What controls do people use?

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marshmallowSage
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Joined: Wed Mar 25, 2020 4:40 pm

What controls do people use?

Post by marshmallowSage »

I'm putting some finishing touches on my PC bullet hell, and that includes options for different control layouts. Right now I have Arrow Keys + ZXC, WASD + JKL, Mouse + Mouse Buttons, and Xbox controller joystick + buttons. Are there other control layouts people use, or other controllers I should add compatibility for?
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schleichfahrt
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Re: What controls do people use?

Post by schleichfahrt »

Ideally you would add the option to rebind controls, because your keyboard control schemes collide with some language layouts (AZERTY for example, that breaks both).
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M.Knight
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Re: What controls do people use?

Post by M.Knight »

Yeah, input rebinding is a must-have. Good call with the AZERTY keyboards, they are a not that uncommon example of why even the best thought-out controls can be a big miss for some players. And keep in mind that players can have unusual control scheme preferences, or have disabilities that make specific keys more uncomfortable so it's always good to let your players freely configure all their inputs to suit their needs.

I also saw that you listed both keyboard/controllers and mouse controls. While you can have keyboard, controller and arcade stick controls that all feel similar to one another, mouse control really is its own entire thing. Due to the much more dynamic range of movement and faster speed, you can't have a ship that controls the same with all 4 of these control schemes at once.

Unless your game is absolutely made for mouse support, which it ideally shouldn't if it aims at being a PC shoot'em up with dense bullet patterns anyway because the audience that plays those games never uses mice for that, I would say ditch this control method entirely and stick to keyboard/controller/arcade sticks.
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