I’ve mostly been a console player throughout the years with only limited dips in the PC pool. However, due to the increasing amount of freelance work I’ve been doing in 3D CAD modeling, I recently made a business decision to splurge on a much more powerful graphics card. The fringe benefit of this is that I can finally play the latest and greatest PC games in my down-time. “Cities:Skylines”, the new “Hitman” and “The Long Dark” are recent favourites.
My problem is that, due to an old injury, I have virtually no use of my left pinky finger and very limited use of my left ring finger. Thankfully, this isn’t an issue with my PS4 but it makes PC keyboard WASD controls awkward at the best of times. It doesn’t matter so much in slower paced genres like puzzle or adventure games but it’s a non-starter when it comes to fast action, esp. online multi-player games.
Does anybody have any experience with alternative game controllers? I’ve seen people vaguely mention things like keypads and other alternatives but I thought I’d see if anybody here had any specific thoughts or recommendations.
For that matter you can also get a PC controller, such as one by Logitech. But, yeah, if you can use a controller fine then the obvious answer is to buy a controller. I thought this thread would be about playing games with a trackball or CueCat or something
My limited understanding is that most games default to an Xbox controller scheme for button prompts (color/shape) and stuff like that. But I’ll allow any PS controller users to saw if there’s any actual issues with that. I know that at least some games have mods for PS controller use which implies that it wasn’t available natively.
Actually, I’ve already used the PS4 controller to play through most of “Hitman” on PC without any issues. I agree that it’s the most obvious solution but it’s less than ideal when it comes to more twitchy genres like online shooters. A mouse is just faster and more accurate for aiming.
What prompted my OP was a Twitch streamer I stumbled across who was using a mouse and something he called a nunchuck to play “PU:Battlegrounds”. Unfortunately, I have no idea who the streamer was and when I googled nunchuck controllers I just got a bunch of hits for the Nintendo Wii. I could be wrong but I assumed he wasn’t using the actual Wii controller since I highly doubt Nintendo would ever release PC drivers.
My hope is that there’s some niche accessibility hardware out there that would provide a decent compromise between the comfort of a console controller and the speed of mouse+keyboard.
Johnny, that’s awesome! It certainly looks a lot like what that streamer I saw was using. And, the main thing is that it looks like I can operate it with just my thumb and the first 3 fingers of my left hand without losing any functionality.
Online reviews seem favourable so I think I might just pick this up!
Do me a favor and bump this thread if you buy it - I’d be interested in your opinion.
My gut reaction is that it wouldn’t be comfortable to use - a computer mouse is for sitting upright at a desk and a handheld controller is a more slouch-oriented device. I’m not sure how I’d like using both at the same time.
Will do. I admit, I share your concerns but I figure they’ll be overshadowed by the fact my hand won’t be cramping up anymore like it does with a regular keyboard.
Great compatibility with Steam games and will allow you to play a lot of mouse and keyboard only games without a mouse and keyboard. Now a days I prefer it over the Xbone controller in most games that have full controller compatibility (this is because of it’s back paddles, it’s superior flexibility, and the right haptic pad which is light years better than a right analog stick in most games).
Seconded. I have both a Steam controller and a Xbone controller I use on PC. For most games, I strongly prefer the Steam controller. There are a couple where I can’t configure the Steam controller how I want (typically the right pad/joystick configuration), so I keep both around, but the back paddles were critical for me in Dark Souls, and the touch pad for the right thumb is wonderful. There’s a little learning curve on the touchpad, but it’s very much worth it.
I’ve never tried it with a mouse intensive game like a MOBA. It’s like a touchpad for your thumb, so if you could MOBA with a laptop touchpad, I’d expect the controller to work for you with some practice.
I’ll have to look into non-steam games, but it works outside of Steam. As a mouse with touchpad, by default, but I’m about 95% sure it could be reconfigured.
So long as you can run the game through the Steam Overlay you can usually use the Steam Controller with that game. I’ve only ever had issues with a couple of Ubisoft games that use some type of anti-cheat system that prevents proper Steam Overlay support. But in these cases the proper Steam version of the game works fine, it’s just the Ubisoft store version that doesn’t work properly.
It’s not going to match a mouse for accuracy, but it can get fairly close, certainly a hell of a lot closer than a right analog stick ever could. The thing with the the Steam Controller is that it’s so damn flexible that you can use a lot of clever mode changes and mode types to make it work really, really well with most games out there.
BUT, it’s a year old video and a lot of new feature shave hit since then. I would, for example use the new touch menu for triggering as many abilities as I want, coupled with a mode shift to a limited bound area on the screen to get to things like the tutorial interface.
Use your left hand (middle+index+thumb) to control the mouse and rebind the numpad to the right of the letters for movement and other tasks.
8=forward 5= backward 4/6= strafe 0=jump 1=crouch 2/3=other movement modes 7/9=lean/quick items +/Enter= reload/use
Arrow keys are useful for sprinting, weapon modes and other things which have to be accessed quickly
The 6 keys on top of the arrows are useful for inventory, map, character sheet and other things which take you to another screen
With a left-handed mouse and additional buttons, you can use your thumb for additional functionalities.
You may have to learn to be quick and precise with your left hand.
I briefly looked into the Steam controller but I was scared away by the wildly polarized opinions. People really seem to love or hate the thing. I might have to see if any local game stores will let me demo the thing. Assuming any of them have it in stock, that is. It wouldn’t surprise me if I would have to special order a niche product like this.
MichaelEmouse, I’m tempted to give your suggestion a shot. I’ll probably hate trying to swap hands but it has the advantage of being free with no wait for delivery. I will come back to report (after I’ve died a few dozen times).
BTW, does anybody have any thoughts on this controller (youtube link)? It has the advantage of being cheap and highly customizable but I imagine the warranty period is pretty short.
It will take some time to get used to it, perhaps some weeks. You may want to invert the 2 mouse keys so that LMB is the secondary key (e.g.: aiming, secondary weapon mode) and RMB is the primary one (e.g.:shooting)
Using the numpad and nearby keys can be quite useful. The physical separation of keys helps to keep functions organized in a way the main keyboard doesn’t.
