How video game controllers got a lot more accessible

In the final chapter of our Vergecast “creators series,” Alex Cranz talks with Ben Heck, who has been modding game systems and controllers since the early 2000s, which led to his project creating single-handed video game controllers. Alex also talks with Bryce Johnson, who is one of the inventors of the Xbox Adaptive Controller, the game controller designed for gamers with limited mobility. Relevant links: BenHeck.com One-handed DualSense (video) Design A 3D Printed Controller Modification For accessibility! (video) One Handed PS4 Controller - Accessible Controller by Evil (video) Microsoft announces Xbox Adaptive Controller for players with disabilities Microsoft’s Adaptive Accessories are designed to be customizable inputs Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by On Investing, an original podcast from Charles Schwab. Each week, hosts Lizanne Saunders, Schwab's Chief Investment Strategist, and Colin Martin, Head of Fixed Income Research and Strategy for the Schwab Center for Financial Research, bring you fresh insights on what's happening in the markets and why, and what the implications might be for your portfolio. Join Colin and Lizanne as they explore questions like, how do you evaluate corporate bonds that look interesting? And what sectors are on the move right now? Download the latest episode and subscribe at schwab.com/oninvesting, or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 0:45Nilay Patel?

  Hey everybody, it's Neely. We've got another special episode of our Vergecast Creator Series coming up. What's up, Alex?

• 0:52Alex Cranz?

  A lot. We're going to talk about controllers today.

• 0:55Nilay Patel?

  Controllers. So this is the third episode.

• 0:58Alex Cranz?

  Yes.

• 0:58Nilay Patel?

  You did keyboards.

• 1:00Alex Cranz?

  We did keyboards.

• 1:01Nilay Patel?

  You did trackpals.

• 1:02Alex Cranz?

  We did ploopy.

• 1:03Nilay Patel?

  You did ploopy.

• 1:04Alex Cranz?

  We talked about ploopy.

• 1:05Nilay Patel?

  Today's controllers. What do you mean about controllers?

• 1:07Alex Cranz?

  Well, I think the thing was, for this final episode, we really wanted to talk about a gadget where all the tinkerers, all the people making these things, actually for once, had a really big win. And these bigger companies really finally started to pay attention. And that led us to controllers, because right now, most of them aren't really accessible, unless you have like, two hands with really solid dexterity. And a lot of people have spent a lot of time modding those to make them more accessible for other members of the gaming community.

• 1:35Nilay Patel?

  What specifically do you mean by accessible?

• 1:38Alex Cranz?

  I think that means like, controllers that you can use with one hand, or a foot, or like, putting all the joysticks on one side. There's even mods for people with different levels of motor control. And so, that kind of led me to this one guy who's been doing this for 20 years, and that's Ben Heck.

• 1:53Nilay Patel?

  So it's funny, I know Ben. Ben is from Wisconsin, Los of Madison.

• 1:57Alex Cranz?

  Okay.

• 1:57Nilay Patel?

  In my ancient vlogging history, we would always cover every Ben Heck mod. I've actually been out to Madison to see Ben before. That's amazing.

• 2:05Alex Cranz?

  Yeah, and he was, he was a lot of fun to talk to about video game controllers. But you know, this is also a success story. And so the other half of this is we really wanted to talk to one of these big companies. And we ended up talking with Bryce Johnson, who is one of the creators of Microsoft's adaptive controller for the Xbox.

• 2:23Nilay Patel?

  That adaptive controller is a big win. People love it. One of the things that I think about all the time is people love the adaptive controller, even if they do have two hands and dexterity, because it's just a, it's a cool controller. It's great. And making things accessible makes them better for everybody. So I am very excited for this episode. Take it away, Alex.

• 2:41Alex Cranz?

  A lot of the times when I hear game control mods, I think of people cheating at Call of Duty by adding special triggers.

• 2:48Speaker 03

  With this modded controller and the rapid fire mods, it completely transforms this gun.

• 2:53Alex Cranz?

  Or I think of like that video of teen Timothy Chalamet painting an Xbox controller. Here's Red Tiger. Started it today, oh, yesterday, finished it today. It looks nice. It looks sexy. And yeah, some of the controller modding is focused on cheating the system or just being unique. But a lot of the people out there modding controllers are doing it for a much cooler reason, increasing the accessibility of playing video games.

