An idle mind is the devil’s worksop, but then again sometimes idle minds conjure up wonders like this homemade accelerometer-controlled USB gamepad which houses a PIC18F2550 from Starlino within.
The code for the firmware was written in PicBasic Pro and it implements a HID USB device with 2 axes and 4 buttons (only 2 buttons connected in the prototype). The device is detected by Windows XP/Vista as a standard USB gamepad and can be used with many games and applications. I am using a 2 Axes Buffered ±2g Accelerometer from DIMENSION ENGINEERING, it has a built in voltage regulator that allows powering the accelerometer directly from the USB bus (5V).
If you’re interested in making one of your own, head on here.