What the Heck?: A Look Into The Life of a Modder

Last year, Benjamin Heckendorn could not figure out what to get his mom for Christmas. His pregnant sister suggested a digital camera because “of course, my mom would want to take nine trillion pictures of the baby.” This seemed like a perfect idea, except for one problem. “We couldn’t decide who was going to have to be the one to show her how to use it,” he said. This statement is rather odd, given what he does for a living. Benjamin writes how-to articles on modifying electronics.

Madison, Wisconsin native Ben Heck, as admirers refer him to, is a minor Internet celebrity because of what he would call “skills with a z at the end.” He is a “modder,” or a person who modifies videogame consoles such as Xbox360s or Playstations. “Modding” projects are becoming mainstream as more and more Nintendo Wiis and Sony Playstations fly off the shelves during the holidays. Some people desire highly specialized or personalized versions of their new toy, such as making it portable or adjusting the controller’s layout. For those who are too technologically inept (or lazy) to reengineer their new gaming system, there is Ben Heck.

“What I do is someone will request some kind of highly specialized videogame console and what I do is I take the existing console, let’s say a Playstation 3, and I take it all apart,” he explained. “Then I put it back together and usually I do it in some new form. Typically I make it like a big laptop so it’s a self contained portable video gaming system.” The going rate for a single Ben Heck Xbox360 laptop: “Around $5,000.” However, modding is not necessarily just business for Ben. It also turns out that it is a way for him to help others.

One of Heck’s specialties is creating access controllers. Access controllers are specially designed gaming tools for the disabled who would still like to play videogames, such as amputees or paraplegics. Ben first became interested in such projects when an Iraq veteran contacted him a few years ago. “I think his name was Jason. He had come back from Iraq and he had lost a limb and he was like, I’ve lost a limb but I would still like to play my Xbox. And I’m like, Oh that’s an interesting project idea.” Thus, the one-handed Xbox controller was born. “So, I made this Xbox controller that you can basically hold in one hand, and you can move it against your leg and whatnot. You can play it, do everything with one hand,” he said. “I get a lot of requests for stupid crap like ‘Put five systems in one and blah blah blah.’ I don’t care about that stupid stuff. This was interesting and it was helpful so I was like ‘I will do it!’” As heartwarming as this story is, Heck did not take on this challenge merely out of the goodness of his own heart.

“To be quite honest I was more interested in the challenge than helping people,” he admitted. “I know that sounds terrible but I knew it would help people so that was fine… mostly I was like ‘Wow, this is an interesting challenge’ but I’m glad it helps people too.” Despite the less-than-altruistic motive, it did ultimately yield a beneficial product for many people. Ben even brought some of the controllers to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington D.C. While he was there, Heck learned that “the thing with this war is there’s a lot of casualties but they’re not fatal. They’re like, you lose a limb because of road bombs.” But Ben’s product is not just for those who have been incapacitated by war. The advent of the access controller has also aided stroke victims and those in motorcycle accidents. In fact, according to Heck, it is “unbelievable numbers of motorcycle accidents” that request the controllers. “So riding a motorcycle is apparently more dangerous than going to war,” he said. Because of this observation, he added: “I’ll never ride a motorcycle. Apparently it’s a good way to lose a limb.” This is coming from someone who lives in a “Harley-Davidson state.”

Ben Heck has lived in Wisconsin his whole life. He claims that Wisconsin is, besides being Harley country, a “beer state.” For those outsiders who are unfortunate enough to believe only what they are told, Ben would like to clear something up: “Wisconsin is not the dairy state. It’s the beer state,” he said. “That’s all it is. All we do is drink. So that’s what I tell people about Wisconsin.”

Before he was old enough to be able to drink along with his fellow Wisconsinites, Ben lived with his mom, a sister, and a half-brother “out in the country,” which is “cool” according to Ben because “you can run around outside and have dogs and stuff. And if you’re a guy, you can pee out the back door.” There was at least one downside to living in the middle of nowhere though: “Radio shack was never close enough. And back then, 15 miles might as well be across the ocean when you can’t drive.”

The son of a hairdresser out in rural America somehow found an interest in electronics at a young age. He claims it might have come from his father, who died from heart disease when Ben was six-years-old. “My dad did stuff like [taking electronics apart],” he said. “I mean, he died when I was 6 so I didn’t really have that much time to be influenced, but maybe I subconsciously got influenced via DNA or some shit, I don’t know.”

Heck went to college, but dropped out soon after and instead pursued graphic arts. “I was a graphic artist for awhile and then I started doing [modding] on the side,” he said. “[With] the graphic arts, I definitely learned a lot about design and industrial design and… building things.” His background in arts is still a major aspect of his life today. “I have two boxed retail products which is cool because my favorite part was making the boxes for both of them.”

After modding as a hobby for a while, Ben decided to write a “how-to” book called Hacking Video Game Consoles. He quit his job to work full-time on it but the pay-off was not so much monetary as lifetime achievement. “If you’re not [J.K. Rowling or Dan Brown], maybe Danielle Steel, you’re not going to really become rich off of it but you can say, ‘I have a book.’” He added: “It’s a cool bullet point in your life. Like, ‘Oh yeah I wrote a book once.’” It was not until after he had published his book that the real money came rolling in from doing mods for other people. “People just kept asking me for more stuff.”

At 34-years-old now, Ben Heck has managed to make nearly a brand name for himself. Through his website, pod casts, and articles, Heck reaches a multitude of different people looking to buy his particular mods or get advice on how to do them at home. Many admirers post on his forum hoping to get a response. Brian Buell from Eau Claire, Wisconsin is one of them. A 21-year-old who has been modding for three years, sees Ben as a role model. “I wouldn’t want to say that Ben is necessarily the best modder in the world… but he has had many groundbreaking projects with consistently good quality,” he said via e-mail. “Other modders respect him, both beginners and professionals.” Another Ben Heck fan, Robert Thompson, said: “I feel like Ben has really opened doors to a lot of younger people. With his book alone, he has made working with electronics accessible to thousands of people, and he loves what he does.”

His mother, perhaps, would not automatically agree with all these words of praise on how Ben reaches out to help others. She eventually bought herself a digital camera and didn’t ask for any help from him. However, it soon becomes clear why Ben did not want to buy her one. “So, she takes these pictures of my niece,” Ben began. “Then, she takes them to Wal-Mart, prints them, and mails them to me in the mail. She has my email address and she has a computer. She mails me photos! It was ridiculous,” he said. ““I think she slipped an 8track in there too.” Obviously, he does not his electronic expertise from her.