For Dylan Huntbach, video games are more than entertainment. Especially during Iowa's long winters, they are a way to spend time with friends. But a cervical spinal cord injury more than a decade ago limited his mobility and hand function, and many games became difficult or impossible to play with a standard controller.

A team of biomedical engineering students at the University of Iowa set out to change that, the university's College of Engineering reported on 27 October.

Designing with, not just for

As part of a course called Advanced Medical Device Design, students Hope Mickey, Drew Bingham, Ashley Streck and Evie Del Campo partnered directly with Huntbach. Rather than being handed a specific solution, they were challenged to understand his daily life and develop their own ideas.

"We received information about Dylan's injury and talked with him about the things he wanted to do," Mickey said. "Gaming was one of the activities that was important to him, so we worked closely with him throughout the design process to create something that fit his needs."

The team built a large format controller for the Nintendo Switch with oversized buttons, a custom layout and joysticks, using acrylic, 3D printed parts and a Raspberry Pi microcontroller. After testing the working prototype, Huntbach got to keep it at his home in Waterloo.

"This is awesome, it feels great," he said. "I could play online more now with friends, and other games that I haven't been able to play before."

An exceptional outcome

Colleen Bringman, associate professor of instruction in biomedical engineering, said the course is really about learning to take a concept from start to finish rather than the final result. "But this was an exceptional outcome," she said. "They went beyond the minimum requirements, and it was something that can successfully be used in the setting it was designed for."

This is technology at its most human. The best tools begin by listening: asking what someone loves to do, then removing what stands in the way. Play and friendship are part of a full life, and making them accessible is a real act of care.

Learn more

• Read the University of Iowa story.
• Learn about organisations that provide adaptive gaming equipment to disabled players.
• If you design products, include disabled people in the process from the start.

Source: University of Iowa College of Engineering, 27 October 2026.