Ringbow Kickstarter project puts a D-pad on your finger

A mobile gaming peripheral by the name of "Ringbow" hit Kickstarter recently. The bluetooth-enabled device features a D-pad on its surface, potentially solving the "pesky touchscreen D-pad" crisis plaguing some mobile games, such as platforming titles.

A $45 pledge will put one of these Android and (soon to be) iOS-compatible rings on your finger, along with a small collection of games developed around the peripheral. Pledging $55 grants developers early access to the device's API. Ringbow will go into production if the project meets its $100k goal by July 22.

[AntsPai]

$45 for just a D-Pad seems worth it, especially since it looks like it would be easy to play games with and not get in the way of the screen/be awkward to use at all.

/s

[SignifiedSix]

Get one on each index finger and this would be great for kinect :O

[Soldierone]

Would that infringe on Sony's Controller + camera patent though?

[-Gespenst-]

Kickstarter has become a little too popular recently. Thankfully half the shit doesn't get funded. Else we'd have a whole lotta junk on our hands (literally in the case of stuff like this)

[SeekDev]

It's actually less than half, only 33% of projects are successful according to Kickstarter themselves. We can only hope that this product isn't a part of that group.

[mochachino]

These things need wide spread game support before they can take off.

[SeekDev]

Exactly. The problem I'm seeing is that this product is aimed at the android/ios market which mainly consists of casual gamers. Why would a casual gamer want to pay $45 for this? They don't care about precision, they're casual. They'd probably rather buy 45 $1 games than this product. It would take some "Microsoft marketing" to sell this product.

[mochachino]

Lol, I like that term "Microsoft Marketing". Say what you will about MS, but they certainly put 100 percent (and at least 100 million add dollars) behind their products, good or bad.

[SeekDev]

And that makes their products sell like lava cakes.

[Jurat]

Whilst I am dismayed at the inevitable side effects of the kickstarter revolution, every now and then an idea comes along that has instant appeal. This is one of those. I'll be making my first pledge. Imagine two of these devices on your index fingers with analog sticks. You could play full on FPS titles on your your iPad.

[Th3 Chr0nic]

best thing since the powerglove

[KrimsonKody]

I think the quality of android/ios games have to increase 1st in order for these D-pads to sell.
Until the android games gain more depth, better quality & remain totally exclusive to the ios/android market, no one will see much reason to purchase.
Like someone mentioned above, casuals don't care for precision to tough, as oppose to someone slightly more "hardcore", who's concerned with landing the commands precisely.
Even myself;
I play some of the toughest of games on consoles, but I don't get too involved with android/ios games. Sometimes, I don't care to finish them or to get "medals", "trophies" or whatever rewards the game is offering.