• 3:17Speaker 04

  My name is Akaki and this is my one-handed DualSense controller.

• 3:21Speaker 05

  This video will review our PlayStation 4 right-handed controller for our accessible gaming division.

• 3:26Speaker 06

  It's a hobby. I build and design custom game controllers for people with physical disabilities.

• 3:32Alex Cranz?

  Video games have a very well documented accessibility problem, but that's starting to change. And it's not because exact set gaming companies have suddenly changed their minds. It's because of the community being vocal and demanding changes. And when that fails, implementing their own.

• 3:50Alex Cranz?

  That's what led me to Ben Heck.

• 3:52Speaker 07

  Hello, I'm Benjamin J. Heckendorf. Online, I go by Ben Heck. I have a website, Benheck.com. I am a self-taught electrical engineer, and I've been doing video game-related modding and customized consoles, controllers, et cetera, since the year 2000.

• 4:07Alex Cranz?

  He was one of the first modders to really embrace building communities online, back before social media was even a term in most of our vernacular. I knew if I was going to talk to anyone about how this area has transformed, and what it takes to do it, it had to be Ben. So here's my conversation with Ben.

• 4:30Alex Cranz?

  What was your first controller that you modded?

• 4:32Speaker 07

  Well, I started out modifying old game systems.

• 4:36Alex Cranz?

  Okay.

• 4:37Speaker 07

  The Atari 2600 from back in the 70s, or like 1980. I found one of those in like a junk drawer, and I was like, I think I could make this portable. This was back in 2000. And so I hacked it all up, and I made it into like a somewhat compact unit. A grand total of 57 wires, nine switches, three potentiometers, three resistors, two capacitors, and one voltage regulator have to be hand-connected to build a VCSP. I had a GeoCities website. I put it on there, and then a gaming, I think it was ClassicGaming.com, put a link to it, and then apparently I became sort of internet-famous back then.

• 5:10Alex Cranz?

  I mean, that was before YouTube, social media even.

• 5:14Speaker 07

  Yeah, that was 22 years ago.

• 5:16Alex Cranz?

  So you've been doing it ever since. What I was really excited to talk to you about is, I think in my head, I usually think of controller mods as like somebody painting a controller, or maybe putting little switches on the back so they can shoot faster in Call of Duty. But you're actually doing stuff to make controllers more accessible for people.

• 5:34Speaker 07

  Correct. So I became known as like, oh, this guy's modifying things, or like, oh, he made a portable Xbox 360 into a laptop, or whatever. So 2006, this guy emails me, and he's like, hey, I was in the Second Iraq War. And when he was over there, you know, he'd been wounded. And he came back, he's like, I realize if I don't have both my hands, I can't hold a controller, because it requires both your hands. He's like, and I want to play video games. This was a big part of my life. So he's like, could you make me a controller? But he's like, can you move everything that be on one side of the controller and make it so it's accessible just on one side? And I'm like, oh, okay, I'll try that. So as you can see, we have the left analog on the leg here. So what you do is you move your arm left and right to do that motion.

• 6:18Speaker 07

  And then the right analog stick is the same as it ever was. The original prototypes that I did, I think this was the Xbox 360 days.

• 6:25Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 6:25Speaker 07

  Well, I think they were actually over engineered because I was like laser cutting panels and little. And he was like, oh, okay, this works. And I can't remember if that was the first time I did it, but you know, there's two analog sticks, right?

• 6:36Alex Cranz?

  Right.

• 6:37Speaker 07

  And obviously that's a problem. So one of the gags I came up with was you take the right hand analog stick and you put it on the bottom of the controller. And then you actuate it against your leg.

• 6:47Alex Cranz?

  Oh, that's cool.

• 6:48Speaker 07

  This acts as a joystick, but then moving the controller against your leg acts as the other analog axis of movement. And so that was something I did pretty early on because I was like, you know, how do you get both analogs? Now, it is harder for people to learn because you're taking this many tasks and putting them all into one hand, which does make it more difficult. But the vast majority of people that I sell them to that seems to work, I get a lot of feedback. It's like, hey, now I can game again. So that's kind of, that's where it started back in 2006.

• 7:17Alex Cranz?

