I always thought System Shock had adequate controls, the thing is most people want to play it like they play Doom and run and gun everything in sight. In my oppinion the default controls make you play more prepared and it works this way but I guess most people aren't willing to give it a try and are modding it with mouse aim which makes the game a laughable easy sealclubbing simulator which contrasts the dark atmosphere it tries to create. Terranova: Strike Force Centauri largely uses the same controlscheme, it isn't really that different than mech games of the day.

Crusader: No Remorse/Regret didn't have the best controls but I thought that if I set Numlock to rotate I could control my character well enough, with Shift to rotate faster, I had a lot of fun playing these games.

The Descent games I preferred to use a joystick where I use one hand on the keyboard and one on the joystick, I didn't use the throttle but use WASD for forward and strafe and use the joystick for rotate.

Gran Turismo gave me a lot of headaches with its analog controls as it has something like a 50% deadzone for steering, using digital controls was better but killed most of the fun for driving. In Gran Turismo 2 the deadzone was maybe 25%, still way too much but at least more manageable. I will never understand why the programmers crippled their game this way, were they really that uncertain of the calibration of the dualshock controllers?

Kreshna Aryaguna Nurzaman wrote:

Couldn't agree more. Unfortunately, head bobbing seems to be standard feature in highly realistic flight sims like IL-2 Sturmovik. 😵

Alas, but they are getting better - I think.

F2bnp wrote:

Gamecollector wrote:

Legacy of Kain: Defiance. *Censored*.

This is getting ridiculous 🤣 . I can understand having issues with the camera in this game, but the controls? What the hell?

Because they are camera related. And you can't change it. *Was cutted by censorship*. Just 1 easy selection between absolute/relative controls could be to eliminate all this negative...

I can't for the life of me get my Logitech Extreme 3D Pro to work on Descent 3. in the setup window before running game it is detected but ingame it is useless and the buttons can't be configured.

this game would kick *** if I could use my flightstick!

When I see the topic, the name of one game flashed in my mind: Bioforge. An extremely brilliant game for its time (IMHO) with very capturing atmosphere and story, but the controls are (especially during combat) was frustrating to say the least.

I don't actually mind the mouse controls for Descent II. They are a bit slow, but it's easy enough to set things up in a modified WASD configuration, and I would definitely say I prefer this setup to the default controls. As for Incoming, I remember it being a little bit hard to control, but I had a lot of fun playing it with a flightstick when I was younger. System Shock is one I still haven't played, but I could probably get used to the control scheme for it.

Now, games with tank controls... ugh. 🤣 Who in their right mind thought that THAT was a good idea? Super Mario 64 came out in mid 1996, and it was one of the first 3D 3rd-person games to NOT have tank controls, so there was really no excuse for developers to continue using tank controls after that point. The only advantage to tank controls I could see is maybe for more accurate shooting mechanics, as dual-analog controllers weren't a thing yet, but surely someone could've figured out lock-on targeting before Ocarina of Time came out.

maximus wrote:

Descent (1994): The closest I've ever come to making this game really playable is by playing in DOSBox and cranking the mouse sensitivity all the way up, both in the game and in DOSBox. Mouse control is impossibly sluggish in real DOS, and even joystick control is clunky. Thankfully, this huge problem was completely fixed in Descent 3.

WASD to Move, Arrow Keys to Look. CRTL to shoot main weapons and SPACE to shoot missiles. 😁

I'd say the ops issues with descent are possibly dosbox's fault I dont remember any issues with real dos
ps: descent has ports that work fine with modern pc's

ps: halo 2 because despite there being an option screen to remap controls they dont remap

hoover1979 wrote:

I can't for the life of me get my Logitech Extreme 3D Pro to work on Descent 3. in the setup window before running game it is detected but ingame it is useless and the buttons can't be configured.!

I have that stick and descent 3 working fine (you dont have any other controllers connected)

find out what file stores the joystick settings, tell me how you want the stick set up and I will do it for you

edit: could be this file change .zip to .pld (board doesnt allow .pld

Jurassic Park: Trespasser.

