possible.
We certainly hope that Nintendo is paying attention to Sakurai’s request, and will have a system in place for the Switch successor that allows players to customize controls on a game-by-game basis. It would eliminate the need for the hard work Sakurai and his development team would have to put in to come up with an in-game system to perform the same task.