  You expanded it. You primarily for a long time there were mainly doing Xbox 360 controllers, right? You weren't working on PlayStation or Nintendo controllers.

• 7:26Speaker 07

  Yes. So if you think about in 2006, if you take apart your standard computer keyboard, not like a razor, but your standard one, it's got those, that silk screen conductive membrane.

• 7:37Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 7:38Speaker 07

  It's basically two pieces of plastic and then that's how the switches work. That's what Sony uses. They've been using that for their controllers for the buttons since 1995. And it makes it really hard to modify. Like you can't just go in there and like, oh, I'm going to solder to this point and that gives me the X button. I'm going to solder to this point that gets me the square button. You can't do it very easily on a Sony controller, whereas in the Xbox, you take it up, it's just a bog standard green circuit board. And it's filled with test points all over. It's like test point, test point, and you solder to those and boom, you get your button.

• 8:07Alex Cranz?

  Oh, that's cool.

• 8:08Speaker 07

  So that's why for the long Longest time I only did Xbox was because it was much, much easier to modify the controllers versus PlayStation. Also, if you want to get into the weeds with it.

• 8:19Alex Cranz?

  Always.

• 8:20Speaker 07

  Sony revises their controllers multiple times per generation, whereas Microsoft might do it once.

• 8:26Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 8:26Speaker 07

  So not only is the PlayStation controller harder to modify, but it keeps changing as well. Uh, I think there was at least three different versions for the PlayStation four, for instance, whereas Xbox had two over that same period.

• 8:38Alex Cranz?

  Was like Microsoft conscious of like what you were doing?

• 8:42Speaker 07

  Oh, yeah. Actually, Microsoft, actually, uh, every so often they'll send me a whole box of like broken controllers, just to scavenge parts from.

• 8:50Alex Cranz?

  Oh, that's cool. So how did that go from like one guy and helping one guy to a little side hustle? Is it fair to call it a side hustle? Is it a full hustle?

• 9:00Speaker 07

  No, it is not the main thing that I do, but actually, I just, I just, I actually got to send them off today. Like, I just did my taxes, like 2021, I built like 124 of them, it turns out. So I, I build about two a week for people. But one thing that helped is we had a, we had this forum on my website. It was the benheck.com forum. And people would go on there like, oh, I want to modify video game consoles. I want to, you know, do this. And that was from like 2004 to 2007 was probably the heyday of that.

• 9:30Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 9:30Speaker 07

  So my website, benheck.com already had a lot of good SEO as far as like modifying things go, because that's why even though my forums are dead, we, they've been dead for a long time. I still keep them up, but I keep the database in good nick.

• 9:43Alex Cranz?

  The SEO is too good.

• 9:45Speaker 07

  Right, because there's still tons of legacy links from Google that still go to that website. So I wanted to make sure it's still there. So it was just, it was just web traffic back then, and I guess it still is. I don't do any marketing. People just come to my website and order the stuff.

• 9:58Alex Cranz?

  So YouTube, Twitter, like when, when, when you started using these, because you're a fairly big presence on both, that didn't kind of transform how people were, were reaching out to you and kind of talking to you about accessibility in controllers?

• 10:10Speaker 07

  Not that I've noticed. Well, a lot of people email me about it. That's pretty common. So maybe they just go to my website because they'll email me and be like, oh, I've got this particular thing. Or I have also done other modified controllers in the past. Like I've done one for someone who had muscular dystrophy, which meant they basically had trouble having the strength to necessarily use the controller.

• 10:30Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 10:31Speaker 07

  Another thing I've come across is the size of people's hands.

• 10:34Alex Cranz?

  I couldn't use the original one. I had two. I have very tiny hands.

