[T-Mobile myTouch 4G Slide] Blue6IX:
Don't even have to go that far.

My complaint lies along the lines of yours, which is no d-pad, but more specifically - no arrow keys.

Fear not, XDA to the rescue with a solution.

If you slide open the keyboard, you will notice at the bottom that you have 4 buttons:

Genius, Back, Menu and Home.

These are the same 4 buttons you have at the bottom of the screen on the front face of the phone.

When the keyboard is open, both sets of buttons work. This means that if you just took out the 4 duplicates on the hardware keyboard, you wouldn't lose any functionality of the phone.

Solution is at hand: Remap the 4 buttons at the bottom of the hardware keyboard to correspond with left, right, up and down.

The way I ended up making it was:

Home = Up ... It kinda looks like it's pointing up...

Menu = Down ... This one picture-wise is just off...oh well...

Back = Left ... It looks like it...

Genius = Right ... The tail of the G points right, right? ....

I can't tell you how much time, effort and energy this has saved me since i've done it.

Read through this thread: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1192282

It has everything you need to do what I just described. It's much easier to edit on the device with Root Explorer.

ETA:

Also, about game emulators - I picked up some a while back, to play my old NES and SNES games with on my Nook - this phone takes it to a whole other level. RCA cable plugged into the TV from the headphones jack, and the phone becomes an interactive controller for the game on the TV screen.

Original mario, contra, tetris? yep. Looking at the useless NES game cartridges physically sitting in front of me, with no system to play them on and my phone breathes new life into games I grew up with.

Starfox ... on my phone ... on a TV...I don't have to take my SNES with me to play it at a friends house...just my phone.

This phone is the future of gaming, right now in your hand. I've said that a few times, here and elsewhere, but it's true. The CPU and GPU on this device were built with precisely this idea in mind, to put the console/controller in the persons hand with direct access to a market 24/7. It works great for the consumers and the producers. This device is the first phone capable of this act interactively, with a live screen, and so sets itself apart as the prototype for a generation.

I am blown away with what this phone can do, and once we get kernel source it's gonna be a whole new game.

I ordered a bluetooth controller, should be here in a few days. I know it won't work, but that's going to force me to figure out how to make it happen. I dislike having to pass around my phone as a controller. For myself, that's fine...but at parties...

I also refuse to play games like mortal kombat, where i'm trained to use pressure while playing. I don't want to use too much pressure on the screen, and won't let others play who I know will. A bluetooth controller solves this problem, because then I could plug the phone in to the TV and leave it by the TV, and just pass around a $16 bluetooth generic controller. Much, much preferred.

Meantime, the phone acts as a fantastic controller, and with an ipod A/V cable you can plug into any monitor with RCA ( red, white, yellow ) connections.