The ability to unplug the cable from the Saturn 3D Control Pad sent the imagination of fans on a rollercoaster for many years. Former SEGA hardware developer Kenji Tosaki spoke to SHIRO! in 2022 about ideas they had for creating peripherals for that cable slot. This includes an accelerometer for gyro controls and even a light gun attachment — all unreleased.
Strides are now being made with wireless Bluetooth controllers and adapters for retro console hardware. This includes a wireless standard Saturn pad and an alternative with dual sticks. It left some tinkerers wondering if these micro-sized components could be used to make a wireless adapter for the 3D Control Pad.
Now this idea is within a stone’s throw of hitting online shelves. Humble Bazooka spent the past few years refining the idea, going through several designs and shell molds. Dave from Humble Bazooka told SHIRO! that he is now “90 to 95% finished.”
“What’s left is basically fine tuning, testing and manufacturing,” he said. “It’s hard to estimate a release date at the moment but I’d like to have it shipped to resellers by the end of Q1 2025.”
The above photo shows one of the more recent models of the adapter. It is encased in a shell that becomes flush with the back of the controller when plugged in. Just a small amount juts from the bottom for its battery and accompanying components within.
The newest prototype weighs about 33 grams, compared to the 3D Control Pad wired plug that clocks in at roughly 22 grams. This is down from the first prototype by Humble Bazooka, which weighed about 45 grams.
“I haven’t done a full battery life test but it’s going to have an 850 mAh battery,” Dave said. “The estimate based on that and power consumption is around 6.5 hours, so pretty similar to a DualSense (the controller used for the PlayStation 5.)”
Dave started tinkering with these projects a few years ago when he saw a need to convert the more niche retro controllers to wireless solutions. His first two projects, dating back to 2022, were BlueRetro adapters for Neo Geo and PC Engine controllers.
“These projects all use a great open source library called ‘ESP32-BLE-Gamepad,’ by LemmingDev,” he told SHIRO! “Basically, this library allows you to create Bluetooth controllers out of simple button presses. That’s an oversimplification since the library is capable of a lot more.”
“During my development of these two projects, I ran into various issues with the BLE-Gamepad library, so I frequented the ‘issues’ tab on the librarian’s GitHub fairly often,” Dave added. “If I remember correctly, that’s where I saw GamingNJncos posting some great issue reports, which led me to reach out to him via Twitter and then Discord. From there we really hit it off.”
Readers may remember our coverage of the 3D Control Pad wireless adapter GamingNJncos worked on. At the time, their goal was to release as much information about its development as possible. Significant progress was made over the course of several months, and the detailed status reports proved helpful when Dave of Humble Bazooka adopted this idea.
“At some point in 2022, GamingNJncos showed me his own BLE-Gamepad project for the Saturn 3D Pad (BLE-3D) and expressed interest in getting it to market,” Dave said. “BLE-3D is a really amazing project on its own but it’s very DIY and relied on off the shell parts from AdaFruit. Don’t take that as a negative, it was just clear a lot of work needed to be done if I was going to fork the project and turn it into a product. It also didn’t initially work with my BlueRetro Saturn adapter, which was a must.”
Putting some other projects on hold, Dave got to work on a fork of “BLE-3D” in the middle of 2022. SHIRO! covered this development process at the time. Dave said it was a year spent enduring lots of trial and error with game compatibility.
“There was one hellish week where we were having issues with the triggers, me and GamingNJncos were actively testing each other’s code and passing info back and forth via Discord,” Dave said. “Only for me to find out that the bug wasn’t with our code but a bug in BlueRetro. With the help of the BlueRetro creator (DarthCloud64) I was able to get this fixed in a future BlueRetro Firmware update. After that, everything was mostly golden with BlueRetro.”
Dave said he has experience working as both a designer and front end developer since the early 2000s. He thinks designing shells is one of the most fun aspects of the job. While fleshing out the boards for this adapter, he at one point created a shell based on the Dreamcast VMU.
At the end of 2022, Dave took a break to focus on other Humble Bazooka projects, his full-time job, and aspects of real life. In 2024, he decided it was time to finish the the 3D Control Pad adapter.
“The gap in development time was actually a really good thing because I was able to look at the whole project with fresh eyes,” he said. “I sat down and wrote up a plan for features, branding, and design. I threw out a ton of my original code and refactored what was left. I designed an efficient power circuit that not only toggles the adapter on and off with a single tactile button but also completely shuts off the ESP32 so it won’t draw power when it’s off. I reworked my sleep system so if you leave the device alone for two minutes, it completely shuts off, extending the battery life when the adapter is sitting around.”
“I finalized the name (BLE Shift) and designed the branding,” Dave added. “I iterated on the shell design for the best fit while also maximizing battery size for longer usage. I did a lot of shell designs…”
As Dave enters the final phases of this yearslong project, he hopes to get this product to online resellers sometime in early 2025. At long last, the mysterious port at the back of the 3D Control Pad is being put to use.
“It was a ton of work in a compressed amount of time but also very focused work.”
Kenji Tosaki himself took note of the project on Twitter right after Humble Bazooka posted the announcement. It roughly translates to, “By removing the cable from the base and allowing something to be attached to it, it seems to be good material to get the creative juices flowing. I’m glad I left it so it could come off.”
Perhaps someone should send the finalized adapter to Mr. Tosaki after it is complete.
To follow Humble Bazooka and their products, check out their website. Humble Bazooka is also active on BlueSky and Twitter (the platform currently known as X).
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