• 10:38Speaker 07

  And you're not alone. There's one right now who I'm trading emails with and their main problem is they are having trouble reaching the whole thing because, yes, people have different sized hands. There's a lot of different things that can affect your ability to game. Myself, I'm like 50% colorblind. So when they started adding those options into games about 10 years ago, I think Dice actually was one of the first ones to do it with Bad Company 2. I'm like, oh, yes, finally. I can see my ally markers in the snow maps because otherwise I couldn't see the blue, right? I'm like, okay, this is something I can appreciate. And there's other things, a lot of other, much, well, almost everything is worse than that, that can affect people. So it's kind of interesting to do that kind of stuff like, okay, what can I do? Even if it's just these controllers, which it's not like it's some

• 11:23Speaker 07

  sort of science miracle, but it's kind of fun to do problem solving with that. And right now, what I'm doing is, actually, I was working on it just this morning, I'm working on ways to improve the process so I can keep the prices static as other prices might change. Like during the, like in 2020, I had a hard time finding the controllers. So I was having to go on eBay, actually, to get a lot of them, or go to the used game store once things reopened. And yeah, that was kind of a crap shoot back then. And even like the filament at that time, like the 3D printer filament. So when people send me controllers for repair, which, you know, obviously they break after time, and the number one thing that goes

• 12:05Speaker 07

  wrong is stick drift. Shh, don't tell the, don't tell big game industries. I had this spool of filament. It's like this marble, fake marble filament I got at a festival in 2019. And I'm like, oh, I wait a minute, I'm never gonna use this. I'm not gonna print chess pieces or anything, right?

• 12:21Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 12:22Speaker 07

  But then Amazon was like, oh, we don't have any white filament. And I'm like, I guess I have to use this white marble. So now when I get, if someone sends you in a controller and I see something that should have been a white 3D printed piece, but it's actually like this marble, which kind of looks like, you know, the white gum that has like the specks of flavor in it.

• 12:38Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 12:39Speaker 07

  It kind of looks like that. So if I see something on there with that color filament, I'm like, oh, I made that the summer of 2020. It's like an archaeologist. I can like rip, it kind of reminds me.

• 12:50Alex Cranz?

  I feel like it's a little bit of an artist's signature. People, you can just see that and be like, I did that. I know. And other people will now know. I love it.

• 12:57Speaker 07

  Well, in the case of that filament, it was the signature of shortages or whatever problem was back then.

• 13:03Alex Cranz?

  You, you mentioned earlier that Microsoft was, was always very enthusiastic about you modifying these controllers and making them more accessible. Microsoft now is kind of embraced accessibility itself. And it started, you know, it has this big, cool accessibility controller.

• 13:17Speaker 07

  Yep.

• 13:18Speaker 08

  With the Xbox Adaptive Controller, a gamer can game with one hand and one foot, or one hand and their shoulder, or even one foot and their chin. And I can change it from game to game.

• 13:28Alex Cranz?

  Was there ever like evidence where they were like, oh yeah, we're working on this because we see so much of the appetite there because of people like you?

• 13:34Speaker 07

  Well, they've never told me that directly. I know they knew of my work. I don't know if it inspired them. And I actually did buy one of their controllers to take a look at. And at the time they announced that, like, oh, I guess we're not going to build these anymore. But an issue that people have with that, like people will email me and there's like, hey, I tried it, but it's this big box and it has all these like one eighth inch, three millimeter headphone jacks. So you're like, okay, I've got this foot pedal, plug it in. That's going to be the jump button. I've got this puff controller where you use air. I'm going to plug it into here. So basically, in order to use this thing, you have to plug all the stuff into it. It looks like a giant like super squid with all these wires coming out of it.

• 14:16Speaker 07

  So the feedback I've gotten from people is that, yeah, I think this thing is like 99 bucks, which is actually a lot less than I charge for my modifications. But they're like, yeah, but you can't just use this thing out of the box. It's got like two big buttons on the front and everything else has to be plugged back in. So at least for people with a specific situation of I only have one hand, people buy that controller and then they don't realize how much extra work you have to put into it or how many add-ons. Microsoft also has this thing on their Xbox consoles. I think it's called Assist or Microsoft Assist. So if you have like, you know, your partner or your brother or sister or whatever, like let's say, okay, I'm playing this game, but I have some sort of impairment. There's a certain thing I have difficulty doing, like this button or this button. Microsoft actually has it where you can map certain functions of one controller

• 15:01Speaker 07

  onto an assistant controller. So someone else can help you perform those functions as well. And that's baked into the operating system of the Xbox, which is pretty cool.

• 15:10Alex Cranz?

  That's very cool.

