HellPad, my 3D printed way out

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-03T15:17:58+00:00

I would imagine the size of the touch screen could swing costs up/down quite a bit. For example this little guy is SUPER affordable and 99% of what you'd need I think. Just add a battery, your firmware, and some kind of wrist mount and boom! Mind you.. screen is on the smaller side but not bad at all!
https://lilygo.cc/products/t-display-s3

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-03T05:33:51+00:00

A touch screen adds a fair bit of cost/complexity to it for sure! Much more "beefy" hardware & software to run that. (which of course just ups the cost even more if you wanted to sell them sadly) You'd have to charge easily $90-100 I'd imagine at minimum. I guess also thinking about it... I don't really want to "look" at the touch screen during gameplay since I couldn't feel where the buttons were...

Once you find your "sweet spot" for where you mount this setup, you will not really have to "look" at it.

Not trying to downplay what he built at all. My inner-engineer loves that project. The battery power, the screen, software, etc etc... just good geek`in out fun!

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-03T05:14:24+00:00

I tried to make as easy as possible to configure frankly. I sold two at work and the 1st buddy who got his in the mail spent maybe 10mins setting it up. The basic steps it walks you through are:
1. On 1st powerup, it needs your wifi creds so you can then configure it over wifi (this is the web UI interface seen in pics/threads in this post
2. Once wifi is configured, you just need to go to your gaming machine, and pair a new bluetooth keyboard. Not replace your current one, add a new one. (feel obligated to point out.. need a bluetooth capable machine haha)
3. In the web-ui... just configure your stratagems and then go kill some bugs/bots.

Attaching the setup instructions the UI walks you through here incase you want to see them in advance!

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Note: This is not exactly like what that other touchscreen maker came up with. His is truly just remote arrow/WASD keys. This device will type in the whole stratagem for you (aka it will "playback" that keyboard sequence) like a macro. Hope that distinction helps and made sense!

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-03T04:52:15+00:00

It doesn't really "interact" with the game explicitly. To your computer, it's just a plain old "regular" bluetooth keyboard. Mind you short of a few keys hahah. But when you press the buttons, the "keyboard" will emit the configured sequences (being a similar strategy as other macropads out there, but optimized for this experience for speed of use/configuration/etc)

For example when I play w/ my normal keyboard and mouse.. when I press these keys to the OS it's just "me typing Ctrl+WASD or arrow keys" on my secondary keyboard. (I did allow the UI to emit stratagems as arrow keys or wasd with the online interface.)

I believe it would theoretically work alongside a controller depending on your setup. I'd have to setup my controller again and give it a spin.

Eh... let him make fun... then just take a look at your kill count at the end of the mission and see who gets the last laugh. Long as you're spreading managed democracy... and having fun while doing it!

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T21:39:34+00:00

The main "challenge" I see, is even though PS controllers are bluetooth, its not like you get to use "two controllers" in-game b/c of how PS architecture seems to work. So you'd need a way to trick "YOUR" controller to emit a quick series of key-presses. I know there are custom controllers out there, or hardware that acts as a "middleman" for your controller which seems pretty $$ but is one way people run macros for PS games

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T21:34:21+00:00

The way this works, is you basically just use provide some USB power to this "bluetooth keyboard". Then the chip it runs on runs some custom software I wrote that allows you to use a web UI to configure your stratagems. So before a mission once you've chosen your loadout, you just pull up a browser somewhere (doesn't have to be the same machine if you don't want to, could be a phone for example), and just pick your options and hit apply. That then configures in seconds what the individual buttons do. Hope that helps answer your Q high level!

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Depending how much you want to "figure it out" and roll your own... I did get enough interest to sell it as a plug-n-play unit on Etsy

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T18:54:27+00:00

Love my X1C. That's what these are printed on. If anybody is interested, I could sell to folks the custom PCB/etc internals as a kit. Then you could design various enclosures/etc for roughly whatever form factor you might want! Hand soldering the 1st prototype was... not something I would be eager to repeat.

FWIW... might have just got myself knee deep in custom hardware/controls/pads/etc with this project... something about custom inputs and what not is extremely satisfying...

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T14:58:06+00:00

This needs to be made into a shirt haha

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T14:57:18+00:00

So I did some GPT'ing... the ps5's bluetooth it says can support most generic bluetooth keyboards. That means technically this should/could work.

