LogInBill Starsap designed a tool to read a rotary encoder.
Game developers always try to push the boundaries of immersiveness, coming up with new ways to totally engross the player. We've had steering wheels for virtual cars for a while, but what if you could enjoy controlling a watercraft with a valve?
A developer known as Bill Starsap knows how it feels as he designed his own housing and code to read a rotary encoder in Unreal Engine, so the valve can turn an in-game vehicle left and right.
The valve is connected to the PC via a keyboard emulator, according to the creator. The rotary encoder sends out a signal of two key presses – left and right – and the direction of the spin can be determined from the state of the two keys.
"This basically just outputs left as A and right as D," Starsap shared on Reddit.
The developer's setup is impressive, and you might want to see an even crazier arrangement a group of World of Tanks players made for their favorite game: they not only turn the tank using a real-world system, but they also shoot enemies using plastic bottles.
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