• 15:11Speaker 07

  I think that's one of the things they thought with the, you know, the Microsoft accessibility controller, whatever it's called, is that, oh, you know, this can let a person do certain things, but then someone else can do the rest of it. So they made it very general purpose, but that's also a negative because you have to add everything else to it. So, yeah, I mean, I thought, oh, I guess, I guess we're not going to sell any more of these mods anymore. And this was like three or four years ago. And I guess not, like last couple of years, I think I've sold more per year than I did in the past even.

• 15:39Alex Cranz?

  Wow. I guess my, my, my last big question for you is how have you seen these big gaming companies? We talked about Microsoft, but, but Sony, Nintendo, even some of these other ones like Steam and stuff. Have they started to embrace accessibility? Have you started to see them change in this last 22 years that you've been doing this?

• 16:00Speaker 07

  Well, I would say a lot more changes happened in the last 10 years even. You know, you have like Able gamers, they've been pushing for this for much longer than 10 years, but it does seem like the industry is starting to, well, not starting to, they have been implementing it more and more. I mean, I'm surprised Sony hasn't done more with it. I mean, they sell way more consoles. And like, I'm not the only one who modifies controllers. You've got like evil controllers and there's a couple of other ones. You know, if you have like, oh, like, let's say you're Sony. Hey Sony, maybe make it so your controller is a little easier to mod. A person of average soldering skill who hasn't been doing it for like 35 years would probably struggle with it. Anyway, what I would want to say with that is since people are modifying controllers, maybe, hey, there's things they could do to make it easier.

• 16:43Speaker 07

  Yes, there's going to be people trying to cheat or quickscope or whatever in Call of Duty. There's also people that want to modify controllers for altruistic purposes. So, you know, without affecting anything, they could make things a little easier to modify or fix. So, yeah, I guess that would be my plea. And as I mentioned, except for like the micro soldering part, Xbox, it's actually gotten easier with the controllers. I don't think it was on purpose, but it's been easier. Whereas Sony, they've actually made the controller the same way, longer than Xbox. It's like, oh, there's a silk screen circuit, and that's got the four face buttons, the four shoulder buttons, and the cross. They keep making it the same way over and over and over, and it's very hard to mod because I can't solder to a piece of plastic the silk screen circuit. So you've got to find the traces on the PCB.

• 17:27Speaker 07

  Oh, the PCB has no test points. Oh, and the silk screen is black or blue, which makes it even harder.

• 17:32Alex Cranz?

  I'm just still continuously impressed. You've been doing this for over 22 years, and you started putting it on your website to kind of creating this industry, to getting people like even Microsoft noticing your work and hopefully thinking about it. But thank you so much for taking the time to chat today, Ben.

• 17:51Speaker 07

  Yeah, no problem.

• 17:59Alex Cranz?

  Okay, I bet you didn't expect we'd be talking about PCBs in an Xbox controller that long. Ben's got a wealth of knowledge about the game controller space and about the unique challenges of building controllers for a wide variety of people with different capabilities. After the break, I'm going to talk to somebody else who knows this space, particularly the Xbox accessibility space, Bryce Johnson. He's one of the creators of Microsoft's Adaptive Controller, which was maybe the first controller from a major console maker intended to actually address accessibility for a wide variety of people. Stay tuned.

• 18:39Speaker 00

  This episode is brought to you by On Investing, an original podcast from Charles Schwab. Each week, hosts Lizanne Saunders, Schwab's Chief Investment Strategist, and Colin Martin, Head of Fixed Income Research and Strategy for the Schwab Center for Financial Research, bring you fresh insights on what's happening in the markets and why, and what the implications might be for your portfolio. Join Colin and Lizanne as they explore questions like, how do you evaluate corporate bonds that look interesting? And what sectors are on the move right now? Download the latest episode and subscribe at schwab.com/oninvesting or wherever you get your podcasts.

• 19:31Alex Cranz?

  And we're back. We've talked to a lot of gadget makers for this video series about their efforts to make cool stuff that maybe, just maybe, that big guys in gadgets will pay attention to. Ben and other game controller modders have actually succeeded. Maybe it's because they've been doing it longer. I'm not sure. But regardless, in 2018, Microsoft introduced the Adaptive Controller and finally gave first-party choice for people looking to make an accessible controller for playing video games. No waiting for a modder, no concerns about voided warranties, just an easy financial transaction. And that's because of Bryce Johnson and his colleagues at Microsoft. They created the Adaptive Controller.

