When I was a kid, there was this device called the Activator that Sega distributed. It was meant to be used for fighting games like Street Fighter and Mortal Kombat, but the concept and tech was so rudimentary that it required the player to unnecessarily pretend and suspend disbelief by mimicking the fighting moves; the novelty of that wore off almost immediately, as you can imagine. There was some sensor at the edge of a box that you stood in, and if your limb crossed it, it would activated a button press - so all you would do is just throw your stupid ass arm across the censor to throw out a kick, punch, jump, etc.
My parents bought me a game like once a year, and if I could scrounge up enough money, I'd spend it on either buying games or renting them. Needless to say, if I owned a game, I'd have to play it a million times and savor it. Anyway, some of the most fun I'd had growing up was trying to beat games using The Activator with friends that we'd played and beat a hundred times using conventional controllers. I vividly remember laughing my ass off and having tons of fun for hours playing the Road Rash games and Sonic Spinball on The Activator with all my buddies.
I think the concept of those frustratingly-fun physics games like QWOP, Getting Over It, OctoDad, etc tapped into that sort of thing. Maybe even Nights with that big stupid controller. There's something really fun about taking some cumbersome, hard to control shit and mastering it.
BRING BACK THE ACTIVATOR
