Ben Kuchera, Polygon:

The screen at the top of this story doesn’t look like much. It’s a simple interface that allows you to swap any one button on the Dual Shock 4 for any other button. It’s a screen that makes gaming a much better place.

“Console wide button remapping is a huge deal for physically impaired gamers. One of the most commonly requested accessibility adaptation AbleGamers receives is for custom controller’s that move buttons to more comfortable positions,” Steve Spohn, COO of the AbleGamers charity; told Polygon.

“If you have limited movement in one arm, only one functioning hand, or even limited digit movement, button positioning is everything. And even more so if you have a neuromuscular disease such as muscular dystrophy where you fatigue more easily depending on what buttons you need to press.”

The push for full customization in button mapping has been going on for years, and some companies are better than others when it comes to offering the feature. What Sony has done is make the conversation obsolete by offering the option at the console level. This is a huge deal for many gamers.

Another tremendously powerful post from Mackenzie Craven:

So here is a snapshot of my post-cancer life, my new normal. I’m back at work full time, squeezing my 40 hours in any way I can with at least 1 of the aforementioned appointments each day. I’m getting mapped for radiation today – once those daily appointments start, my calendar is going to fill up even more. My free time mainly consists of getting my stretching time in to improve the mobility in my arm, but I do try and work out when I can (now that I can). And other than that, I’m just… trying my best to remember how to enjoy life, and to remember what normal even is. It isn’t easy. Some days all I want is for people to acknowledge I’m still recovering from this whole nightmare and cut me some slack, yet other days I swear I will scream If I get another sympathetic face and a “how are you feeling?”  I don’t even want to THINK about cancer one moment… then suddenly it is the only thing on my mind. I’m laughing, I’m crying. I’m a survivor; I’m a victim. I’m fine! I’m not fine. I’m… a contradiction. Every day I put on my best normal face and fool the world around me that I’m doing as well as I’m leading on, yet every day I get frustrated that the world thinks I’m back to normal. I don’t have hair, eyelashes or full range of motion in my arms – but I also don’t have cancer. Baby steps.

An important read about Tim Sweeney and Epic Games covering Unreal Engine, it’s use in interactive experiences from cinema to video games, the potential of VR and AR, and the state of free-to-play.

Chris Plante, The Verge:

When asked if Unreal Engine 4 will span the next 10 years, Sweeney says that it’s for the foreseeable future, that Unreal Engine will get to “the promised land,” a vision of the future Sweeney’s hinted at earlier in the day during his speech at the Game Developers Conference. “This is the word I was afraid to use earlier. This is the convergence of all these forms of media.”

Technologists, media theorists, and game designers spoke of the convergence ad nauseam in the 1990s, when film and video games came together in a garbage fire of media that could neither be called a good game nor a good film. In the 2000s, the convergence was replaced with the notion of transmedia, with entertainment spread across different mediums, connected through a shared universe or narrative. However Sweeney believes the convergence is making a comeback, that the graphics world is seeing humans and technology meeting at a unified point. Sweeney sees photorealistic 3D objects and lighting and virtual reality attracting game designers, sure, but also industrial designers, architects, and film makers to engines like Unreal Engine 4.

In this future, or present if you ask Sweeney, lessons learned from one field, say an architect designing a virtual building, can be applied to games or film, and likewise. Sweeney believes the potential application of the engine across all fields increases exponentially as information is shared.

All of this raises the question: does Epic Games identify purely as a games company? “We’re realizing now that Unreal Engine 4 is a common language between all these common fields.” Sweeney doesn’t see the industries as all that different. More interesting than Sweeney’s prediction of field-sharing information and experience is the speculation of the fields in some ways merging together. For their most recent demo, Epic Games partnered with Weta to create a VR demonstration featuring the dragon Smaug from the The Hobbit.

The separation between game and experience and art is becoming more defined. Under the guise of this piece, interactive experiences such as Journey and Dear Esther feel like the blossoms of Tim Sweeney’s greater vision, most recently demonstrated with Smaug.

Update: I failed to mention the main reason why this important. Not only does the diversity of Unreal Engine 4 practical uses help clarify the categories of computer generated media, there’s this:

… this year, Unreal Engine 4 is free — the company asks for a 5 percent royalty for any commercial product made with the engine that makes more than $3,000 a quarter.

Commercial product: a product that can make money (i.e. video games, VR/AR experiences, movies, TV shows, YouTube shorts, amateur animations, etc.).

Michael Martin, IGN:

Main character Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey) is seen playing and describing the game in the fifth episode of the hit Netflix series. As a result, the game has soared into the top 10 top paid apps on iTunes, where it currently resides at number five and is number three in the paid games category on the Google Play store. The game did not rank in the top 25 on either app store before appearing on the show.

Speaking at GDC 2015, ustwo lead designer Ken Wong said the show’s producers reached out to the developer about the game appearing in House of Cards at no cost to the studio, according to IB Times.

“They called us up and they said, ‘Can we use your game?’ and we said ‘Yes,’” Wong said.

IGN’s Seth G.Macy reporting from PAX East:

“Any item that affects game play,” he told the audience, can be acquired “through grinding.” He compared his ideal F2P model to Disneyland, saying that when a person visits the park, they have the choice to spend money as they see fit once inside, but they can still enjoy and experience all the park has to offer. He contrasted that with Vegas, where the push to spend to increase enjoyment is non-stop.

“Be more Disney, less Vegas,” he said. Bleszinski also said that Boss Key is watching and taking note of the people on the forums and on reddit who are offering suggestions and participating in the community, hinting that they will be rewarded for their participation.

This seems like a very misguided comparison. Bleszinski seemed to skip the part where you pay to enter Disneyland. Get the most out of a $99 single park ticket means a Disneyland guest will spend anywhere from 11 to 16 hours in the park. Guests can bring food and drink into the park, but the realistic chances of anyone bringing in three meals plus snacks sounds overly ambitious. Needless to say, food will be purchased. And if a guest has gotten by without spending a dime inside of Disneyland, they still paid to enter. This is no where near a free-to-play model.