Play Forza with This Modded RC Controller

Dave Madison has always been fascinated by remote-controlled cars: speed-based fun and engineering wrapped up in a package small enough to hold in your hand. One day while playing a racing game, he got the idea to combine the two with a modified RC-style wheel controller and USB dongle. What he came up with adapts it to play Forza Horizon 4 on a PC, and it's capable of being used with other games that support the Xbox controller (XInput).

The build is outlined nicely in the video below, and although the controller itself was modded, the overall form stayed the same. Changes included swapping a button from a toggle input to momentary, along with adding a pair of extra buttons on the top with custom caps.

These extra buttons add two extra channels to the output, which works perfectly with the included 6-channel receiver. To interface the receiver to the console, it was disassembled and sandwiched on top of a custom ATmega32U4 USB-cable dev board — based on the SparkFun Pro Micro, with a USB-A plug built into it. This translates PWM signals into standard controller inputs, using his own Arduino Xinput Library. A parts list is available in the above linked write-up, and code, CAD, and PCB designs are on GitHub.