• 20:11Speaker 09

  I've been at Microsoft a while, working on accessibility probably most of my time here, throughout Xbox and now hardware.

• 20:17Alex Cranz?

  So let's talk to him about it.

• 20:23Alex Cranz?

  You know, I think it's kind of interesting that you guys did this and then Microsoft released it and really put a lot of marketing and other things behind it, a lot of resources behind it. Because kind of prior to that, as far as accessibility in gaming, it was primarily up to people online, like just hacking together things. Would you say that's kind of correct?

• 20:44Speaker 09

  Oh, yeah, for sure. And I mean, it's not like we didn't know or notice. We learned a lot from a lot of people and we had wonderful partners throughout the journey. I think as you get into any type of accessibility inclusion, you know, we talk a lot about it being intentional and we kind of dig into the weeds there with the community. So that that is super important to us. But to do that, you have to be part of the community. So yeah, we were there. We were there when we saw it, but we we saw folks doing things and we we we learned.

• 21:12Alex Cranz?

  Was it primarily like in forums? Was it on YouTube? Was like, where where were you finding a lot of that community working on these things and thinking about it? Because I think most of the community did a very different kind of approach to accessibility controllers versus what you guys did, which I want to get into.

• 21:28Speaker 09

  Yeah, absolutely. And and I would say that like definitely in the beginning, there was a lot of YouTube. You know, I'm thinking like my buddy A.J. Ryan, who goes by only use me feet. There are so many people, to be honest, you know, Nomad, all all these folks. There's there's really just tons of them. I wish I could just sit here and say them all. Broly, of course, Broly, can't believe I forgot Broly.

• 21:49Alex Cranz?

  I think a lot of the the ones I'd seen had primarily been created for people who might have only one limb or something like that. But you you really were working on something that was available for people with a wide variety of different needs. What kind of led you to trying to kind of do as much as you can for as many people as you can?

• 22:09Speaker 09

  Well, I think that's the answer in a way. It's like we wanted to do as much as we can for as many people as we can. And we had to investigate a lot of solutions that were out there, understand who they were optimized for. I think the one thing that is tricky, and I don't want to say that it's this is a golden rule or anything, but often when you optimize for one disability, you're excluding from another, right? You have to figure out the balance, right? And so for us, it was always this exercise in understanding the balance. And I will say that I think that, you know, we still have a lot to learn there in that way. We still are learning to understand that balance. But we started, I think, in a place that you just described, right? We started with limb different vets.

• 22:52Speaker 09

  You know, we moved on to quadriplegia because that makes sense because that's where a lot of limb different vets are also quadriplegics. You know, we moved on to cerebral palsy. And then, you know, we moved on to muscular neuromuscular conditions. So while I think we do really well for limb different folks and quadriplegics and even CP, you know, I definitely recognize that we could do better for neuromuscular folks. And that's, you know, what we're always thinking about.

• 23:16Alex Cranz?

  Yeah, I think it's it's a real challenge because you do have just you can't build just I mean, I think you guys are kind of coming close to that, but it but you can't build just one thing for for everybody.

• 23:27Speaker 09

  Yeah, I mean, like one of the big black buttons on the front of the controller, you know, you can press it in any spot. The engineering team made it so it didn't wobble. It was fairly lightly pressed, but not too lightly pressed. Like the the trick, we did have these in the beginning, we had these a little bit lighter to press. But the problem was is if you moved it, it would press the button. So because it was so lightly finely tuned. But the other thing about it, and I'm gonna this might, you know, sorry to the audio guy in advance, like you can hit these things, right?

• 23:54Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 23:54Speaker 09

  Like, they're meant to be hit for people who have like, they don't have the the motor control and and they have what they would call high tone, so they can kind of hit it. So that's just two different extreme uses, like the ability of people who press too light and the ability of people who press too hard. There's many spectrums like that that we think about as we work on our products. And I I will come back to we try to find the balance. But it is always in the service of like, human diversity, right?

• 24:21Alex Cranz?

  What I thought was really interesting about the community and what I've really seen from the community is is for the most part, it's it's a lot of mods and stuff. And I know a lot of people in the community specifically appreciate Microsoft because you leave a lot of like, the pins on the board available, so people can really get in there and mess around. Why did you go instead of kind of doing just the most Xbox modded mod Xbox 360 controller? Instead of doing that, you created this this almost joystick looking device. What what kind of led you from that very traditional iconic look to this new one?

