Sir CarcassI have been shown the end of my worldRound Rock, TXRegistered Userregular
My main concern with using a trackpad for buttons is it's absolutely terrible on my Nexus 7. The main problem being you can't tell where your thumb is in relation to the buttons like you can by feeling the physical edge of them. It makes it hard to make sure your fingers are where you think they are in relation to the buttons, or keep glancing down. These look like they have ridges or something, so it may work, I dunno.
I am curious to try it as a kbam replacement, though. I could see having this and a 360 controller for all of your gaming needs.
The more I look at this controller and compare it to my existing one, the more excited I am for it. The potential! My major complaints about my 360 controller appear to be resolved with this thing.
I like the gallery of controllers on the left side of the picture. Anyone know what the first one is? other is NES, SNES, N64, the Duke, blank, Wii, and Atari?
I like the gallery of controllers on the left side of the picture. Anyone know what the first one is? other is NES, SNES, N64, the Duke, blank, Wii, and Atari?
If you had told me a year ago that the end result of Valve developing a new controller would be an updated Turbo Touch 360, I would've laughed in your face.
I like the gallery of controllers on the left side of the picture. Anyone know what the first one is? other is NES, SNES, N64, the Duke, blank, Wii, and Atari?
Pong paddle, maybe?
I think that's a Dreamcast controller instead of an Xbox one.
I like the gallery of controllers on the left side of the picture. Anyone know what the first one is? other is NES, SNES, N64, the Duke, blank, Wii, and Atari?
Pong paddle, maybe?
I think that's a Dreamcast controller instead of an Xbox one.
Looks more like a NES bone controller than an SNES controller .
I was kinda thinking the first is the Wii U just because of the touch screen tech in the SteamPad
I like the gallery of controllers on the left side of the picture. Anyone know what the first one is? other is NES, SNES, N64, the Duke, blank, Wii, and Atari?
Pong paddle, maybe?
I think that's a Dreamcast controller instead of an Xbox one.
Looks more like a NES bone controller than an SNES controller .
I was kinda thinking the first is the Wii U just because of the touch screen tech in the SteamPad
yeah, I was thinking it looked like the dogbone also
The main problem being you can't tell where your thumb is in relation to the buttons like you can by feeling the physical edge of them.
If the haptic feedback works like I am imagining, the touchpads could actually give you subtle feedback when your finger is on a virtual button, effectively allowing you to feel your way around the pad without looking. Whether this is the case and how well it works will (for me at least) be a big factor in how well this can work for some games. I am cautiously optimistic at this point.
Starcraft 2 can't be played with a controller? Hell, there was a guy on Twitch that would essentially troll people by kicking their asses with a controller. Apparently his account was banned recently? That's a shame. And I'm not talking Bronze or Silver here, apparently he made it up to Masters (not sure if he ever crossed into Grand Masters, but that's pretty damned high) like that. Can't imagine the tear he'd go on with one of these things.
Like, don't get me wrong. My friends are mostly console players and we've had the 'what is better/more accurate/etc' conversations, but I respect that while for the average person, certain tools or layouts/setups might be easier to use or quicker to pick up, let's not use absolutes here either.
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
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Magus`The fun has been DOUBLED!Registered Userregular
I'm not sure about that controller just yet. My biggest issue with the 360 controller is the d-pad is garbage and I'd like the analog stick to be shorter, but... yeah.
This controller actually looks great. I've been trying to do more and more on my PC with a controller and this may finally resolve the issue I have with controllers in most games.
I guess we'll see just how much res the trackpads have.
I also think it looks great. I won't give up KBAM completely, but this is something I would definitely like to try and use.
Yeah there have been times where I've wanted to play more mouse driven games with a gamepad. Like simply lie back in bed and play them. I even played King's Bounty with a gamepad and an emulator (actually work surprisingly fine. Slightly slower to play but it's turn based so it doesn't really make much difference). So if they've got something that works better, I'm certainly interested in taking a look.
I once used one of these to play Battle for Wesnoth. It wasn't that bad, surprisingly:
What? No. Saying you need to use hotkeys to play Starcraft is not a "lolnoob" insult. The game is designed, in both single and multiplayer, around the assumption that the player will learn the hotkeys, as all of the single player missions have their difficulty tuned with the assumption of a certain level of input speed that comes from learning to use the hotkeys.
