I think most people are roasting their choice of game controller. The cheapo Logitech model. Plus if they wanted simple and reliable I would think a wired version would be better, not the wireless model. The military is all the time using them for controlling UAVs and stuff in the field. Nobody really pokes fun because it doesn't look like the cheap controller you'd hand off to "player 2".

Maybe, but wired is simpler then wireless and it sounds like everything was done on the cheapest possible route. It's likely the controller, which was for the camera control(?) had nothing to do with the failure, but does shed some light into the design philosophy.