• 24:59Speaker 09

  That's a really good question. Let me kind of give you a bit of a broader story around it. We knew that we needed to externalize controls. So on the back of the controller, there's 19 ports that basically have a switch input for every function on a game controller, plus two extras. Actually, sorry, generation nine controllers, there'll now only be one extra. So if you want to have that share button, you can. So there's still a lot of options there. And so trying to figure out How to externalize all those controls was was really tricky. And what allowed us to design a form that was so different from a regular controller was Copilot. So we were working in a different direction. The original hacks were in a different direction.

• 25:44Speaker 09

  And Copilot, when we designed that as a feature and we've got that into like production, allowed us to like use different forms because you can always use a traditional controller alongside your adaptive controller. You can use them at the same time.

• 25:58Alex Cranz?

  Can you explain Copilot?

• 26:00Speaker 09

  Yeah, Copilot is the ability to take two controllers. So it could be an adaptive controller or a regular traditional controller and tell the Xbox or Windows 10 PC that they're the same controller, that you really only have one controller. And for the adaptive controller, what this allowed us to do is it allows to have this form. Because if you could use half the buttons on a regular controller, let's say you were a limb different. You could use the right half of a controller. We want you to use the right half of a controller. We don't want you to go out and buy stuff. We want you to use what like you have. So the other thing too for Copilot is some people don't even need the adaptive controller. They could get what they need from two controllers. And we continue to look at that as we develop the ecosystem. You know, the design for Xbox Hori products that they put out.

• 26:45Speaker 09

  You can Copilot their arcade stick with a controller. So in a sense, that's super powerful. If you've looked into these hacks, you've seen people, it is about modularizing control. You know, we always ask people to tell us where you have movement so that we can put buttons there. We can put joysticks there. I think a lot of times in the disability community, especially in the limited mobility community, we talk in terms of what people are missing, but we don't focus on that. We focus on what people have.

• 27:13Alex Cranz?

  Where do you think the community is gonna go next? Like, what are the next big goals in making gaming more accessible?

• 27:21Speaker 09

  In terms of gaming, I think there's been a lot of people who've been talking about this for a really long time, and that history should be honored. I look at what gaming's doing, and I see them basically rocketing through accessibility. You know, if you think about the internet, like, the web was designed to be accessible from the beginning, and we're still talking about it like 30 years later, like, making web accessibility.

• 27:41Alex Cranz?

  Yeah.

• 27:41Speaker 09

  We always have to be kind of, sort of vigilant to make sure that we're intentionally including people, we're bringing people into the community. So where are we going next? I think there's tons of stuff in game accessibility that's going on. Like, to be honest, after the adaptive controller, I did a lot of game stuff. I then kind of sunk more into hardware stuff, and I've still kept, basically, in the gaming world. I actually, I'm on a group chat with, like, the folks from GAConf, and can I play that? And so I'm still connected to that world. So it's really interesting to see how quickly that's developing, especially if you know the history of computing accessibility in general. Like, human-computer interaction in gaming is like human-computer interaction on extra hard, right? Let's put a gaming metaphor in there, right?

• 28:26Speaker 09

  There are so many things that they're uncovering and addressing so quickly in gaming accessibility. It's really quite impressive. But there is still a huge way to go. I mean, even an inaccessible website is somewhat more accessible than an accessible game. There's really a lot of ways to go, and that's not to diminish any of the work that anyone's done. There's been some incredible work throughout the community. But, you know, that's just that aspect of it. Like, but I mean, as you think about, like, well, what is gaming, right? I think, you know, one of the sad things, and this will date myself, is I know that the Mixer team did a lot of really great work on how to think about, like, how people with disabilities stream. And when you think about, like, the fact that if you can't get a nine-to-five job

• 29:08Speaker 09

  because of a disability or condition that you have, you know, streaming can be a viable option to help supplement your income. You know, it's so it's, as we think about empowering people with disabilities through gaming, there is, there's just so much stuff that we can do.

• 29:22Alex Cranz?

  Do you think that community of people creating these controllers, doing these purely extensive mods and stuff to make these more accessible, is that going to go away as companies like Microsoft and Hori kind of invest more in this community, or do you think they're going to continue?

