Microsoft Surface Used as a Big Games Controller

Hands-on gaming.

Touchscreen gaming, like it or not, is soon going to be huge. Some would say that gaming on touchscreens is already big and here, and not in the way of the Nintendo DS, but the iPod touch, iPhone and all the Android phones that rely entirely on the touch screen for input.

What, then, will become of the control interfaces for more hardware games that require a controller or mouse and keyboard? Nobody knows yet, but University of Massachusetts Lowell Robotics Lab student Eric McCann seems to have an early idea of what it could be like.

Using Microsoft's experimental Surface table experiment, McCann hacked together a controller interface that uses both hands on the screen to control Microsoft Flight Simulator as well as Valve Software's Portal.

While it's not a perfect solution since your hands are still covering screen real estate, it's still a fascinating exercise that could point to how we someday may play hardcore games.

Check out the video demo below:

_{(via Kotaku.)}