Games By Russell Holly Apr. 12, 2014 10:01 am
If you’re the type that digs arcade controllers, chances are you have a very specific configuration that you appreciate. One route to consider is a DIY bluetooth setup where you mount your own joystick and button setup, leaving the base of your controller entirely up to you.
After completing an entirely different DIY project, Dustin Evans found himself with a few Xbox 360 casings lying around. He ripped all of the remaining hardware out of these boxes and found that what remained was a decent sized box to mount just about anything in. The sturdy design of the 360, which is also just about the perfect shape and size for an arcade controller, seems like an obvious choice when you see it all disassembled like that. With a little bit of measuring to determine spacing that agreed with his hands, and the right parts, Evans was able to make his arcade controller.
The design for the controller itself is simple enough that the folks at Adafruit Industries have a step-by-step tutorial for making one yourself. Naturally, the parts are also available on Adafruit’s retail section. The Adafruit tutorial only has three buttons for their setup, but any BlazBlue or Street Fighter fan will tell you that sometimes three is not even close to enough. Because it’s Bluetooth, you should be able to pair it with ease to anything from a smartphone to an Amazon Fire TV, and have everything work well out of the box. Although, since you have all that space under the controller, maybe someone will get crazy and mount a display to make this rig more like a portable arcade system.
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After completing an entirely different DIY project, Dustin Evans found himself with a few Xbox 360 casings lying around. He ripped all of the remaining hardware out of these boxes and found that what remained was a decent sized box to mount just about anything in. The sturdy design of the 360, which is also just about the perfect shape and size for an arcade controller, seems like an obvious choice when you see it all disassembled like that. With a little bit of measuring to determine spacing that agreed with his hands, and the right parts, Evans was able to make his arcade controller.
The design for the controller itself is simple enough that the folks at Adafruit Industries have a step-by-step tutorial for making one yourself. Naturally, the parts are also available on Adafruit’s retail section. The Adafruit tutorial only has three buttons for their setup, but any BlazBlue or Street Fighter fan will tell you that sometimes three is not even close to enough. Because it’s Bluetooth, you should be able to pair it with ease to anything from a smartphone to an Amazon Fire TV, and have everything work well out of the box. Although, since you have all that space under the controller, maybe someone will get crazy and mount a display to make this rig more like a portable arcade system.
More...