• 29:38Speaker 09

  No, because I think we try to service those people, right? Like when we created the Adaptive Controller, we definitely had a sense of like supporting makers. Because as we talked about earlier, when you lean too much in one direction, you might be excluding someone else. So for example, people ask why we don't include joysticks with the Adaptive Controller. You know, and it's kind of like, well, what joystick? Like a joystick for like someone with cerebral palsy who might use their feet or a tetraplegic that needs something bigger. Or like a tiny joystick for someone with like a neuromuscular condition. So you realize that as soon as you start including all these parts in here, parts that cost money. Some people will use them and other people won't. So it is actually crucially important for us to support that maker community and to have those things out there.

• 30:23Speaker 09

  So in many ways, we've we've actually dug deeper into that, but at the same time. You know, we recognize that people want to go buy a product that they can kind of go to a store and buy and and sort of use. Without having to like go in their garage and build something first, you know? So we're trying to figure out all these things, right? Like, how do you create products that can be extended by the maker community, but can be purchased at a store and basically taken home and used?

• 30:48Alex Cranz?

  So what is next for Microsoft in this area?

• 30:52Speaker 09

  So on on May 10th, we announced the Microsoft Adaptive Accessories. It's a suite of products, which basically includes an adaptive mouse that can be extended by 3D printing. Tails and things like that that change this mouse in many different forms. There is the Microsoft Adaptive Hub, which is very similar to what the Xbox Adaptive Controller is. And then there's the the Microsoft Adaptive Button. So this is very similar to our D-pad. This comes in a number of different ways. All the functions of these devices can be programmed, not only with like to whatever button presses you want, but to macros and things like that. To help you kind of increase your productivity. So the top of this button can be 3D printed and designed to be extended by the maker community.

• 31:36Speaker 09

  And to kind of bridge that gap between makers and consumers. We've partnered with Shapeways so that people can basically go to Shapeways, pick the mods that they want and just have Shapeways print them. And then send them to them. So you don't even have to have a 3D printer to basically go in and get and take advantage of the community of people that will build mods for this thing. So we have like joysticks for this button. We have cheek sticks for this button. We have all kinds of things, you know, more kind of vertical things. Typically, a lot of quadriplegics want a bigger joystick to even press buttons, you know, because this kind of movement helps. So we've created this system so that people on their PCs, and it also works on mobile phones too, can basically create what we did with the

• 32:21Speaker 09

  adaptive controller. Like, that's a, I think, one of the things that we've learned in our inclusive design practice that is something that I think we need to dig in more to is that, you know, very often in accessibility, we talk about what's wrong, but we really need to also focus on what's right. You know, like with the adaptive controller, I couldn't really articulate this until about, until the middle of the pandemic. You know, we created the adaptive controller for veterans with limited mobility, but we were inspired to do so to support their mental health because they loved gaming, right? We were there to support what they loved. So I think a lot of what we talk about in inclusive design and accessibility can sometimes be about the bad things, but we need to hold on and cling to the good things. We need to hold on to why they're there.

• 33:09Alex Cranz?

  I want to thank Bryce and Ben both for coming on the show. A lot of the times, you can get, I don't know, a little despondent about what major tech companies are doing versus the little guy. Too often, it feels like they buy up the cool stuff only to kill it, or they sell their own products for so cheap, the cool stuff can't survive. But here's an instance where both are happy to coexist and actually create really important technology that makes playing video games a lot more accessible for a lot more people. It gives you hope for people like Colin and Phil Lamb, who created Ploopy to make open source gadgets a real viable thing, or Jacob Alexander, who just wants you to use a better keyboard than the one IT issues you. Great sea changes in the gadget world

• 33:52Alex Cranz?

  can happen. The adaptive controller feels like proof of that. You just need to find a gadget you love and find a community that loves it as much as you do.

• 34:02Alex Cranz?

  If you have thoughts about this episode, you can hit me up at Alex H. Krantz on Twitter, or you can email us at [email protected]. Our regular Vergecast chat show will be back on Friday. This episode of the Vergecast is produced by me, Alex Cranz, lead producer Liam James, and senior audio director Andrew Marino. OK, stay classy.

• 34:29Speaker 10

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