With the release of Sony's PlayStation 4 comes a new controller, the DualShock 4. Before the DualShock 4 reached its final design, Sony considered making it look like controllers from its biggest rival, Microsoft's Xbox.

Toshimasa Aoki, Sony Computer Entertainment manager of the product planning department, was given the job of creating the PS4 controller. Aoki considered changing the controller's signature look by changing the location of the analog sticks.

"For the analog sticks, we did test having the analog sticks on top, since the Xbox has the left side on top [above the D-pad]," Aoki said Monday in an interview with GamesBeat. "Especially from the shooter teams, we got feedback that that's what they wanted. They knew that consumers liked the 360 for shooters."

Sony played around with different analog stick locations. One option was to have the two analog sticks on the bottom, like current PlayStation controllers. Sony also tried putting one stick on the bottom and one top, like the Xbox 360, and even considered putting both sticks on the top of the controller like the Nintendo Wii U GamePad and Pro Controller.

"...we decided that it just wouldn't work," Aoki said. "People are used to having the buttons up there, and this moves the most-used button, the 'X,' so far away [from your right thumb]. If we moved the X up there, it just breaks all the muscle memory. The right hand mostly goes for both buttons and sticks, but the left hand stays on one or the other and usually doesn't switch around [between the left analog stick and the D-pad]. That's why it's okay to switch around the left side, but switching the right side really breaks the gamer's experience."

In the end, Aoki and his team decided to stick with the look that PlayStation gamers have grown to love.

"[The traditional analog stick placement] is kind of in our DNA," Aoki said. "The prototype team, myself, and also the management team really felt that having this look is the PlayStation look, and we had to keep that."

PS4 will be available in stores in North America for $399.99 on Nov. 15 and is available for pre-order now.