History Main / UnusualUserInterface

* E.W. Hildick's ''Literature/GhostSquad'' novels featured an inversion of this trope. One of the main characters regularly used a word processor (with a regular keyboard) that he built himself. The inversion is that the protagonists were ghosts of young people, and they were severely limited in how they could interact with the physical world. The electronics whiz's affinity for his creation gave them a way to communicate with the living.

* Cylons in ''Series/{{Battlestar Galactica|2003}}'' have two for the price of one. They can plug fiberoptic cable into their forearm to interface with computers (but they have to [[{{Squick}} make an incision first)]] and they can interface with their own ships by putting their hands in a stream of water called the "datastream". The latter might be either electrical or biochemical transmitters, it's unclear but it [[RuleOfCool sure looks cool!]] It helps that they're {{Artificial Human}}s. Humans also seem to interface well enough whenever putting their hands in this cylon liquid. But perhaps this is facilitated by the hybrids always present in the bathtub in those instances.

* The controls for playing ''[[Franchise/DotHack The World]]'' always involve a UsefulNotes/PlayStation controller, a keyboard, and a headset, the latter being the unusual part. It simulates a three-dimensional environment in the game (from the view point of the character, maybe) and three dimensional sound and responds to both head and eye movement. [[spoiler:It also operates neurally, though the degree is unspoken as it isn't made a big deal until ''The World R:2''. A fair guess is that most people playing the game assume their character's gestures are procedurally generated.]] [[spoiler:The real kicker, for series fans, is that the neural aspect does not factor into the cause of the coma victims/Lost Ones at all.]]

** In addition to the steering and pedals, the car-robot came equipped with no less than ''seven'' video game controllers: the Atari joystick, the NES controller, Genesis, SNES, UsefulNotes/PlayStation, a ''VideoGame/DanceDanceRevolution'' pad, and just for good times, a ''microphone''. Alongside that, [[PlotSensitiveButton buttons that changed function as the plot required]] ("Missiles," "More Missiles," "All Da Missiles!," "5 Minutes Until End Of Episode," and "Exactly the same button Coop just used like five minutes ago"), and you've got a car that [[OnlyICanMakeItGo only Coop can drive]] (Kiva failed miserably the one time she tried).

* Before the debut of the UsefulNotes/Nintendo64, there were jokes being passed around that the controller was in fact a glob of jelly that could read the electrical impulses from your brain through your fingertips. Though the actual controller was nowhere near as strange, it did offer then-unusual but innovative features like an analog stick and rumble feedback that later became standard across the industry.

* Franchise/RoboCop has a four-inch (or so) data jack that protrudes out of his fist that he can plug into computers to download data. Apparently, every computer in Detroit has a port included specifically for him. We never see anyone else use the same port. [[spoiler: It also becomes a handy ImprovisedWeapon in his [[Film/RoboCop1987 first movie]].]] Its fan name is the [[BrainComputerInterface "neural spike"]].

* In ''Film/ZoomAcademyForSuperheroes'', the spaceship at Area 51 is controlled via placing one's hand in a sphere of gooey stuff.

Want to make your [[ArtificialLimbs cyborg]] or RidiculouslyHumanRobot seem truly technological? Have them [[BrainComputerInterface plug a phone jack into their skull]] to browse the web, or maybe even use AugmentedReality. Maybe you'd like to wow the audience with a truly spectacular piloting system for a spaceship? Have a HolographicTerminal serve as the flight controls. Or heck, maybe you just want to have the universe-destroying superweapon be triggered by ''interpretive dance.'' Point is, there are more ways than a keyboard, knobs, or a steering wheel to tell a machine what to do in sci-fi, and here are some of those ways.

* The little hacker kid from ''DTEightron'' doesn't use keyboards anymore; he links cables to the tip of his fingers and he types, in midair.
* Unusual User Interfaces (as opposed to the traditional aircraft-cockpit style) for HumongousMecha are very popular, as a means of [[HandWave Hand Waving]] the ''why'' behind giant humanoid tanks - they're an extension of the pilot's body:
** Several SuperRobot series us cockpits designed to [[MotionCaptureMecha copy the pilot's motions exactly]], usually because [[MyKungFuIsStrongerThanYours they're super-powerful martial artists]]. The best-known example is ''Anime/MobileFighterGGundam'', but the originator is ''Anime/{{Daimos}}''; ''Anime/GearFighterDendoh'' uses a similar interface, but is (initially) controlled by two people at once for added fun.

