Is there some trick or superior gaming setup to playing games that involve driving? I’m on a PC using a keyboard and gaming mouse, and I absolutely suck at driving. I have tried to play GTA V a few times but I can’t get past the part where I and my buddy steal twin Ferraris, and I try to keep up with him.
In most other ways I find the keyboard / gaming mouse setup to work well for me. I’m a good shot-- I can take out a moving target with a sniper rifle at a good distance. But driving, I am awful at (at least gaming-wise-- I’m a pretty good driver IRL).
Warning I Learned to Drive from Playing Video Games
I guess it is good that you didn’t? Back in the day, I played the game Test Drive on PC and if you did really well it would say something like: “Pass any low-flying planes?” Many years later I got one of the sequels and it looks like a new version came out in 2024. I don’t know how it compares to similar games, but I had fun with it at the time. Now I am more of Fighting Games fan (lots of Tekken 8 recently) and I need a controller for that, but I also took advantage of a promotion on Steam to get the Quake series of games, which involve a lot of keyboard and mouse.
I recall how way back when Grand Theft Auto III came out, I developed a habit of using a shortcut to reach a particular contact that involved driving full speed off an elevated street, flying through the air and crashing into their parking lot. Then hopping out before the car exploded.
After doing that a half dozen times I recall thinking “You know; this game does not teach good driving habits.”
Funny but true story. I played a lot of Mario Kart back in the day (going back to early high school). SNES, N64, and so on.
In my 20s, I was able to go to a go-kart track for the first time. I think you might already be predicting what happened, and you’re probably not wrong. I started out on the track, and I tried things I’d learned from the video games, like leaning into turns and stuff, and everything worked. Short of being able to throw banana peels and turtle shells at people, all my instincts from playing those games kicked in, and I felt like I’d been driving go-karts for years rather than for the first time.
So I then tried, well, forcing other cars to crash. (Friends, not strangers.) Using, again, the same techniques I learned in the games. And that worked too! It’s pretty incredible how faithful the physics in real life compared to the games; despite how cartoonish they were, they must have really gone out and tested how go-karts worked in real life to get the games to replicate real life so well.
There was one major difference between real life and the games, though. In the games, they don’t kick you out and ban you for reckless and dangerous driving. In real life, they did.
It was totally worth it though. Holy crap was that fun.
@solost When I play GTA games, I drive/run with a USB Xbox controller and shoot with a mouse. I forget if I have to stand still to shoot.
With this Forza game, I just use the controller. I have not tried driving with a keyboard. It sounds like an exercise in frustration but I am sure there are people who are good at it.
Interesting. I tried using an XBox wireless controller to play games on my PC a few years ago, thinking it might improve the general gaming experience, but I found that aiming and shooting was vastly easier and more accurate with a gaming mouse. So I stopped using the controller. But I was playing all shooting games then. Maybe I’ll dust off the controller and try it on GTA V, thanks.
It’s definitely easier to use a mouse to aim in a first person shooter, but I’ve found a controller works much better for driving and flight simulator games.
I’m playing Kingdoms of Amalur right now. Bought it in 2014 and played it for maybe ten minutes then never touched it afterwards. Restarted now and am well into it (Level 22?) and enjoying it. As you said, it’s pretty casual feeling especially on default difficulty and mainly just a way to wander around a fantasy world, beat shit up and run some pretty hand-holdy side quests. Very nice really for a few hours in the evening.
Me too (maybe mixed with rogue as well). This last time I played a fighter using a greatsword. It worked fine, but for the very last zone I switched to chakrams and they really do feel better because of the huge reach.
I finally got to playing Watch Dogs: Legion this week, after owning it for years. Enjoying the “recruit anyone” mechanic. Does require a bit of roleplay on your part, I think, for better immersion. Have been doing a lot more of the side quests than main missions.
That one covers London quite well, obviously with size limitations, but I’ve sure had some spooky deja vu in Chicago, New York, SF and LA after the likes of GTA, Watchdog series, Midtown Madness, a lot of which I visited much later after playng them.
I’ve been running 50/50 Might/Finesse and enjoying it though the Finesse is more just bows, poison and traps. I do like the chakrams but not enough to invest in the mage tree. And I usually don’t like spell casting in action games.
The Division 2’s map of DC was made with GPS data off the real thing so it’s all accurate and to scale. My wife’s family lives in/around DC so each time we visit it’s constant “I know this spot!” vibes.
From the way I played, if I’m remembering properly (it has been many years at this point) my mage didn’t do much spellcasting at all, and I spent most of the time just fighting with my chakrams. Spells were mostly for healing and defense. I totally maxed out things like arcane weaponry and chakram mastery. But again, this is just going from memory. I just don’t remember relying on spellcasting as an attack much.
Well, if I get bored with smacking stuff with a sword, I’ll keep it in mind. I’m pretty happy with the basic Long sword – Greatsword/Hammer feels too sluggish for me.
I’ve put in a lot of hours into GTA V, to the point that I’m a pretty skilled driver. It wasn’t always that way. I just did the twin Ferrari mission recently (I’m doing another playthrough of the game to take advantage of manipulating the stock market for immense financial gain). This time through, I found the mission to be pretty easy, but I’m certain it wasn’t the first few times I did it. I do all of my driving in the game with a keyboard and mouse, btw. Stick with it. Practice by just driving around the city really fast without hitting things. It’s easier when you aren’t under the pressure of doing a mission at the same time.
I’ve also played through on a Playstation using a controller. I actually find it harder to drive that way.
Thanks. Maybe I’ll give this another try, since I’m kind of between games right now, waiting for the Summer Steam sale.
I will say though, maybe it’s just me, but in my admittedly small window of experience with Rockstar Games (GTA V and Red Dead Redemption II), I seem to find them kind of generally frustrating-- very cutscene-heavy, and they don’t always seem to save properly for me, dumping me back to have to start another interminable cutscene over again.
I’ve also been trying to play RDR2 again, and I’ve heard that after the ‘tutorial’ period the cutscenes aren’t so long and frequent, and you get to actually roam around in the open world and do stuff more. Last time I played it a week or so ago I started enjoying the game, got through the train robbery and a deer hunting segment, the game seemed to save properly before I quit for the night…
…and the next time I started the game up, it was at a cutscene before the train robbery. Ughhh
