Valve's Orange Box Finally Receives Novint Falcon Controller Support

13 Comments Posted June 24, 2009 - By Jake Gaskill

Valve Adds Support For Novint's Falcon Controller To Orange Box Novint’s Falcon controller of the future is one of the craziest pieces of technology available today. If you aren’t familiar with it, the controller basically lets you feel the actions taking place in a game in hyper-realistic ways, sometimes by replicating the physical make-up of objects, thereby creating the proper amount of resistance whenever you interact with those objects. It also has a pistol attachment for first-person shooters that not only provides realistic kickback, but it also vibrates according to where enemy bullets are hitting your body. I remember when the controller was demoed here in the offices a while back, and the whole place was giddy for several weeks afterwards. It’s that cool.

Anyway, Valve has just released an update via Steam that adds support for the Novint Falcon to its critically acclaimed Orange Box. Valve says that it also plans to add support for Left 4 Dead, Day of Defeat: Source and Counter Strike: Source sometime soon. The partnership between Novint and Valve was first announced almost a year ago to the day that this update showed up on Steam, so it's been a long time coming. However, for anyone who loves mind-blowing game controllers and Valve games, it seems it was well worth the wait.

Novint CEO Tom Anderson said via press release:

"We're very excited to partner with a company so dominant in the PC game industry. Their sustained excellence, best-selling games, enormous user base, and forward looking vision make them standard bearers for the industry. We feel Falcon support for their online games in particular could be our first real killer app, which is an exciting milestone."

For a limited time, Novint is selling a Falcon/Pistol Grip/Orange Box bundle for $149, which is quite the bargain considering the controller itself is usually $189.99. If you have the means, I highly recommend looking into picking one up.

Anyone out there have a Novint Falcon, or at least tried one out?

Source

Tags: PC Gaming, Tech

Comments

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XoneGod

Took them long enough... Been having to brew my own code for most games, but Orange box and its success should had put it on top of Novits list. ..X..

Posted: June 24, 2009 10:04 AM | Reply | Report

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IcemanMX

I am curious to know how many people out there have this Falcon controller. I have heard amazing things about it, but I do not feel that it has been adopted by gamers on a massive scale. Could someone reading this please put it into perspective for me, please?

-M

Posted: June 24, 2009 10:19 AM | Reply | Report

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KevinJames23

This thing sounds kind of cool, article writer what do you mean "replicating" the make up of objects? If in the game you're touching let's say sand, does the controller let you feel a sand like texture on your hand?

Posted: June 24, 2009 10:44 AM | Reply | Report

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TheFrza

Yes, you can feel the textures on your hand. There is a demo package that has ice, rubber, sand and other textures that you can feel. The falcon with a pistol grip is an excellent accessory and I recommend it fully.

Posted: June 24, 2009 12:15 PM | Reply | Report

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Vergil117

This has been out for a while (like months) if you followed along the steam client betas.

Posted: June 24, 2009 1:18 PM | Reply | Report

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CamperHunter1

Never tried one of these, but if it really enhances the experience that much, I just may look into it.

Interested to see when they add L4D support what its gonna feel like when you get stuck with a crappy team that lets 20-30 zombies start bashing your body when incapped. Hopefully it doesn't blow up =)

Posted: June 24, 2009 3:29 PM | Reply | Report

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IntelliMoo

Guess true virtual reality is finally around the corner... for a nice chunk of change. eek

Posted: June 24, 2009 3:43 PM | Reply | Report

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B1ack_Blob

How much does it cost, I remember a story about it a while back, but i forgot a bit.

Posted: June 24, 2009 9:21 PM | Reply | Report

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B1ack_Blob

oh im stupid, its right there. hmm under 200 dollers? god i want one... hmm

Posted: June 24, 2009 9:24 PM | Reply | Report

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B1ack_Blob

Crist i may just get one, but i want to try one out before i do.

Posted: June 24, 2009 9:33 PM | Reply | Report

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tomnovint

Hey guys, I'm Novint's CEO. Here are some answers. Let me know other questions you have. thx, tomnovint.

“Could someone reading this please put it into perspective for me, please? “
it is still what you consider early adopter, but hopefully with the Valve release we'll start selling many many more :)

“does the controller let you feel a sand like texture on your hand”
yes, it give you a very realistic sense of touch. In our Penumbra games you can feel the surfaces and textures of every object. It is such high fidelity that we can simulate a virtual surgical procedure that feels realistic (i.e. like the real life procedure) to a doctor. We're now taking that level of realism and letting gamers use it

"This has been out for a while (like months) if you followed along the steam client betas."
that is true - beta's been out for a while, but this is the first official release of our first AAA title, which is a big milestone.

Posted: June 25, 2009 10:05 PM | Reply | Report

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tomnovint

[cont]
"Interested to see when they add L4D support what its gonna feel like when you get stuck with a crappy team that lets 20-30 zombies start bashing your body when incapped. Hopefully it doesn't blow up =)"
you'll love L4D. I love being smashed around by 20 zombies - a very compelling feeling.

"How much does it cost, I remember a story about it a while back, but i forgot a bit."
we have a special for $149 with the pistol grip and a bunch of software including orange box, for one week.

"Crist i may just get one, but i want to try one out before i do."
we have a 30 day money back guarantee

btw I love G4! thanks for the pickup guys. Your front page is where I get much of my gaming news each day, so I was stoked to see us on it ;)

thx, tomnovint, ceo

Posted: June 25, 2009 10:05 PM | Reply | Report

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serinitism

B1ack_Blob - you won't be returning it =) I recommend it highly (with the pistol grip) the normal ball grip works for most but FPS really bennefits from the pistol grip. That said, the Falcon adds a TON to the immersion of gaming. Not only are you looking around and shooting with it, you feel the recoil, the reload, and the impacts (using Crysis as my example here).

The demo is a great example of what it can do with the textures - sand, ice, metal, goo (molases) you can feel as your virtual hand passes over it and into it in the case of the sand and goo. The basic control and feedback is really the tip of the iceburg and my hope is that this release will boost the support from control to more detailed textures in games... possibly feeling along a wall for an uneven area indicating a secret passage.

Posted: July 3, 2009 6:56 AM | Reply | Report

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