Bulletin E-Edition:
more photosAshe Renee, 17, of Bend, right, plays the Bejeweled Twist game Sunday afternoon at CAT6 in The Old Mill District. She is using a foot pad system to control the cursor and move on-screen jewels around.
Photos by Andy Tullis / The Bulletin
Stepping up their game
By Kate Ramsayer / The Bulletin
Published: August 10. 2009 4:00AM PSTKyle Smith, 12, focused on the screen in front of him, rotating brightly colored shapes so they would line up and win him points in the computer game Bejeweled Twist.
But instead of sitting sedentary behind a computer, he balanced on one foot and darted from front to back and to the side, stepping on a specialized game pad to control the cursor in front of him.
Kyle was in the middle of his turn participating in the FootGaming tournament Sunday at CAT6, a video- game lounge in The Old Mill District, which drew players of varying ages. They tried out a system developed by a Bend woman, which allows gamers to guide a cursor around by stepping their feet instead of moving a mouse.
“My feet hurt,” Kyle said shortly after the eight-minute mark of his tournament turn, but he kept going.
He hopped around, pressing the different keys, lining up on-screen diamonds and rubies, racking up points and making it past several levels before his time ran out.
“It makes it really fun with all the steps,” said Kyle, who will start seventh grade at Cascade Middle School this fall. “I kind of had to hop around and wobble a bit.”
Rhett Anderson, 46, took a turn next — he tried out different strategies, including keeping one foot in the center of the board while moving the other around, and standing off the board and reaching for the buttons.
“It was a lot of work — I wasn’t expecting to sweat so much,” he said. “I just tried to not fall over.”
Judy Shasek, 60, of Bend, developed the controller pad to try to encourage kids to be more active, she said.
“I’ve always been interested in getting kids to move more as they learn,” she said.
The FootPowr setup can be used with a variety of computer games, including educational ones, said the former teacher. And this is also a way to play video games but move at the same time.
“We all tend to sit at our computer more than we want to,” Shasek said.
It’s a workout, said David Vigil, 21, of Bend, who noted that he’d rather play these kinds of video games than do jumping jacks.
“It’s definitely a way to keep kids active,” he said. “My calves are pretty sore.”
Ashe Renee, 17, had been honing her FootGaming skills earlier in the week, and it showed — she took an early lead in the competition with 23,800 points.
She’s also a fan of Bejeweled, she said, and plays the more traditional version all the time on her phone.
“I love this game,” she said.
Kate Ramsayer can be reached at 541-617-7811 or at kramsayer@bendbulletin.com.
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