Skip to main content
Log in

Design and Implementation of a Reconfigurable Mobile Game Controller on Smartphone

  • Published:
Wireless Personal Communications Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Expansion of games industry came in modern life, accompanied with innovative features in a game controller. Nowadays mobile industry is booming with the expansion of the variety of novel technologies, such as the use of 3D accelerometer sensors, high resolution cameras, the capability of connecting to wireless networks and so on. Therefore, a smartphone can be added with the game control functions to become a mobile game controller. In this paper, we propose the design and implementation of making a mobile phone as a game controller using User Datagram Protocol socket programming. This system is developed by Java 2 Standard Edition and Google Android Software Development Kits which has already provided sensor and multi-touch APIs. We successfully realize a reconfigurable mobile game controller on a mobile smartphone to interact with the existing digital games by mapping control functions on the server. Acceptable performance is shown to validate the effectiveness of our solution.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. \(\text{ Wii }\_{{\rm remote}}\), http://en.wikipedia.org/wikilWii_Remote.

  2. Kinect, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinect.

  3. Leu, J.-S., Changfan, C., Su, K.-W., & Chen, C.-F. (2013). Design and implementation of a fixed-mobile convergent music search engine (FMC-MUSE). Wireless Personal Communications, 70(4), 1911–1923.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Arumugam, S., Kalle, R. K., & Rrasad, A. R. (2013). Wireless robotics: Opportunities and challenges. Wireless Personal Communications, 70(3), 1033–1058.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Fernandes, C., Ng, K. Y., & Khoo, B. H. (2011). Development of a convenient wireless control of an autonomous vehicle using apple iOS SDK. In IEEE region 10 annual international conference, proceedings/TENCON (pp. 1025–1028).

  6. Kiran, B. R., & Sankita, P. (2010). Implementing mobile phone as a multi-purpose controller using 3D sensor technology. In Proceedings 3rd IEEE international conference on computer science and information Technology, ICCSIT.

  7. Sakane, Y., Tsukamoto, M., & Nishio, S. (2002). Rajicon remote PC GUI operations via constricted mobile interfaces. In Proceedings of the annual international conference on mobile computing and networking, MOBICOM (pp. 251–262).

  8. User Datagram Protocol. (2013). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_Datagram_Protocol#Applications. available.

  9. Shang, H.-L., Xu, R.-M., & Yuan, J.-K. (2012). A smart home system based on ZigBee and iOS software. In Proceedings of the international conference on parallel and distributed systems—ICPADS (pp. 940–943).

  10. Android. (2013). http://www.android.com Retrieved March 1st, available.

  11. Java Robot Class Introduction. (2013). http://www.developer.com/java/other/article.php/2212401/Introduction-to-the-Java-Robot-Class-in-Java.htm, available.

  12. Horipad ex2 turbo, Game controller for Xbox 360. (2013). http://www.hori.jp/us/products/xbox360/us_xbox360_horipad_ex2_turbo/index.html, available.

  13. Douglas, S. A., Kirkpatrick, A. E., & MacKenzie, I. S. (1999). Testing pointing device performance and user assessment with the ISO 9241. In Proceedings of the ACM conference on human factors in computing systems—CHI ’99 (pp. 215–222). New York: ACM.

  14. Daniel, N., Castellucci, S. J., & MacKenzie, I. S. (2009). ISO 9241–9 evaluation of video game controllers. In Proceedings—graphics interface (pp. 223–230).

  15. Android Sensor API. (2013). http://developer.android.com/reference/android/hardware/SensorEvent.html, available.

  16. Error detection and correction. (2013). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Error_detection_and_correction, available.

  17. Mobile Game Controller on Smartphone. (2013). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXx1CuYv5nw&feature=youtube, available.

  18. MacKenzie, I. S. (1992). Fitts’ law as a research and design tool in human-computer interaction. Human-Computer Interaction, 7, 91–139.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Winfitts experiment software. (2013). http://www.cs.uoregon.edu/research/hci/research/winfitts.htm, available.

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jenq-Shiou Leu.

Additional information

A preliminary version of this paper has been presented in the 2012 IEEE International Conference on Consumer Electronics (IEEE ICCE 2012). The video demo clip can be accessed via http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXx1CuYv5nw&feature=youtube.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Leu, JS., Tung, N.H. Design and Implementation of a Reconfigurable Mobile Game Controller on Smartphone. Wireless Pers Commun 74, 823–833 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11277-013-1323-5

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11277-013-1323-5

Keywords

Navigation