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A Simple DIY Game Controller For People With Physical Challenges
capedgirardeau writes "Caleb Kraft of the well-known Hack-A-Day site noticed that game controllers and alternate keyboards for people with physical challenges were very expensive. Simple switches for buttons that could be made for a few dollars were running $60 or $70 apiece. Working with a young man he knew who loves gaming and has muscular dystrophy, Caleb created a do-it-yourself controller for people with physical challenges using a 3-D printer, a super-cheap micro-controller board and some simple keyboard emulation software. He is freely releasing all the 3-D printer files and tutorials to make his and other controllers on a new site, The Controller Project. He also encourages people to check out The AbleGamers Foundation"
I hear good things from Ocean Marketing about the Avenger controller for disabled players. They will also wwebsite as on the internet, which will be tough to compete with.
http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/events/paul-christoforo-ocean-marketing-emails
What doesn't kill you only delays the inevitable
Things like this is where 3D printing will be truly revolutionary. Many niche products are expensive because making them the traditional way requires a large amount of money to be put into making the initial molds and such, and although the price per unit when you're dealing with hundreds or thousands of units would be very cheap, they're cost-prohibitive in smaller runs.
Customization will be the killer feature of the future.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
I love the Drake Project work... ...and it's not unrelated :O)
http://www.drakemusic.org/showcase
Of course, all this depends on a platform capable of using third-party controllers. Xbox 360 used cryptography to lock out unlicensed controllers, and to my knowledge, Microsoft never licensed a third-party wireless controller for the Xbox 360. I've read rumors on the Internets that Xbox One will continue this policy and may end up not having third-party controllers at all.
Not necessarily. They might have been born that way.
For example, did your parents drop you on your head? Or were you born an asshole?
Royalties for connecting your controller to a particular gaming platform can also be "cost-prohibitive in smaller runs."
When I saw "people with physical challenges", I thought of "people with marathons to run" or "people with bars to jump over with a long pole".
Ezekiel 23:20
I knew a girl born with an arm that ended just below the elbow, yet she was one of the deadliest Counterstrike players I ever saw. When I first saw her setup, she was using a large trackball in place of a mouse, as that was easy enough to operate without using her one hand -- except for the buttons. For that she had a SECOND trackball unit that had failed -- it didn't track any more so she had taken the ball out of it entirely and just used the buttons by putting it on the floor and pressing them with her toes.
Eventually I was able to rehabilitate the "dead" trackball unit (it was just really, really dirty more than anything) and made a switchboard more suitable for use by feet, with the usual left and right buttons, and a pair in the middle that acted like the scroll wheel. No longer did she have to take off her shoes to use them, nor sit in any particular posture. Though being able to feel the buttons was helpful for scrolling, socks or thin moccasins were now acceptable where they pretty much weren't before. Her dad didn't want me to tear up the new trackball so I hooked the switchboard up to the old one and she just kept them both attached like before, though it was no longer necessary to keep it under the desk.
A few months later, her brother spilled a drink on the modified trackball and managed to gum it up pretty good, so I had to move the switchboard port over to the new trackball. It was proven to her dad's satisfaction by that point though, so he was fine with that. To this day I suspect the little brother was just tired of always losing. I played hockey with him and he didn't handle losing very gracefully. (To be honest, neither did anyone else in that family.)
Anyhow, my first step in fitting someone up for custom hardware would be to see what off-the-shelf commodity hardware comes close to what they need, and tweak it as necessary from there. Also consider using limbs or input methods not normally used to operate a computer, such as pedals or a breath controller.
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
For the combination of alturism, creativity, neat use of cool tech and of course helping fellow gamers. :)
"Xbox 360 Turbo Fire 2 Wireless Controller with Rumble by Datel" doesn't look licensed. Datel has a history of cracking cryptographic lockouts to produce its products. I wonder how long it'll take for Microsoft to file the ITC complaint. I get the impression from TBONE1207's one-star review that Microsoft might have already updated the Xbox 360 firmware to refuse to recognize this controller.
Not necessarily. They might have been born that way.
Still ... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o25I2fzFGoY
When I saw "people with physical challenges", I thought of "people with marathons to run"
And now that you point that out, I can't look at that without thinking of Nickelodeon's game show Double Dare .
Host: "What's the capital of Kentucky?"
Team 1: "Dare"
Host: "Now worth 20, or you can double dare them back. What's the capital of Kentucky?"
Team 2: "Double dare"
Host: "Now worth 40. What's the capital of Kentucky? You can answer or take a physical challenge."
Team 1: "Physical challenge"
Host: "The answer is Frankfort." (goes on to describe something sloppy that Team 1 must do in 30 seconds)
Caleb created a do-it-yourself controller for people with physical challenges using a 3-D printer
How durable are the 3D printed parts?
Is this commercial or hobbyist grade custom 3D printing?
What are the recommended standards for similar assistive technologies?
Size of the buttons. The maximum pressure or minimum resistance required and so on.
If you are going to take on a project like this, why aren't you talking to the medical and social service agencies who work with the disabled? That could lead to a generalized solution and not a one-off for a single patient at single stage of his disease.
Isn't that the problem in the first place, that they cannot do anything for themselves?
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
...and it was covered by Hack A Day over two years ago.
http://hackaday.com/2011/06/14/man-spends-30-years-helping-disabled-gamers/
This guy is just making piss poor quality printables and is trying to compare them to well engineered custom controllers while preaching from a very tiny soap box and utilizing other people's existing ideas.
It's great that he is out to help disabled people increase their quality of life... but comparing these poorly / cheaply engineered devices to the likes of what Ben Heck engineers is just a joke.
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