We live in a future where a Nintendo Sega Genesis controller isn’t heresy

Send this to the ’90s with Mario’s time machine

As numb as I’ve become to the status quo of the video game console landscape, some once-heretical sights still shove me back into the heated console wars of the 1990s.

We’ve had plenty of time to let the idea of an official Sega Genesis controller for Nintendo Switch simmer, but it’s not until this exact moment — after seeing the back of the gamepad via a photo from SEGAbits — that the gravity of this situation has fully sunk in.

This new (optional) controller for playing Sega Genesis games on Nintendo Switch has an interesting pair of logos on its back. Enhance:

Nintendo Genesis pic.twitter.com/oKyz8oxTZT

— SEGAbits.com 💥 SEGA News (@SEGAbits) October 26, 2021

To players of a certain age who lived through the fiery ’90s magazine ads, commercials, and brand-defending schoolyard arguments, the novelty of seeing the Nintendo and Sega logos side-by-side on a legitimate Sega Genesis controller should be pretty potent.

In case you’ve stayed away from the whole Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack saga, this new controller for Nintendo Switch is on sale now for a steep $50. Unlike the equivalent N64 controllers for Switch, which tend to vanish from the shop as quickly as they appear, these Genesis gamepads are still in stock today. (Reminder: you need to be a paying subscriber to even have the ability to buy them from Nintendo.) I can’t justify the price for a three-button control pad (Japan got lucky with the six-button controller), but in a weird way, the amusing Nintendo x Sega logo synergy almost tempts me. Almost.

This is up there with one of my favorite “wait, what?” gaming headlines: Nintendo’s white PlayStation 4 debuts. (To say nothing of the actually real Nintendo PlayStation.)