The last post here covered three keyboards for retro consoles. These input devices often go hand-in-hand with matching mice or sometimes, like the Super Nintendo/Super Famicom mouse, no keyboard is required. Most modern mice now have optical sensors but back then, they had balls. Balls that needed a regular clean.
Like the console keyboards, I own three examples of these controllers and I thought it would be fun to take a closer look at them and see what they can do.
SNES/Super Famicom Mouse
The SNES/Super Famicom mouse was released in 1992. A ‘mechanical’ or ‘ball’ mouse with two buttons on top, it can feel a lot slower to use than today’s optical mice and comes with a comparatively short cable.
A plastic mouse mat was included as this helped ball mice to remain clean, reduced table scratches, and increased speed and precision.
Unlike the console it was designed for, the SNES mouse has the same grey and purple color scheme across all regions, which means it only matches the U.S. console. European and Japanese consoles used blue, green, red, and yellow buttons on their controllers.
Coming bundled with Mario Paint, an art creation video game, it is the only controller that will work with the game. With it, you can create art with various tools or paint and draw freehand. There is a music mode to allows players to create their own songs and an animation mode that can be used to create looping animations.
The inclusion of an interactive title screen where clicking on each letter of MARIO PAINT will make something different happen such as Mario himself shrinking and returning to normal size when the ‘M’ is clicked, serves to get players used to using the mouse.
Mario Paint also contained Gnat Attack, a mini-game where players use the mouse to swat flies before defeating a final boss whereupon the game loops back to level one.
Several other games were also released with SNES mouse support. Along with a regular controller, T2: The Arcade Game and Tin Star are games where the mouse can be used instead of the Super Scope for those times when you don’t have six AAs handy to power that battery-munching peripheral.
The SNES mouse was so popular that in 2017, Hyperkin released the Hyper Click Mouse, an aftermarket Super NES mouse that updated the original to a modern optical mouse with a longer cable.
Sega Saturn - Shuttle Mouse
The Shuttle Mouse is a four-button (A, B, C, and Start) controller for the Sega Saturn. Released only in Japan and bundled with a blue mouse mat, it came in two color schemes (grey/blue, white/red) to match the two versions of the console released there.
It supports over a hundred games, many of which are point-and-click or simulation games but like the SNES mouse, it can also be used as an alternative to the Saturn’s light gun on games such as Crypt Killer and Virtua Cop.
The U.S. Sega Saturn version was called the NetLink Mouse. It was black with the same number of buttons but a different design and came with a red mouse mat.
Released for use with Sega’s NetLink cartridge, a modem that allowed users internet access and email through the console, it is also compatible with the same software as the Shuttle Mouse.
Sony PlayStation - PlayStation Mouse
Back to two buttons with the PlayStation Mouse. Released in 1994 on the same day as the PlayStation itself, this ball mouse was also styled to match the console in a concrete grey. The mouse mat is white with the PlayStation logo in the middle although these days most examples seem to have turned yellow with age.
There was also a limited edition version released with the game Tokimeki Memorial: Forever With You that had the game’s title and chief protagonist printed on the top.
Supporting a similar number of games to the Shuttle Mouse it also makes playing point-and-click, strategy, and management games on the console a lot less cumbersome. Light gun games supported include Time Crisis and Area 51.
There are many other mice for retro consoles including the MegaDrive/Genesis, Nintendo 64, PC Engine, PCFX, Phillips CDi, Panasonic 3DO, and Sega Dreamcast. Out of all these the Dreamcast mouse of which there were two versions, is the only one with a modern scroll wheel.
Personally, the game I play most often with a mouse on retro consoles has to be one of the various ports of Lemmings, including:
Lemmings 2 on the SNES
Lemmings & Oh No! More Lemmings on the PlayStation
Lemmings 3D on the PlayStation and Sega Saturn
Still a fun puzzle/strategy game after all these years. I first played it not on console but on the Amiga with the legendary Tank Mouse, another one that has recently had an optical, wireless update, from Lucas Remis on Kickstarter.