Topic: Lack of Circle Pad Pro Support for Super Smash Bros. for Nintendo 3DS Explained by Director

[Steel Diver]

Sakurai speaks the words you did not want to hear.

http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/news/38631/lack-of-circle-pad-pro-support-for-super-smash-bros-for-nintendo-3ds-explained-by-director

Super Smash Bros. for 3DS does not support the Circle Pad Pro due to hardware constraints, specifically, the amount of processing power the add-on requires.

Smash Bros. and Kid Icarus: Uprising director Masahiro Sakurai explained the problem in a recent issue of Famitsu magazine: "Supporting the Circle Pad Pro requires the use of some of the CPU's processing load." They found while developing Uprising that it took "around 5%" of the handheld system's processing power. Sakurai's recent explanation for omitting the Ice Climbers noted that his new game uses the 3DS to its maximum capabilities, meaning there is no room for a peripheral such as the Circle Pad Pro.

The New Nintendo 3DS (and XL) will support the use of the system's second joystick in Super Smash Bros. for 3DS, which is used in the same way as the Circle Pad Pro. However, the New 3DS also has a more powerful processor, so having it as a part of the system instead of as an add-on should not be a problem.

[nhaines]

Well, with an integrated hardware component, the controller input is sent over a dedicated hardware bus.  All you have to do is read from a specific memory address and find out what buttons are being pushed at the current time.

But the Circle Pad Pro uses IR light to send controls to the IR port.  Now depending on how much work the IR port is doing, you may need to read from it fast enough to decode the digital pulses being sent.  It's like decoding Morse code.  You have to pay attention long enough to hear all the pulses and the silences, then determine which pulses were dots, which were dashes, which pauses meant next letter, next word, new signal, and so on.

So you have to dedicate enough CPU type to checking the IR input and then decoding that into controller button presses and then pass that along to the control input subroutines.  That's why it gets so much more difficult than an integrated button.

[pokepal148]

Wait, it takes 5% of the 3DS's processing power to accommodate the Circle Pad Pro? Yeesh, I didn't expect  it would take no more then like 2% to handle it.

[nhaines]

Wait, it takes 5% of the 3DS's processing power to accommodate the Circle Pad Pro? Yeesh, I didn't expect  it would take no more then like 2% to handle it.

I wouldn't be surprised if the IR receiver is really dump and the poll rate has to be really high to be reliable, especially for a game that needs a high enough poll rate to have super low input latency like a fighting game.

[pokepal148]

No circle pad pro support,
No Ice Climbers,
Fox only,
Final Destination

[Ceric]

Super Smash Bros: For the Glory of 3DS
Only the Hardcore step in here.

[Shaymin]

You forgot "no transformations", but I do find myself playing the world's tiniest violin...

[Bman87301]

Based on what logic are these supposed to be words we wouldn't want to hear?? I can't speak for everyone,  but I'm more than happy to hear there was a rational explanation.