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Valve releases Steam Controller CAD geometry so you can mod it
- santaclaus 11y agoIt would be pretty rad if you could get controller cases custom printed to fit your hands.
- samstave 11y agoYouve identified a garage 3D printing startup
- wallmani 11y agoYeah, that reminds me of this company https://formygrips.com/ https://formygrips.com/
- criley2 11y agoSounds like my dream industry where a fully automated tailoring machine was combined with body scanning. So you could, once a year or whenever, get a scan and have your body in the system, and from there, be able to a) shop online seeing clothes rendered on your body type b) with enough maturity for the system, have the ability to have your favorite styles created in your favorite fabrics on-demand, ready to pick up at a local store which keeps the tailor machine and spools of material handy (with more a delivery away).
- jessaustin 11y agoI guess there's a race on, between this vision of clothing tech and that of the film of coordinated nanobots that can instantly reconfigure to form any desired clothing. Gain a little weight? Just pour on a teaspoon more nanobots.
- the8472 11y agoIf you really want to dream, throw 3d-weaving into that process to make things actually fit your form instead of flat, sewn-together patches stretching over you.
- seanp2k2 11y agoWe're getting there: http://www.shapeways.com/blog/archives/24028-the-art-of-engineering-a-3d-printed-petal-dress-by-nervous-system.html http://www.shapeways.com/blog/archives/24028-the-art-of-engi...
- sixers2329 11y agoThis is actually really awesome- one of my biggest complaints with the steam controller was how the build quality of it felt a little "cheap" (i.e. light & plastic-y when compared to an xbox controller). The technology inside the controller is superb, and I think they had to sacrifice a little on build quality to bring it down to that ~50$ price range. Very interested to see what kind of crazy improvements the community develops.
- paulgerhardt 11y agoSame designer made the Xbox controller as the Steam one. Lightness was a design goal not a shortfall for the team. Reasoning was that VR is the future, the less fatigue the better.
- spb 11y agoThe Steam Controller isn't for VR. You're thinking of the Vive controllers.
- timdeneau 11y agoWhen I tried the 30min demo, it felt about right, meaning that I didn’t notice any fatigue holding the controllers. Which is valuable when you’re moving around much more actively, compared to a traditional controller cradled between your knees.
- seanp2k2 11y agoI'd love to see something like the Xbox Elite controller, where it's a almost-no-expense-spared version for $100-200 with much higher build quality and materials.
- shmerl 11y agoInteresting. What about firmware and the protocol? Will they open source / document it too?
- mlkmt 11y agoThe valve controller seriously needs this, the driver/steam integration is badly broken. I'm pretty sure the open source community can do better.
- mc42 11y agoThis is actually, a pretty big step forward in my opinion. It makes it feel, for the first time (to me at least), that the company is replying to the feedback of the customers. They know that people want to mod it, and rather than force them to use arcane methods to hack the current controller into their desired one, they can simply alter it digitally. As an aside, I'd love to see a full-metal case for it, only using plastic when needed (the buttons and touchpads?)
- ekianjo 11y agoValve actually said they would open the design right when they disclosed the controller project so it was kind of expected.
- kefka 11y ago$Companies have a tendency to say what will get them the sale, or even include features initially... and then fail to come through with their promises. So it is a breath of fresh air to see this happen.
- BoysenberryPi 11y agoCall me crazy but I can't help but think that the large majority of Valve's customers don't care whether the design is open or not.
- seanp2k2 11y agoThey probably don't, but they probably had some people internally pushing for this, and seeing how it likely wouldn't cost them much but had the potential to generate a lot of good will and potentially increase demand for their product. Why would they not do it?
- radiorental 11y agoNot that it's much of hinderance these days but it will make the knock-offs easier and quicker to produce, and of a higher quality. I know the controllers are assembled in the US[1], don't know if the injection molding is too. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCgnWqoP4MM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCgnWqoP4MM
- jamessteininger 11y agoThey did the same for the Steam VR motion controllers. We call them the doughnut sticks for fun at the office, but they are really incredible to use. It was a huge blessing for us that Valve included the exact model for us to modify and reskin, because having 1-1 mapping of what you're seeing in the simulation and what you're actually feeling is huge. We did the same with the PlaystationVR Move controllers, which you can see in an image here: https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TNDizq2W4eY/VvMWu0mcx_I/AAAAAAAALXs/trhSiLitB78s-bHKGkn85m-9KD29NPeIA/s1600/XING%2BMove%2BBeach%2B2.jpg https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TNDizq2W4eY/VvMWu0mcx_I/AAAAAAAAL... This is just a simple material change for now, but we plan on doing design modifications to the mesh data eventually. Likely we would only change the geometry of areas the hands don't touch, like the tracking sphere, so as to keep the player visual/haptic continuity.
- Impossible 11y agoDo you have a link to the location of the CAD files for the Vive controllers, or are you talking about OpenVR render models that are obj format and, afaik, not suitable for 3D printing custom, real world, hardware.
- kibwen 11y agoFor those who haven't gotten their hands on a Steam controller yet, I was very impressed. The software is still quite immature (par for Valve), but the haptic feedback in the hardware is immensely cool and the potential configurability is insane. It really is a great middle-ground between mouse+keyboard and traditional gamepads.
- douche 11y agoIt is a pretty excellent controller. It's kind of amazing how many keyboard/mouse only games you can comfortably with a little tweaking of the keybindings. I haven't tried using it directly with my computer, just for couch gaming with my TV and Steam Link. The Steam Link is also pretty cool, but has some serious issues with crashing Steam on my PC - not sure whether it is the Link itself, or Big Picture mode, but it is super irritating to have to get up and go restart Steam in the other room when it craps out in the middle of a game. The Wake-On-LAN feature has never worked for me...
- Joof 11y agoIts hard to convince people of the utility though. It also has a pretty large ramp-up time. A friend of mine keeps trying mine out on stuff like cities skylines and determining it's no good. Its somewhat unsurprising, skylines is a very work-table feeling game; replacing a mouse would feel really weird (and take a while to really feel decent). For me it clicked demoing DOOM mods; it felt great on the controller and I could throw it up on my TV. Stardew Valley feels pretty good too and while you can play RTS games with it (control groups on the left pad), it won't compare with a mouse anytime soon.
- dkhenry 11y agoSo now someone can make a back panel that has a slot for the USB dongle ?
- michaelbuddy 11y agoYES thank you. Or at least some kind of magnetic connection that's reliable, even if a partial indentation and that would support a fairly strong magnet.
- tetrep 11y agodirect source: http://steamcommunity.com/games/353370/announcements http://steamcommunity.com/games/353370/announcements article doesn't really add anything
- listic 11y agoIs this a first when consumer product company releases CAD geometry for their parts? Suppose I would like to produce a modified replacement plastic part for my phone; how much would that cost? For starters, a different color interchangeable panel for a phone with interchangeable panel, such as Lumia 435 or Xperia U http://www.gsmarena.com/sony_xperia_u-4437.php http://www.gsmarena.com/sony_xperia_u-4437.php but, eventually, an extended size battery and a cover for it.
- fudged71 11y agoA handful of companies have done this, including Dyson. Everyone is pretty concerns about the IP of their physical designs... it's their main asset.
- unixhero 11y agoHalf-Life 3 confirmed ... No wait