Yes, you can click everything. The developers assume you'll learn the better, faster method they provided you as you play.
Well, thing is I'm not really going to. I play like a dozen strategy games as fancy strikes and each one has different bindings, and I don't have the time to learn the bindings in all of them (and if I bothered to learn one, you bet Starcraft wouldn't be the one, anyway, but that's another matter entirely).
That said, I don't really think this controller looks half as comfortable as a mouse even for my casual RTS playing.
Anyway, as to my opinion... honestly, color me very skeptical. I'm not going to call doom or anything, but it doesn't particularly strike my fancy at all. But eh, I already have plenty of controller power between my X360 and my Classic controllers, anyway. So if it is a bit of a dud it's not really any skin off my back. Hence, color me cautiously pessimistic.
This controller looks like they took the concept of mobile phone virtual joysticks -- the worst idea ever -- and mapped them to physical hardware.
Agreed. I'm also finding it really funny that the only announcement they've made with any kind of image of the product also happens to be the one I think is an utterly godawful idea.
Still, a controller isn't really a high stakes gamble for Valve. If this is the only part of the triumvirate that explodes directly in their face, they'll be happy with that.
Finding the perfect balance between function and comfort/ease of use is the holy Grail of gaming controls. I don't think this is it, but maybe it's a step in the right direction.
Everyone is also ignoring the fact that they'll be opening the spec for anyone, so someone can make one with thumbsticks.
But who is going to bother when we have DualShock 4 and Xbone controllers coming, the former of which also has a touchpad for navigation and more PC-like inputs? And replacing the thumb-pads doesn't solve the poor button placement, or lack of a D-Pad.
I actually am intrigued by the touchpads, it's the rest of the controller I'm iffy on.
Maybe it'll be great when/if I use one, but strafe is on the left stick/pad, turn is on the right stick/pad. Jumping also with the left stick/pad seems wrong and bad. On a 360 controller it belongs on A. It's on the opposite hand here. And I'm still not sold on all those buttons and touch pretend buttons being so far off of the sticks/pads. It seems like you'll use them for more "down in the weeds" stuff. I don't care if quick save and quick load are a little awkward. I care if jump or attack are. And on the new controller it looks like they are.
See, that bugs me, because then, I'm splitting all movement between my left and right hands. I enjoyed games that limited them to the left hand and kept all right hand motion controls for crouch.
I don't think I understand. How are you strafing and turning with one hand? The only thing I can think of that did that was Goldeneye on the N64 which featured no real look. Up was forward, down was back, and left and right were turn.
Well, I put aiming in a separate category from moving so that's fine for the right stick, but moving the character around, jumping, and the like are what I associate with the left hand and left stick, just as I use that for the left hand on the keyboard. If I had to have something go to the right stick, I'd prefer that to be crouch rather than the jump. Apples for apple people.
Finding the perfect balance between function and comfort/ease of use is the holy Grail of gaming controls. I don't think this is it, but maybe it's a step in the right direction.
It's just a matter of time until they make a (cheap, non-surgical) thought-controlled device.
Everyone is also ignoring the fact that they'll be opening the spec for anyone, so someone can make one with thumbsticks.
I don't see what someone making a different controller has to do with this controller, the one we are talking about, being questionable.
Basically if you're crying about this controller and it's lack of analog sticks there will be one out there that has the sticks AND can be used in every Steam game as this one can be.
So, I've seen people (not necessarily here) who can't quite figure out the advantage this control affords over a traditional thumbsticks, so I've created the following images to explain.
Thumbsticks work by giving the user control over acceleration of movement. The thumbsticks themselves don't actually control where your looking, but rather how much your view changes every tick. So here is a thumb stick that is centered for 4 hypothetical frames:
when the stick is centered, the degree of acceleration is 0, and you see that the direction the person is facing remains the same for all 4 frames. But if we tilt the stick slightly, like so:
now we see that we have a 15 degree change. So, in frame 1, we're still looking forward, then in frame 2, our view has shifted 15 degrees, then further and further until by frame 4, we're looking to our right. Now, we can push the stick further and make the rate at which our view changes increase in speed, like so:
now the change is 45 degrees. You see that, by frame 3, we're now looking to our right when, if we'd pushed the stick slightly less, it took us 4 frames. This is actually what we have control over, how fast the things change. but the fundamental flaw with this control method is you still have to wait until the game updates enough for you to face the desired direction. These thumbsticks have limits to their extents, so, for example, there is no way to push the stick far enough so that, by the very next frame, we're facing the complete opposite direction. There is always a few frames we have to wait.
