On how gareth170 made a change

gareth170 is a regular forum user at Overclockers UK (a store, and very popular forum for everything PC).

On the 31st of January 2011, at 20:13, gareth170 posted the following message:

hi

i payed for dead space 2 today. installed it and ran the game. went to settings, controls , to custom them, and guess what!!! theres no way to have the walk forward on a mouse button... it makes me so mad that game companys don't make they games fully custom controls....

if they can have the fire assigned to a mouse button, surely they could of assigned to a mouse button...

so now i can't play this game and i wasted £25..

Initially, gareth170 faces the usual barrage of OcUK hostility - ridicule, poking fun at him, etc.

It then turns out gareth170 is a quadriplegic (ie can't move any of his 4 limbs) gamer. He plays games with his chin. To prove his point, he uploads a video of himself playing a number of games (including Dirt 2 and Fallout 3 - New Vegas).

Of course, suddenly the forumites that were making fun of him were hailing him as a legend (see page 3). The best bit though, is that gareth170, along with the quadriplegic comedian/videogamer Chuck Bittner successfully rally EA/Visceral to add disabled-friendly options in Dead Space 2 (and hopefully future games).

gareth170 has now been interviewed by PC Gamer, featured on Eurogamer, and has been emailed by company CEOs to show their support for the cause.

It's a heart-warming tale of gamers uniting for a good cause, despite initially being sceptical and perhaps even mean towards gareth170, before he bravely uploaded a video of himself for all to see.

Have a look at the thread, at least the first 3 pages of it until he uploads his videos - you can literally here people's jaws dropping as they realise how skilled the man is.

So, here's to you gareth170, and to you Chuck Bittner - and may you play long!