Divekick has been out for a while now, and even before it came out I was drawn in by the idea of owning my own silly, two-button controller. Lacking any sort of technical expertise, I knew that I couldn't easily build something like this, but after tossing around a few ideas I came up with one that seemed reasonable. I grabbed a retired keyboard, kite string, and some old flip flops. Nothing can wash away the horrors that those flip flops saw while keeping me safe in dorm showers, but bleach sure helps. The only purchase that needed to be made in this whole process was a ps/2 to usb adaptor. For about five bucks, legacy hardware can be made new once more.
I ripped the keys and face plate off the old keyboard, sanitized the heck out of both it and the flip flops, and then tied the flip flops to the face plate so that they wouldn't fall off, but could still move. Reattaching a key under each flip flop gave the necessary dive and kick buttons. I ended up placing them in the "I" and "9" spots since that was comfortable.
Now all that was left was to reattach the face plate and decorate!
Beautiful, right? Just beautiful. Starting into playtesting, it was about as cumbersome as I expected for the first few minutes. What I didn't expect was to get used to it and actually perform about as well as I do with sensible controls. So if anyone out there is like I once was, looking helplessly at people's beautiful Divekick controllers and desiring your own, perhaps my story will inspire you to make your own monstrosity. At the right thrift store, you could probably get all the supplies you need for about 10 bucks. Happy divekicking, everyone!
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