Now, with touchpads (or with a mouse) we can directly select exactly which directly we want to face, on any given frame. It works like so:
you can see from left to right is actually a gradiant of positions which encompasses our view in 360 degrees. When we press in the middle, or don't press anything, we're looking forward. However, we can slide to different positions on the gradient and our view will match within the colored circle instantly:
with touch (and mouse) controls, we're not inputting the rate of change. We're inputting exactly where we want to look. That is the advantage mouse users have over controller users - they can instantly select any angle to use, where as controller users have to wait to get there. These touchpads afford the exact same advantage, without the need for a mouse.
Does that clear this up for anybody? Feel free to repost this anywhere else, btw.
Maybe it'll be great when/if I use one, but strafe is on the left stick/pad, turn is on the right stick/pad. Jumping also with the left stick/pad seems wrong and bad. On a 360 controller it belongs on A. It's on the opposite hand here. And I'm still not sold on all those buttons and touch pretend buttons being so far off of the sticks/pads. It seems like you'll use them for more "down in the weeds" stuff. I don't care if quick save and quick load are a little awkward. I care if jump or attack are. And on the new controller it looks like they are.
See, that bugs me, because then, I'm splitting all movement between my left and right hands. I enjoyed games that limited them to the left hand and kept all right hand motion controls for crouch.
I don't think I understand. How are you strafing and turning with one hand? The only thing I can think of that did that was Goldeneye on the N64 which featured no real look. Up was forward, down was back, and left and right were turn.
Well, I put aiming in a separate category from moving so that's fine for the right stick, but moving the character around, jumping, and the like are what I associate with the left hand and left stick, just as I use that for the left hand on the keyboard. If I had to have something go to the right stick, I'd prefer that to be crouch rather than the jump. Apples for apple people.
That was bad comm on my part then. Left stick is for moving your whole character, right stick is for aiming your gun. I think we agree (at least on how stick movement ought to work).
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CarbonFireSee youin the countryRegistered Userregular
How many games need a d-pad anyway? I can't think of the last time I used one for primary control that wasn't on a DS
Fighting games, platformers, some puzzle games. More to the point, a lot of games use those as an additional 4 buttons for other actions (only two of which exist here, on the back of the controller). And a touchscreen is a poor substitution for adding buttons, because if I ever have to LOOK at my controller while I'm playing, then the control scheme automatically fails.
I once used one of these to play Battle for Wesnoth. It wasn't that bad, surprisingly:
snip
When I am looking for a review of controllers, I don't want "wasn't that bad" to be the stand-out quote.
Well it wasn't that great of a controller, but it wasn't terrible. I also played Quake, Half-Life 2, and a handful of other games with it, but the turn-based nature of Wesnoth made learning how to use it my favorite choice.
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CuvisTheConquerorThey always say "yee haw" but they never ask "haw yee?" Registered Userregular
How many games need a d-pad anyway? I can't think of the last time I used one for primary control that wasn't on a DS
If you stick to modern AAA titles, not many, except for fighters. But there's a lot of indie titles and smaller titles where a good D-pad is essential, to say nothing of retro games.
Finding the perfect balance between function and comfort/ease of use is the holy Grail of gaming controls. I don't think this is it, but maybe it's a step in the right direction.
It's just a matter of time until they make a (cheap, non-surgical) thought-controlled device.
I suspect that this won't be the solution either, honestly.
Look how well it worked out for the Krell, after all.
Also worth noting, with this controller, you have access to 8 buttons without ever taking your hands off the touchpads - the 2 touchpads themselves, the 4 triggers, and the 2 handle grips.
All the other controllers only give you access to 6 buttons at once - 2 analog stick buttons, and 4 triggers.
This thing might look unconventional, but it sounds like it's a much more precise controller than what is currently available.
This isn't the perfect controller, not by a long shot. But it does sound like the best attempt to cram KB&M into a controller that I've ever seen.
