Gary Kitchen Game Maker Question.. Did the cover joystick exist?

[imstarryeyed]

Greetings I was looking at my copy of Gary Kitchen's Game Maker this weekend and saw the iconic hand holding a red joystick with a metal shaft and yellow fire button.

 

Does anyone know if this joystick actually existed?  It looks like an interesting joystick but I could not find any information on it on Google or the internet after about 2 hours of searching.

 

I want to think it was a real product sold at one time from a distant memory but it's so stylish (my opinion) I would not be at all surprised if it was just a mock up for photos.

 

It definitely has the red color and top white button a Wico joystick would have back in the day.

 

Since Apple joysticks were analog I can totally see this joystick being an analog.

 

While the joystick was tiny on the front cover I figured it was to illustrate the whole "you are the creator" type thing.

 

 

Here are a few pix to help show what I am talking about.

 

 

 

It would be interesting to find it if this actually was a joystick back in the day as I would love to own one!

 

I owned a C64 back in the day but I know it was available for Apple as well so I am posting here and I also posted in the 8 bit Commodore forum as well.

 

 

Thank you!

[BassGuitari]

I'm confident it's just an illustration or mockup. I've been hunting Apple joysticks off and on for at least a decade (I try to collect really early, funky ones), but I've never run into anything like this. And I've been collecting Atari/Commodore controllers even longer--no dice in that scene, either. (And if it isn't mentioned here, it probably doesn't exist, at least not in digital form.) 

 

It's probably just as well. With a stick that ridiculously long (what on Earth would anybody need that kind of leverage for?), it would handle terribly unless the base was heavily weighted and the action was tighter than a TAC-2.

[imstarryeyed]

You are most likely spot on BassGuitari, I too have been looking at Apple sticks since the early 80s along with Atari / Commodore ones but have not come across anything like this as well.

 

It would be a neat stick to use as a top of a gamer trophy for a competition as I personally think it is quite attractive, but maybe no so useful.. haha..