Eventually I got used to it and love the idea and the control, but having modifier keys to fold your wrist and rotate it, and another to hold your arm out, is weird and off-putting. No wonder nobody liked that game. Except me.

I think Operation: Flashpoint wouldn't let you redefine the fire key, which was hard coded to mouse1. My friends were all into this game but I never liked it because of this.

I think the game was trying to be 'realistic' (index finger = trigger finger) but it was just annoying for people used to other key assignments.

Ultima 6 and Martian Dreams. I think I will go back to them someday, but the interface still scares me away. Especially sorting through piles of items. It's horrendous.

Recently I bought "FlatOut" on the PC. It's a fun game, but the menu controls are annoying. There's no way to set up separate keybindings for the menu navigation. It just makes assumptions like Accelerate == Up, Brake == Down, Handbrake == Back and Upshift == Confirm (I'm sure that's not exactly correct, but you get the point).
Text is also a pain - they make you clumsily navigate an on-screen keyboard using those same keys from your keybindings. It's a PC guys - we have actual keyboards. And mice. I'm all in favor of not making the player switch between input devices* - but if it has to be this clunky, I'd at least like the option to click with a mouse or type.

* On that note - any PC game or application which requires me to switch between input devices. I get really irritated with applications where the programmer has never configured the tab order of the dialog boxes or generally made it keyboard-usable. The topic is about games, but I have to mention it anyway because assuming everybody wants to mouse around is a plague in software development.

shamino wrote:

* On that note - any PC game or application which requires me to switch between input devices. I get really irritated with applications where the programmer has never configured the tab order of the dialog boxes or generally made it keyboard-usable. The topic is about games, but I have to mention it anyway because assuming everybody wants to mouse around is a plague in software development.

I understand all Microsoft software, even the newest stuff, is designed to be operated by keyboard alone. This design principle goes back to the early days of Windows. It's a good idea. Not only can experienced users work faster, but why should you lose work just because your mouse malfunctions?

A similar gripe: all software should be usable on a 640x480 VGA display, especially dialog boxes. Again, why lose work just because your video card malfunctions?

AidanExamineer wrote:

Jurassic Park: Trespasser.

Eventually I got used to it and love the idea and the control, but having modifier keys to fold your wrist and rotate it, and another to hold your arm out, is weird and off-putting. No wonder nobody liked that game. Except me.

Ok...it's an official four year old necro bump. Guilty as charged your honor!

There has been recent activity on TresCom for this old game.
https://www.trescom.org/

There were two main patches for this game which made it playable, one of them fixed the jump bug, now it looks like some more patches have evolved, so im gonna check them out asap.
The first time a buddy showed me this game i stayed up all night playing it. He gave me the disc to take home the next day. I finished the game in 24 days.
Must have played it at least another five times and recorded to DVD a finish time of just under seven hours. I thought i was a legend until i saw the speed run posted on youtube. 😠
I'll be updating these recent patches and see if i can't finally get the hi-res one to work! 😀

I love and hate the controls of "Edge of Chaos: Independence War 2" (or I-War 2 in short).

It's a mixture of excessive keyboard shortcuts paired with full joystick controls. The learning curve for this game is extreme (and only topped by "Diaspora: Shattered Armistice"). I started playing this when I was a young boy and was quickly overwhelmed by all of the functions. Shooting, docking, formation, LDS drive, 3 axis, targeting enemies and friends, looting cargo, handling your ships energy systems...woah. The boxed copy even comes with a key combination printout that you can tape to your screen to remember all of the combinations. 😵

Paired with Newtonian physics, this game sometimes feels like I'm just rolling the dice when I'm going into a mission. It can be hard and frustrating and yet, it gives me so much freedom and so many possibilities as a player.

...and the music! It's wonderful.

Upon re-viewing this thread, I'll add to my old post: Modern 2D platformers.

Bottom line, I don't want to play them on an XBox 360 controller or anything of that type.
I want to use a D-pad controller that was designed for 2D games. Most modern developers don't consider that, they assume you want to use a 3-D oriented modern controller with a subpar D-pad, way too many buttons involved and sometimes even using the clunky analog sticks. They typically dedicate a separate button for every possible action, which I find unnecessarily confusing and frustrating.

