“I Love The Power Glove, it’s so Bad.”
One of the greatest things about the medium that are video games is seeing how hardware evolve with the goal of blurring the line between what is only a game and reality. That’s pretty much what video games are, something that interacts with what we do to have something exist in a virtual world. Yes the standard controller set up works just fine, but one of the great things about video games are the interactive ways to play the game as many are trying to cross the line of not just playing the game but being apart of it and its own world no matter how gimmicky it may be. Rather it be the early day attempts of a trackball controller for an Atari 5200 or to modern day virtual reality headsets (VR), many gaming companies have wants to blur the line of reality and being a part of the game itself rather than playing it. Something that makes your gaming experience one of a kind and more than just pushing buttons.
In the late 80s, the idea of wanting to make an interactive experience with gaming has not changed that much than what it is today. Some times you hit a home run and change the landscape of gaming forever, but sometimes there’s that massive swing and miss. Without success, ambition can only go so far. Not even Nintendo when in the late 80s were taking over the gaming world by storm had immunity from this, especially in the prime of their Nintendo Entertainment System (NES for short). There are a few really cool NES accessories for the system. They most notable one would likely be the NES Zapper, a first of its kind light gun that you could pull the trigger at the screen and would interact with what’s on the screen. The Zapper massive success was also helped by the simple yet fun game, “Duck Hunt”. There’s a simple fun of just shooting ducks on a screen and getting mad at that laughing dog, I see you!
Another great lesser famous but still successful accessory was the Nintendo Power Pad. You could use the power pad on the ground and use it to hit buttons and “run” in games like Track and Field. Kind of thinking of it as a controller you put on the ground and play on a pad. Kind of like a Dance Dance Revolution pad. You know maybe I should have talked about that more when the Olympics were going on. Maybe next time.
However, there’s one special accessory that has become a holy item of video game history, not for being a great accessory but in fact the opposite, something that even back in the day seemed absolutely insane of an idea and even now is quite the fascinating gaming hardware and not in all the right ways. Something that’s “so bad” that it’s quite fascinating that Nintendo would put their name on such a strange concept. Strap on, I’m reviewing The Power Glove.
So what exactly was/is The Power Glove? Well as you can see in the pic above, it’s a glove that is in the place of the controller. You use your fingers and hands in place of movement and button input. If you think this sounds totally bonkers for 1989, don’t worry it was. The concept likely comes from a movie 2 years prior in RoboCop. Hey if we can get control things with just the power of a glove, just how much society will grow and evolve? So… how does it work? The glove has sensors in the fingers that can act as your buttons. There’s a number pad that you enter to code what game you’re playing for the best fit for the job. There are also multiple sensors that sit on the TV and the sides, the glove sends out a pulse to see a XYZ positioning to see how far you are between he points. This is used for movement for games. Think of it as to how a bat uses super sonic sounds to see how far and close things are.
So the $64,000 question is… does it work?
Two games were released to take advantage of the power of the Power Glove. Super Glove Ball, a pseudo 3D puzzle game, and “Bad Street Brawler, a beat em up. But could be played just fine with a normal NES controller, but are made with the Power Glove in mind. Super Glove Ball is likely the best game with the Power Glove in mind, as it feels like a ball bounces back to you and you “drop it” back down to solve puzzles in a “break out” style puzzle game.
Other games also work with the Power Glove, but I use the term work very loosely. Let’s look at the TV ad that aired for the Power Glove.
First of all, they do a great job making the Power Glove look futuristic and all out badass. Who needs controls when you GOT THE POWER GLOVE! The future of interactive gaming is here!!! The first game shown being played is Rad Racer, and to be fair from my experience, it’s not the best controlling but it’s better than you’d think for a late 80s/early 90s accessory. Also you can hit select on the controller in Rad Racer to give it a 3D glasses look for maximum radness. The other games shown are Super Mario Bros 2 and Punch Out!, now this is where the power glove to me starts showing its limitations. You can move your hand up for Super Mario Bros to jump up, but there’s no doubt a noticeable delay and some times just won’t work. It’s cool to be able to do this, but no doubt not the controller replacement you think it would be. This especially goes for Punch Out where the input lag makes a game that’s already very hard to borderline impossible. Any sort of input delay in a game like Punch Out is the difference between winning and losing since that game relays so much on timing. To be quite honest, I wanna know how this teen beat Super Macho Man in Punch Out with the Power glove, that’s hard enough on a controller, let alone a power glove with that much input delay. I’m calling shenanigans.
The Power Glove was a success but was met with mix reviews as it… kind of worked? What game you played it on was really a dice roll as to how well or awful the Power Glove would vibe, leading to mix results.
However, the Power Glove has become quite the nostalgia item. Something that screams late 80s and early 90s aesthetic. I think when many think of The Power Glove, they think of the scene from the movie “The Wizard”. The Wizard was a movie in the 90s aimed for a younger audience. It was pretty much a Nintendo shilling advertisement into a road trip comedy adventure for the whole family to enjoy. But hey, us kids were like “yoooo a movie with video games!” so I guess mission accomplished?
At one point, we get one of our antagonist playing Rad Racer with the Power Glove and yeah it looks really cool to see. This makes our protagonists of the movie get intermediated realizing what they will be up against later. In retrospect, being intermediated by someone using the power glove is humorous but it’s no doubt in the window into a yesteryear, something I think people have a thing for now a days. Being able to be sent back in time to when things were simpler, even if it’s just for a moment.
It also gave us one of the greatest lines in cinema history.
In the end I honesty think there was potential for the Power Glove, I just don’t think the tech was quite there yet and might have been a bit too ambitious for its time. It is a cool idea of putting on a glove and playing video games on it in place of a standard D-pad and buttons and to be honest, playing video games with just a glove sounds really cool on paper. Now a days we have things like VR that get you much more into the game. I’ll give points for the admiration for the Power Glove but… yeah it’s a case where technology was not that advanced for that just yet. A for effort but not so much in execution.