* ''VideoGame/DeusEx''
** There are mentions of an occipital[[note]]bone in the back of the skull/lobe of the brain right in front of it responsible for vision (yes, in the back of your head).[[/note]] jack in one in game news article and an in game email. Based on the context of the news article (The fact that a teenage girl has one is mentioned alongside having a tattoo and wearing black) these are looked upon negatively.

Want to make your [[ArtificialLimbs cyborg]] or RidiculouslyHumanRobot seem truly technological? Have them [[BrainComputerInterface plug a phone jack into their skull]] to browse the web, or maybe even use AugmentedReality. Maybe you'd like to wow the audience with a truly spectacular piloting system for a space ship? Have a HolographicTerminal serve as the flight controls. Or heck, maybe you just want to have the universe destroying superweapon be triggered by ''interpretive dance.'' Point is, there's more ways than a keyboard, knobs, or a steering wheel to tell a machine what to do in scifi, and here are some of those ways.

[[folder:Anime and Manga]]

* ''Film/{{Superman}}'' has a kryptonian computer made of crystals. Touching or rearranging the crystals makes the computer perform different functions. How he remembers these without labels is a RequiredSecondaryPower.

* ''Comicbook/PaperGirls'' has an iPod-like device that projects a virtual map directly into the holder's visual cortex, or so we can only assume, because only the character holding the device can see what it is displaying.
* One of ''Comicbook/TomStrong'''s many inventions is a big transparent [[PoweredArmor crystal suit]] for exploring dangerous environments, complete with three color-coded buttons operated with the user's tongue.

* While the Literature/NewKashubiaSeries uses {{Cyberspace}} to pilot its weapons platforms they need cybernetics to access it, however what makes this unusual is that that part was thrown in at the last minute since everything else was already there tech-wise. Later the hero gets a CoolChair so he also doesn't need to strip and float around in a goo pool.

** In their initial appearance, Borg drones use their alcoves to plug themselves into the Borg collective consciousness--to the extent that when using them, drones don't register as individual life forms to sensors. [[Main/EarlyInstallmentWeirdness This is downplayed in subsequent episodes]] where drones are depicted as being fully connected to the Collective at all times.

* ''Videogame/DonkeyKongJungleBeat''. You make a gorilla jump, swing, grab fruit and headbutt giant bird eggs by beating on a pair of bongos and clapping your hands.

* Webcomic/CassiopeiaQuinn has the titular character stealing a spacecraft from a species of blob creatures. Since her hands and feet aren't squishy enough to use the piloting interface, she improvises by using her...[[http://www.cassiopeiaquinn.com/comic/the-seat-of-your-pants-page-13 "aft section"]]

* Implied for circa 2015 video games in ''Film/BackToTheFuturePartII'' when two boys in the Cafe 80s watch Marty pull off a Crack Shot in the vintage arcade game Wild Gunman.

** This raises the question of how video game controls are supposed work in 2015. Computerized goggles that scan eye movements? BrainComputerInterface?

* ''Film/{{District 9}}'' had an alien ship steered by sticking your fingers in two small pots filed with some sort of gel. Looked really fricking cool. There were also conventional touch screens, and {{Holographic Terminal}}s, and screws straight into your brain.

* [[http://starcraft.wikia.com/wiki/Goliath According to]] the ''VideoGame/StarCraft'' [[TheWikiRule wiki]], the Terran Goliath is controlled with the pilot being strapped into a sort of cradle that transmits his/her movements to the mech's computer to imitate them.

* ''Series/{{Farscape}}''

* In ''Series/{{Jake 20}}'', Jake has nanites that allow him to control computers with his brain. Interestingly, he doesn't get any feedback from this interface. So if he hacks a computer, he still needs to look at it in order to read the information.
* On the ''Series/LandOfTheLost'' series, pylons were controlled by arranging different colors of crystal on a glowing grid at the top of a stone pedestal. This was made ''insanely'' difficult by the sheer number of possible combinations of colors, as well as the tendency of crystals to blow up, get hot, generate force fields, or whatever if they actually came into contact with one another. (But then, if it was ''easy'' to operate the portal-opening pylon, the Marshalls could've just camped out inside it for a few days until they triggered a portal leading home.)

* ''Series/SeaquestDSV'' had the HR (Hyper Reality) Probe, a vaguely crab-like ROV that the ship's engineer could operate by means of a VR headset and haptic gloves.