back to article Designer pitches iPad gaming wheel

Wacky iPad accessories are slowly starting to surface, with one designer convinced that a steering wheel is what’s required if you hope to play games on the Apple tablet. The iDrift, designed by Michael Greenberg, is essentially two thin, circular plastic halves that fix onto either side on the iPad, turning Apple’s tablet …

COMMENTS

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  1. 1of10
    Thumb Down

    pain in the neck

    what a pointless gadget...

    1. DR
      Coat

      re: what a pointless product

      quite, the plastic steering wheel is quite cool though

  2. jonathan keith
    Jobs Horns

    Rubbish

    Quote: Greenberg’s iDift – if it ever makes it past the conceptual stage – should make holding the iPad while playing driving games slightly easier, we reckon.

    Er, probably not. The great thing about the Wii wheel (and any other useful steering wheel game controller) is that, although the wheel's turning, your visual reference, i.e. the monitor or TV, stays put. Helpfully, this means you don't have to roll your head by 90 degrees each time you go round a corner.

    Use this piece of crap to play a driving game and you'll be paying an expensive visit to a physiotherapist soon enough.

    Still, anything that underscores the idiocy of iPad owners can only be a good thing in my book. I wish Mr. Greenberg much success, although I hope he never works in automotive design.

    1. The Indomitable Gall

      Correct me if I'm wrong....

      Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't current iPhone/iPod Touch games already work this way, using the device's accelerometers?

      The wheel designer hasn't created the problem of visual reference -- that's something the game designer's did. I'm guessing that they compensated for this in the programming of the game....

  3. simon gardener
    FAIL

    Poundland

    fantastic ! probably end up going for a quid like the Golf Club, Gun, Tennis Racquet and ... wait for it... Yes ...Steering Wheel shaped wii remote holders that i saw this afternoon in uber Tat shop Poundland.

    where incidentally you can get 5 curly wurlys for a pound :

    (while stocks last

    1. Adam T

      Screen tilt != action tilt

      How do you think most iPhone racers work at the moment?

      Check out Real Racing for starters.

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CFavTmIGplo

  4. mlo0352
    Thumb Up

    Uhm

    I think I would just make my own unless it was 5-10 dollars. Of course, I'm not getting an iPad, but cool idea nonetheless.

  5. Nick Ryan Silver badge
    WTF?

    Erm... slight design flaw?

    Well, not exactly a design flaw, but stupid anyway...

    Tilt the wheel on this and the screen tilts, meaning you have to tilt your head to get the same angle of view of the screen.

    Tilt the Wii Wheel and the screen stays the same orientation and so does your head.

  6. T-Unit
    Coat

    Well it looks nice

    Looks quite cool but largely pointless... and so is that peripheral... Mine is the one with other peoples jokes in the pocket

  7. J 3
    Dead Vulture

    But before you howl with laughter

    Er... There is one little detail that you seem to have missed: you can turn and wiggle the Wii Wheel as much and as fast as you want, but you view of the game will be unaffected. You know, it's on the TV screen, static. Or so I understand.

    How good will it be to look at a fast moving screen while playing? I don't know, since I haven't played any games on a device like that (Touch, iPhone, etc.), but I don't feel attracted to the concept of bad visual feedback. Will have to wait and see.

  8. coxy

    iFrisbee?

    ^ sorry.

  9. James Pickett

    Driving games

    Or save some money and velcro the thing in your real steering wheel. That way, you can have motional feedback at the same time... :-)

  10. Fractured Cell
    Joke

    T,FTFY

    Production costs will be wheely cheap

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Welcome

    Multi-purpose

    And when you finally tire of the lack of multitasking and the inability to see your favourite Flash-based website, you can turn your iPad into a Frisbee and hurl it against a wall!

  12. Bear Features
    Joke

    GREAT

    It'll work well with the iHype, seeing as they're both pointless. ;-)

  13. Tom Richardson
    Megaphone

    Is it really called iDift?

    Or should that be iDrift?

  14. John 90
    IT Angle

    Best new game ever!

    Pop your iFad into this wheel (or hoop) and roll it down the road, guiding it with your iStick as you run alongside. Hours of amusement for the children.

    Until the battery runs flat.

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Down

    Well Michael...

    ...I'm going to tell you where I am.

    I don't see how this is an investable opportunity.

    It is just an overpriced piece of plastic designed to solve a problem that didn't exist in the first place.

    ...And now you want me to give you some of my children's inheritance to stick another pointless piece of plastic around the outside of it.

    You have badly overestimated the size of your market. Steering wheel peripherals are bought by serious gamers. The I-Pad is not a machine for serious gamers. Most will have a console and/or high spec pc at home and a dedicated portable handheld system like the DS or PSP for travelling.

    Epic Fail.

    ... and for that reason... I'm out.

  16. Mal Franks

    some comments are missing the point...

    The racing games on the iPad, like on the iPhone require the screen to be tilted anyway so it's not a flaw of the peripheral but the nature of the hardware and these kind of games' design.

    The peripheral itself merely is attempting to make it more natural/comfortable to hold when playing the game as did the wheel adapter for Wii controllers when playing Mario Kart Wii .

  17. Sir Sham Cad

    Er... guys?

    It's an iPad. Same as an iPod Touch or iPhone. You *have* to tilt the thing anyway, to control your gameplay. The screen is going to tilt however you hold it. This device simply makes holding it a little easier and perhaps more familiar for driving games.

    This screen-tilt thing you laugh at? Nothing to do with the iDrift. All to do with the platform.

  18. Richard Vivash
    Thumb Down

    Questions..

    Don't you have to use your thumbs on the touch screen to accelerate and brake with these driving games?

    With the wheel attached wouldn't your thumbs be too far away from the screen to do this?

    Doesn't that reduce this products customer base to those with impossibly long thumbs?

    I need answers!

  19. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    I think most of the above posters..

    ...have missed the point that the games this would be for are controlled by the accelerometer which means that the screen will be being tilted anyway to play, irrespective of silly plastic wheel attachments.

    Fail for above posters rather than the wheel.

    1. jonathan keith
      FAIL

      Accelerometer

      A good point, and one that, not having a iDevice, I overlooked.

      It's still an incredibly daft way to play driving games, though. This just shows that it's the platform that's FAIL for driving games instead of the peripheral.

      Now, let me get back to my Logitech G25 and remember how it's done properly.

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