Nintendo UK’s big cheese, the ever jovial David Yarnton, has branded Sony a copycat – both for its latest move in introducing a motion sensing joystick for PS3, as well as for copying with the PS2 rumble feature in the past.

Speaking to MCV after Sony’s unveiling of the PS3 controller, Yarnton told them: “I’d love to dig up some old Phil Harrison comments and say ‘Hang on a second – six months ago when we launched our controller you said one thing, and now why are you doing this?' I don’t know what their decision making process is but I think if you look back, any innovation that has come in gameplay has come from us.”

While it doesn’t really come as a surprise that Nintendo is taking this stance, it should be made clear that Sony’s motion sensing controller is somewhat different and less ambitious than Nintendo’s Wii control system, as we pointed out earlier this week.

Yarnton also went on to attack Sony for the shameful lack of rumble technology in the PS3 pad, suggesting that the omission was not down to technological conflicts with the gyroscopic feature, but rather down to patenting issues.

“Historically we’re always developing new things. We know Sony have had a lot of issues with their rumble feature and they’ve had to withdraw it – because they didn’t innovate, they copied. With Nintendo, I’m trying to think of anything we’ve copied... but I can’t.”

Can anyone else think of anything Nintendo has ever copied? If you can, let us know right below these words in the forum.