Carts lasted ages longer than discs. Sure for some actually responsible adult player discs would probably have been better but for preteens fighting with their siblings on who’s turn it is and what will be played…?
(We once ruined a PS2 game because we had it upright and it fell and the disc took such a deep scratch it never worked past that point again. I still feel guilty and feel I missed out on HP2. And that was 5 years after we got a N64, so PS1 discs would’ve been even more at risk.)
The controller is weird by modern standards , yeah, but it wasn’t too weird at the time. It’s sort of like two controllers in one, a more classic form like the snes and the basic ps1 controller and a more modern one with a joystick with the middle-handle.
There was no weirdness at all using it when it came out. The “basic” model (think xbox controller) only came out a bit later.
But nowadays? Idk, I don’t have one, but we tried playing Goldeneye 64 with my brother and man the control schemes were all over the place and I couldn’t for the life of me get “in the groove” and we used to play 4 player deatmatch a ton for years and I was ace at it.