NESpresso: Random Thoughts \ #002: Amplitude Controller

This idea pretty much spawned after playing the demo of Amplitude, I thought "What would make the game more enjoyable for myself?" & the answered occured to me: a custom made Amplitude Controller. I don't have the picture available to show you the idea, but I can at least describe the idea.

Think of a drum synthesizer here. You know the one that has like four or five pads that you can hit, it's like that. However, the Amplitude Controller will have 3 main sensors (one for each note), 1 smaller sensor for button for the power-ups & 2 foot pedals so you can move across the tracks. The standard PS2 controller will be mounted in front of the customized controller so you can still use it to select the songs & do the menu stuff without problems, but the controller is used for the circuit board wiring that's used to make this customized controller.

First of all, you will want to use a good third-party controller since they're cheaper & easier to work with compared to the official controllers. Next, you'll need a few feet of Catagory 5 (aka Cat-5) cable for the wiring in between the controller & the sensors. About 30-40 feet should do, depending on your design & controller height. Third, a low-temperature soldering iron will be required for the wiring hook-ups. The other items you'll need will be some 26-gauge zinc stainless steel for connectors (NO ALUMINUM SHEET METAL! Solder will NOT stick to it). The other parts of the controller, mainly the legs & the holder of the main 4 sensors is up for your imagination & budget will allow. Expect to spend around $200 for materials, but expect to spend more because it's likely that you'll run into a few problems. You'll need metal & eletronic tools (like a low-temp soldering iron) to work on this.

For the rest of this idea, you may want to talk to others who made their own DDR pads to get some ideas on how to build your own sensors. You'll most likely want to make your sensor a lot more sensitive than DDR sensors (usually set to register around 5 pounds of force) so you don't have to pound the sensors to register. You'll want the sensitivity for the 4 main sensors to register with only a pound of force while the foot sensors would need at least 2½ pounds. However, you'll need to do some trial & error to fine tune this.

There'll be more information on this idea as images & other information comes in.