Valve releases Steam Controller CAD geometry so you can mod it | Hacker News Reader

Valve releases Steam Controller CAD geometry so you can mod it

pcgamer.com

215 pointsIvoah45 comments

They 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/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.

Do 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.

This 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?)

Valve actually said they would open the design right when they disclosed the controller project so it was kind of expected.

$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.

Call 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.

They 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?

Not 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

Maybe they don't, but its a huge win for some groups and tends to generate goodwill and news / hype if anyone does anything halfway interesting with it. Valve relies on user trust, there isn't much stopping anyone from using another distribution platform; people have to go out of their way to install steam instead of using the Windows store. Being the 'good guys' is a big part of their business model. I dont want ubisoft managing my DRM.

Also, Valve's highest grossing games are all originally user modifications.

For 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.

It 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...

Its 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.

I wanted to return mine. It was the worst controller I've ever used.

I stuck with it after hearing about other people having similar experiences and changing their minds and now I can't go back to using an Xbox controller.

Stardew Valley might not the best example as it was designed to work also with a gamepad. You control the mouse cursor with the right analog stick and the player with the left stick.

Ah, well. I've been playing a lot of it lately. Its the same with the steam controller except the touchpad is a really nice mouse.

The steam controller probably should still work well in scenerioes where a controller is intended. Admittedly, I don't think it's as good for third person games.

I pre-ordered it months before release but have been rather frustrated with being able to use it for anything replacing a right analog stick. It's been barely okay for turn based games like civilization but for something like bioshock infinite it feels woefully inaccurate and difficult to get the feel, even after 2 weeks of solid use (including scores of steam link crashes)

If you're using GNU/Linux, it could be a problem with the nvidia drivers. Mine constantly crashed due to a bug with nvidia-358, updating to 361 fixed it and now I don't think its crashed since.

I bought mine on a lark to play with Street Fighter V, and it's surprisingly good for that use case.

None of my fight pads were XInput and I was a little lazy about setting up an XInput wrapper to get them to work.

The left touch d-pad is quite good for quarter and half circle motions, and dragon punches are pretty easy to pull off.

I also experimented with the right pad as buttons. It was pretty good, but where it fell short is that the right pad, unlike the left pad, doesn't offer any tactile cues as to where your fingers are.

Indeed, I don't think it's going to be a replacement for serious competitive gaming e.g. dedicated arcade sticks for Street Fighter (though I'm very intrigued at the people trying to use a combination of the touchpad and the accelerometer for rapid accurate aiming in FPS games), but for casual gaming it could comfortably work with 95% of the games out there, even in command-heavy games like Civ and XCOM.

It works fine for stuff like Civ and XCOM. Part of it is the experience though. XCOM is pretty easy to watch and doesn't have many complicated menus (there are menues, but they aren't too bad). It's probably a good fit! Civ is similar.

Cities Skylines has tons of menus, sliders, charts, tiny checkboxes, small details to attend to and is generally uninteresting for onlookers most of the time. Even if you're just being creative without all the micromanaging, a controller still feels more like an inferior tool that stands in the way of your designs. It's just not comfortable to sit back, relax and build the perfect city. That game is much better suited to play alone at your desk with a mouse and keyboard.

Edit: sorry wrong person, but it still works as a response, so I'm leaving it. I've been awake too long.

There are definitely better options for serious competitive gamers. I have a small collection of arcade sticks and six-button fight pads, but I like messing around with new stuff too.

I can't say that I was any better using the Steam controller (not that I'm any good to start with, but that's another story), but the real story I guess is that I wasn't much worse either.

I've seen some demos where people used the accelerometer to play Street Fighter (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D0YGzURzThY) which could open up the game to some people with physical limitations. I'm a fan of anything that gets more people into playing games.

That the Steam Controller is more customizable than a lot of controllers to me is its biggest strength. And now, with the ability to 3d print mods, I think it's even better.

Can you use it with non-Steam games?

Yes, but Steam may need to be running

That sucks then.

The sounds that play when starting and turning off the controller are emitted by the haptic engines in the pads! It's pretty crazy they have so much control over feedback they can reproduce music.

This 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.

Same 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.

The Steam Controller isn't for VR. You're thinking of the Vive controllers.

When 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.

I'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.

Interesting. What about firmware and the protocol? Will they open source / document it too?

The valve controller seriously needs this, the driver/steam integration is badly broken. I'm pretty sure the open source community can do better.

Is 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 but, eventually, an extended size battery and a cover for it.

A handful of companies have done this, including Dyson.

Everyone is pretty concerns about the IP of their physical designs... it's their main asset.

It would be pretty rad if you could get controller cases custom printed to fit your hands.

Youve identified a garage 3D printing startup

Yeah, that reminds me of this company https://formygrips.com/

Sounds 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).

I 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.

If 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.

We're getting there: http://www.shapeways.com/blog/archives/24028-the-art-of-engi...

direct source: http://steamcommunity.com/games/353370/announcements

article doesn't really add anything

So now someone can make a back panel that has a slot for the USB dongle ?

YES 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.

Half-Life 3 confirmed

... No wait

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