In 1978, the first home consoles became available. The Atari 2600 was released with a virtual arcade replica controller. This was a simple joystick with the one action button for, you guessed it, actions. It was used for jumping, firing, accelerating, etc. The machine, stunning to the eyes of players (at that time, anyway), was very basic and unable to undertake complicated tasks.

It's what can be perceived as a Domino effect. Games were limited by what the machine could do and controllers were limited by what games could do. This meant that when new machines were introduced, new, more powerful software could be made, requiring more complex control systems. Evolution and growth as a whole was slow at first, since capital was low due to the industry having more of a cult following. It was only when the big players began to flex their muscles that evolution began. In 1982, a Japanese card manufacturer moved into the console industry and released the Famicom (or Nes in the UK). Nintendo were about to revolutionise the entire industry in multiple forms. Games such as Super Mario Bros, Donkey Kong and Metroid entranced a generation of Japanese kids and squeezed their parents' wallets dry.

The basic Nintendo control pad brought in the new A, B button design which Mario (with his run, jump and shoot abilities) could not have been without. You may think the second action button wasn't important but it doubled the number of actions that could be performed - pass and shoot in football games, use weapon and utility item in RPGs, run and jump in platform games. Also, the Nintendo had START and SELECT buttons, so pauses were easy to execute and menus easy to navigate.

Nintendo set the standard for console controllers, and although Sega released the Master System (again with two buttons) and then the Mega Drive with three buttons. The Mega Drive was the first 16bit machine. Games had the potential to be twice as powerful as the NES but the controller wasn't in synch. Many gamers, although enjoying Sonic, believed the experience was shallow, possibly due to the blue hedgehog not having enough actions.