Microsoft Surface Used as a Big Games Controller

Hands-on gaming.

Touchscreen gaming, like it or not, is soon going to be huge. Some would say that gaming on touchscreens is already big and here, and not in the way of the Nintendo DS, but the iPod touch, iPhone and all the Android phones that rely entirely on the touch screen for input.

What, then, will become of the control interfaces for more hardware games that require a controller or mouse and keyboard? Nobody knows yet, but University of Massachusetts Lowell Robotics Lab student Eric McCann seems to have an early idea of what it could be like.

Using Microsoft's experimental Surface table experiment, McCann hacked together a controller interface that uses both hands on the screen to control Microsoft Flight Simulator as well as Valve Software's Portal.

While it's not a perfect solution since your hands are still covering screen real estate, it's still a fascinating exercise that could point to how we someday may play hardcore games.

Check out the video demo below:

Microsoft Surface Used as a Big Games Controller

_{(via Kotaku.)}

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joneb , September 18, 2010 7:38 PM

I come up with common sense queries unlike the "rosy colord glasses" people or the "sound movies wont catch on" kind of people. Bending over the table is not as comfortable as reclining in a chair full stop. It doesnt take brain power to work out one puts stress on the body and the other helps take it off. If the screen is to also becomes the controller with hands placed over it there wil be loss of screen real estate. If you can conrol the action on screen without touching it, like from sitting back relaxed that is obviously going to be what people want whenever possible unless they want to play an energetic game or maybe using a work / utility type application.

I remember little over 8 or so months ago when people were still laughing at the idea of a tablet over a laptop and I saw there were some good applications for it and look how tablets have taken off.
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jamie_macdonald , September 17, 2010 9:13 PM

This is showing use of a virtual controller (existing style controller) on a touch device ...so like virtual joypads,

It's a tech example, of course flicking the actual switches would be better like you can with the mouse on flight sim ...it's purely a tech example and not a game release ...so dont look too much into anything but the concept (or you'll drive yourself mad )

I would be pretty certain that MS FS 2030 with a touch PC and a billion odd cores doing ray tracing will have proper switches right? hehe
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tinnerdxp , September 17, 2010 9:09 PM

agree with ^^^ But... I have to admit this kind of input makes sort of sense for Flight Simulator... What strikes me though is why the guy did not "touch" any of the instruments directly - It just feels intuitive to do - right?