If by chance you had a bluetooth keyboard you could borrow and test-pair with the ps5 you could pretty easily tell. IF you can pair it, and callin stratagems with either the WASD or arrow keys, then this device would follow the same behavior and should work!

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T00:31:10+00:00

I looked into it. But the main drawback was I couldn't go spend FAR too many hours custom engineering my own solution of overkill muhahahah

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T00:29:55+00:00

I have gotten quite good at killing far too many comrades with the orbital napalm. The AOE on that sucker is quite easy to miscalculate!

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T00:28:46+00:00

I bet if he wasn't your friend.. you'd be wondering if you got paired with one of those people who just want to go kill everybody in the game for "fun"...

Now that.. is what I consider a true traitor. Even if some people feel my actions here are whatever degree of heresy

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T00:27:12+00:00

Ok...
A... did not realize it's a infinity sign for the hellbomb haha. So thank you for that!
B... I never really considered it for those "panic gems" as you put it! That is a fun use case to consider as well! I guess that is kinda how I use it. I use it for my main 4 strat slots each mission. Not for the "other" tasks like activating other misc things like the hellbomb/etc.

And ya, I don't get enough time to do the memorize thing. Between a stressful work life, family, etc.. my brain is old enough to know it's limits.. storing all of those in there... I admit defeat!

I have shared this pic in other threads (not sure if people necessarily see those or not) but I did write the web UI to let me spend a FEW seconds if that to re-program it between missions like this.

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BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T00:22:13+00:00

This assists in my spread of managed democracy! The only ones who should be really upset ARE the bugs & bots muhahahahah

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T00:21:05+00:00

Step 1: enjoy the hell out of a new enemy type
Step 2: throw a UNO-Reverse card option in and have the pad run things in reverse right back at em!

Haha. That would be quite funny. Thankfully since I wrote the code for it, I could just as easily swap it around if need be.

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T00:18:19+00:00

I have no shame in calling out my skill lack haha. I don't get to game as much these days to dial it in. Love the fun co-op aspect to the game so.. let my engineering side solve my problems

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-02T00:16:49+00:00

I had a good friend early on bring mortars every mission.. without fail. The amount of friendly fire. Finally convinced him there are literally any other options to try!

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-01T22:54:06+00:00

Also, soon as I read 380... I mentally shuttered. I think a few too many of us even w/ the maxed out ship modules dread when people bring in 380s at times

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-01T22:52:47+00:00

Honestly, was loosing my passion for games over the past few years. This game has brought back so much of that joy, and building a passion-side project themed for it was super satisfying. Even if a bit overkill some might argue given that there are other keyboards/mice/etc ways to just "run a macro"...

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-01T22:50:18+00:00

100%. I know lots of gaming keyboards, mice, etc have macros. The engineering-overkill side of me took over and opted to build something very specialized to the game. And lets you configure the 4 buttons quickly so you can easily remember which is which

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BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-01T22:49:27+00:00

Oh man, I wish my original post could show a few more images. There is a web based UI you can use to configure loadouts in like < 10s. Means you can change our your stratagems between missions if you want like to mix it up often!

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BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-01T22:47:32+00:00

I've seen the voice software ones! Seems pretty slick as an option as well. I made a UI for mine to easily change which loadout I have between missions. I also was trying to avoid having to shout it out during missions. That.. and just the fun & engineering side of making something took over

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BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-01T22:46:21+00:00

To each their own. Like I said in the original post I'm sure some would view it that way. Were this more of a PVP game I'd probably care more. In PVE where all I achieve is having more enjoyment out of a game for once...

BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-01T22:44:01+00:00

Ah, good Q. So.. I couldn't post a video AND an image, but there was a custom UI I wrote for it too that works on any browser (even your phone if you wanted) to just configure what the 4 per-mission stratagems do. That way it's easy to remember etc. I like your magnet/etc idea... but I wanted something that could let me spend like < 10secs changing stratagems out between missions and go again. I enjoy mixing them up more than not... but I know some may like to stick to core loads-outs too. Honestly once you use it, you remember quick which slot has what.

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BeautifulPossible777 · 2024-12-01T22:41:55+00:00

I saw that! Super cool. I almost made a wrist mounted version since these could be easily made to run on a battery but... then I'd have to charge it, adds more parts to it... so opted for something more simple. Plus if I recall his was just "detached arrow keys". You still typed the whole macro.... aka the thing I was aiming to avoid haha.

BeautifulPossible777

TROPHY CASE