I'm not really nervous about the touch pads because haptics. Until you play with something that uses that sort of feedback it can be really hard to judge. If they implement it correctly this will feel nothing like the touchscreen game pad controls used in phone/tablet games. That's not to say it will be inherently better than a stick, but it will be very different from iphone gameing.
My big question is about the "16 buttons" and if there are analog triggers.
I see:
2 triggers
2 back buttons
4 face buttons (A/B/X/Y)
2 additional face buttons (start/select)
2 trackstick buttons
I need four more. The Portal layout provides 4 buttons via the trackpad, but I don't think that will count for buttons.
I think the area around the "tracksticks" contains the other 4 somehow, or at least 2. In the portal layout, there's a filled in circle button, and a filled outer ring button (l-shift). Am I missing something obvious?
How many games need a d-pad anyway? I can't think of the last time I used one for primary control that wasn't on a DS
If you stick to modern AAA titles, not many, except for fighters. But there's a lot of indie titles and smaller titles where a good D-pad is essential, to say nothing of retro games.
I don't know - I see the d-pad as a quick select on the d-pad all the time. I just finished Assassin's Creed III, for example, and it was definitely used there (at least on the 360).
Posts
I am curious to try it as a kbam replacement, though. I could see having this and a 360 controller for all of your gaming needs.
Day 1 purchase for me. When/where - sign me up!
Pong paddle, maybe?
I think that's a Dreamcast controller instead of an Xbox one.
Looks more like a NES bone controller than an SNES controller .
I was kinda thinking the first is the Wii U just because of the touch screen tech in the SteamPad
Steam ID: Good Life
yeah, I was thinking it looked like the dogbone also
If the haptic feedback works like I am imagining, the touchpads could actually give you subtle feedback when your finger is on a virtual button, effectively allowing you to feel your way around the pad without looking. Whether this is the case and how well it works will (for me at least) be a big factor in how well this can work for some games. I am cautiously optimistic at this point.
Like, don't get me wrong. My friends are mostly console players and we've had the 'what is better/more accurate/etc' conversations, but I respect that while for the average person, certain tools or layouts/setups might be easier to use or quicker to pick up, let's not use absolutes here either.
BOOM
Steam Profile | Signature art by Alexandra 'Lexxy' Douglass
I once used one of these to play Battle for Wesnoth. It wasn't that bad, surprisingly:
Well, thing is I'm not really going to. I play like a dozen strategy games as fancy strikes and each one has different bindings, and I don't have the time to learn the bindings in all of them (and if I bothered to learn one, you bet Starcraft wouldn't be the one, anyway, but that's another matter entirely).
That said, I don't really think this controller looks half as comfortable as a mouse even for my casual RTS playing.
Anyway, as to my opinion... honestly, color me very skeptical. I'm not going to call doom or anything, but it doesn't particularly strike my fancy at all. But eh, I already have plenty of controller power between my X360 and my Classic controllers, anyway. So if it is a bit of a dud it's not really any skin off my back. Hence, color me cautiously pessimistic.
Agreed. I'm also finding it really funny that the only announcement they've made with any kind of image of the product also happens to be the one I think is an utterly godawful idea.
Still, a controller isn't really a high stakes gamble for Valve. If this is the only part of the triumvirate that explodes directly in their face, they'll be happy with that.
Battle.net
When I am looking for a review of controllers, I don't want "wasn't that bad" to be the stand-out quote.
Rock Band DLC | GW:OttW - arrcd | WLD - Thortar
"Was mostly not on fire." ?
Steam Profile | Signature art by Alexandra 'Lexxy' Douglass
"Didn't give me cancer, and I think that's a feature we can all get behind."
I wouldn't mind a few reviews saying stuff like "pretty good" and "was ok"
instead of everyone either saying IT WAS AWESOME AND EPIC except for a couple of issues or IT WAS HORRIBLE AND WRONG except for a couple of things
Steam ID: Good Life
But who is going to bother when we have DualShock 4 and Xbone controllers coming, the former of which also has a touchpad for navigation and more PC-like inputs? And replacing the thumb-pads doesn't solve the poor button placement, or lack of a D-Pad.
I actually am intrigued by the touchpads, it's the rest of the controller I'm iffy on.
