Today I was sifting through my cupboards of books, old games that I'd promised myself I'd play again and the periphery of electronical nonsense that was outmoded as quickly as it came. The crowning glory of my wardrobe is the flat space at the bottom where my dead 360 and its many components share delightful accomodation with disintergrating jogging shoes and cables for things I don't own anymore.

Of all the things that get me tetchy regarding the death and rebirth via $80 and subsequent death of my 360, it's the fact that I have 4 perfectly good controllers which powered many hours of Halo and Gears with like-minded friends. Today, I this annoyed me more than usual because I knew for a fact that the dull and monotonous PC gaming crowd use 360 gamepads for the sacreligeous titles that shockingly require a custom built hardware to play properly.

A plan formed in my irked psyche that maybe, just maybe, I could use these dusty controllers for good. There are a lot of games on PC that I want desperately but having played through them on 360, I knew that a keyboard would completely ruin the experience. Before some of you bite my head off, you just don't play platformers or 3rd Person action games with a mouse, it's a soul-destroying experience. Bastion, a game that I still think is a close contender for the year's finest game, is one such title that I have avoided purchasing on Steam because the demo with the keyboard sucked the responsiveness out of the gameplay.

I assumed that as the 360 controllers have charging kits with USB inputs, Microsoft would be smart enough to make them compatible. Being Bill Gates tech, the world seems to think that this is downright wrong and I should buy a 5th 360 controller that is made for a PC. This dear readers, was an offence to my sensibilities. Upon extra research I found that even if I was to actually make use of my old controllers to make PC non-FPS games bearable, I would have to shell out wonga to secure for myself a wireless adaptor. While most of you knowledgeable folk make be thinking "well duh?", keep in mind that only late year did I have a PC that could manage Team Fortress 2. PC gaming is by and large an anethema to me, though I make say words like "textures" and "draw distance" in my reviews I could not give a monkeys about whether a game looks X amount better on computer Y because of combination Z of card and memory.

I resolved not to bow down to the forces of consumerism and decided to do techy things. While my PC didn't give a rat's arse whether I wanted the 360 controller to talk to the Bastion demo, my PS3 controller was found to be communicative with said PC if not actually compatible with any games.

Now a plug must be given to one caffenpill for his informative video on getting PS3 controller to work on your PC using MotioninJoy (links to the files required are provided). Though it took a bit of fiddling, especially since the program emulates 360 inputs through PS3 which in laymans terms equals: "you have to change the buttons around because no one wants to shoot with R2 on the Dualshock". I get that this may have been one hoop too many to jump through in order to play the games I want to play without using damn WASD but I can imagine plenty of people are in my position and are just as stubborn about shelling out cash for useless add-ons they don't need.

As a result; TOLERABLE PC GAMING. Chuck accusations at me all you want, I am a console gamer. I think console games look pretty damn good, I like games to play when they go in the slot and I want to have a great experience without reading more than 4 acronyms. The ability to play a dual-stick shooter without going in straight lines transcends any "controllers lack the precision" rubbish that the purists habitually throw at the console crowd. Yes, I'm using a PS3 controller whose button prompts come up as "Press A to do..." but as I still think in 360 buttons after 3 years of Playstation that's a minor irritation. No money spent on wireless whatnots, Bill and his friends can slum it.

So far, I think I could play a few more low-key releases on the PC rather than download them on PSN. My card apparently can't run even the graphically ho-hum new releases like Saints Row the Third (best use of Power!) that well so you may expect a despicable descent into the world of Steam sales and indie games. Especially if I get too used to the joy of not playing games with the implements I use to operate the trappngs of my real life.

Now comes the question: I have maybe $25 US in my Steam wallet that has never been spent, in order to test out my new setup I can afford either the new Trine 2 or Bastion (which I finished on somebody's 360 because they were heathens and hated it). Both are my kind of games in a very big way, thus I would appreciate any and all recommendations as to the true test of my elaborate emulator setup.