I guess the fundamental problem is that devs want the X360 to be the standard controller for every game. Personally I think that should be rejected for 2D games. It seems like the SNES is the most popular 2D era console nowadays and it had a great controller, so if the world could settle on the SNES controller being the 2D standard, I'd be fine with that. Games should support 2 default control schemes, one for XBoxen, and the other for SNES or whatever decent controller the dev is willing to pay attention to. If they can't make their game work on that, then they need to reconsider how it's designed.

River City Ransom: Underground:
I loved the original and thought this would be fun. It probably would, if I could play it with a real controller.
The original was played on an NES controller. So surely, I thought, I can play this game on a Sega Genesis 6-button, which actually has 8 buttons plus the D-pad.
I'm very comfortable with that controller and it should be great, I thought.
Nope. Too many functions to map out. I have to unmap something, and still be left with some functions in awkward spots, because there's too many different moves with different buttons associated to them.
If a simple 2D side scrolling beat 'em up can't be comfortably played with 8 buttons, something is wrong with the game.

Spelunky:
Similar complaint, but for the time being I've been willing to use a 360 controller.
I've only played this a little bit so far. I'm sure I could eventually get used to it, but I grow impatient with overly complicated controls. At every critical moment, I get a little panicked to remember which button to press so something stupid doesn't happen, like how to pick up the princess without dropping a bomb on her or starting a war with a shopkeeper or something. The game thinks confusing you is funny.
Like so many modern games, this game uses separate buttons for every little operation, exercising no contextual logic about what the player is trying to do.

Terraria:
I think I could get addicted to this game, but I don't want to play a platformer with WASD and mouse/keyboard controls. It would probably need to be redesigned to work with 2D console controllers, but I think it would be fantastic if it was.

==
There are games where using all the buttons and knobs of a 360 controller is justified. But they shouldn't all be doing it, and it's especially irksome with 2D games where I'd like to use a more appropriate controller.

shamino wrote:

I want to use a D-pad controller that was designed for 2D games. Most modern developers don't consider that, they assume you want to use a 3-D oriented modern controller with a subpar D-pad, way too many buttons involved and sometimes even using the clunky analog sticks.

A D-Pad is not needed for any 2D games; in most (well, in all) cases, a keyboard is better, if you know how to use it.

Actually, there are very few games (read, none) where a D-Pad is of any advantage over a proper keyboard.

shamino wrote:

I guess the fundamental problem is that devs want the X360 to be the standard controller for every game. Personally I think that should be rejected for 2D games.

The X360 controller API (XInput) is very comfortable for devs, that's why they want to use it, I guess. If you don't like the Microsoft Xbox 360 controller, there are plenty other XInput controllers, some of which may have good D-Pads.

Playing a 2D console style game with a keyboard is not my idea of relaxing or fun. 😀 Nor am I able to do it.

API isn't really the issue, except if it's somehow what makes devs feel compelled to use all 12 of the 360's buttons when they aren't needed.
I use a Genesis controller through both XInput and DirectPlay with an adapter. I'm sure similar adapters exist for other popular 2D console controllers like SNES, etc.

Ideally, I'd like the devs of 2D games to design a default control mapping for the 360, then design another control mapping for some popular 2D console controller like the SNES pad. The latter would be a healthy exercise to help them clean up their control scheme, and perhaps add some features to the controls that they've ignored when targeting the 360. (For example, hold 'B' while pressing the d-pad to move something that they currently require separate buttons or an analog stick for.)

I think it comes down to you preferring a control scheme that uses fewer buttons, and achieves special functions through combinations of buttons, whereas the trend is using more buttons and a dedicated one per function, when possible.

Gamecollector wrote:

Legacy of Kain: Defiance. *Censored*.

That game is perfectly playable.
The camera is a little wonky, but manageable. Everything else is fine.
Sure, it's no Devil May Cry 3, but it's ok.

Anyway, anything with 3D movement and inverted look controls and no remapping option gives me conniptions. Magic Carpet is a great example of this.