Modern PC gaming is hardly viable if you don't have a controller connected to it.

I can't say much about NVidia Shield (does it connect as game controller at all or it just emulates keyboard button presses?), but the best option for me is using regular Xbox controllers with wireless adapter (no need to get special wired controllers and you can use the very same controllers for both PC and 360).

You can also connect wiimote and classic controller to PC if you get a cheap bluetooth receiver, but i find it to be quite a hassle and even then it's not recognized as native controller.

On Steam sales: while i do dabble in them occasionally, if i find something interesting for a buck or two, i stopped participating in them entirely.

I just found out that my time is way more finite than my money. At this point of time, if i want to play a game, i will just buy it at any price, sale or not. It's finding time and desire to play it in the first place that stops me.

Especially when in the latest sale they basically turned consumerism (as in act of spending money) into a metagame, which is all kinds of scummy for me.

You're supposed to buy games to play them, not to compete in some virtual competition on which team will spend more. This is skewing of the buying process into some kind of casino where you don't even have a hope of a chance to end up earn more than you spend.

I'm not big on the idea of giving permanent price drops to games like Super Mario 3D World, which isn't even a year old. Nintendo's pricing structure is partly the reason Zack can get good value selling games like Skyward Sword and Ocarina of Time 3D after he's done playing with them.