Well, I put aiming in a separate category from moving so that's fine for the right stick, but moving the character around, jumping, and the like are what I associate with the left hand and left stick, just as I use that for the left hand on the keyboard. If I had to have something go to the right stick, I'd prefer that to be crouch rather than the jump. Apples for apple people.
http://www.fallout3nexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=16534
It's just a matter of time until they make a (cheap, non-surgical) thought-controlled device.
I don't see what someone making a different controller has to do with this controller, the one we are talking about, being questionable.
Basically if you're crying about this controller and it's lack of analog sticks there will be one out there that has the sticks AND can be used in every Steam game as this one can be.
Thumbsticks work by giving the user control over acceleration of movement. The thumbsticks themselves don't actually control where your looking, but rather how much your view changes every tick. So here is a thumb stick that is centered for 4 hypothetical frames:
when the stick is centered, the degree of acceleration is 0, and you see that the direction the person is facing remains the same for all 4 frames. But if we tilt the stick slightly, like so:
now we see that we have a 15 degree change. So, in frame 1, we're still looking forward, then in frame 2, our view has shifted 15 degrees, then further and further until by frame 4, we're looking to our right. Now, we can push the stick further and make the rate at which our view changes increase in speed, like so:
now the change is 45 degrees. You see that, by frame 3, we're now looking to our right when, if we'd pushed the stick slightly less, it took us 4 frames. This is actually what we have control over, how fast the things change. but the fundamental flaw with this control method is you still have to wait until the game updates enough for you to face the desired direction. These thumbsticks have limits to their extents, so, for example, there is no way to push the stick far enough so that, by the very next frame, we're facing the complete opposite direction. There is always a few frames we have to wait.
Now, with touchpads (or with a mouse) we can directly select exactly which directly we want to face, on any given frame. It works like so:
you can see from left to right is actually a gradiant of positions which encompasses our view in 360 degrees. When we press in the middle, or don't press anything, we're looking forward. However, we can slide to different positions on the gradient and our view will match within the colored circle instantly:
with touch (and mouse) controls, we're not inputting the rate of change. We're inputting exactly where we want to look. That is the advantage mouse users have over controller users - they can instantly select any angle to use, where as controller users have to wait to get there. These touchpads afford the exact same advantage, without the need for a mouse.
Does that clear this up for anybody? Feel free to repost this anywhere else, btw.
That was bad comm on my part then. Left stick is for moving your whole character, right stick is for aiming your gun. I think we agree (at least on how stick movement ought to work).
Fighting games, platformers, some puzzle games. More to the point, a lot of games use those as an additional 4 buttons for other actions (only two of which exist here, on the back of the controller). And a touchscreen is a poor substitution for adding buttons, because if I ever have to LOOK at my controller while I'm playing, then the control scheme automatically fails.
Well it wasn't that great of a controller, but it wasn't terrible. I also played Quake, Half-Life 2, and a handful of other games with it, but the turn-based nature of Wesnoth made learning how to use it my favorite choice.
If you stick to modern AAA titles, not many, except for fighters. But there's a lot of indie titles and smaller titles where a good D-pad is essential, to say nothing of retro games.
I suspect that this won't be the solution either, honestly.
Look how well it worked out for the Krell, after all.
http://steamcommunity.com/id/tralev/
All the other controllers only give you access to 6 buttons at once - 2 analog stick buttons, and 4 triggers.
This thing might look unconventional, but it sounds like it's a much more precise controller than what is currently available.
This isn't the perfect controller, not by a long shot. But it does sound like the best attempt to cram KB&M into a controller that I've ever seen.
My big question is about the "16 buttons" and if there are analog triggers.
I see:
2 triggers
2 back buttons
4 face buttons (A/B/X/Y)
2 additional face buttons (start/select)
2 trackstick buttons
I need four more. The Portal layout provides 4 buttons via the trackpad, but I don't think that will count for buttons.
I think the area around the "tracksticks" contains the other 4 somehow, or at least 2. In the portal layout, there's a filled in circle button, and a filled outer ring button (l-shift). Am I missing something obvious?
Origin: Viycktor
I don't know - I see the d-pad as a quick select on the d-pad all the time. I just finished Assassin's Creed III, for example, and it was definitely used there (at least on the 360).