I love my steam controllers. Surprisingly where they shined best for me was in racing games. Single joystick was enough for steering. Trackpad+gyro was great for flicking to look around and if there is nos or boost in the game I would always map it to the button for full press on the trigger. Legitimately not an experience you could replicate with any other controller.
I have 2. I absolutely love it. I prefer it for playing 3rd person games like the witcher and monster hunter too. I like the granular control and momentum for panning around the world.
I bought the second one for $5 when valve was doing the discontinuation liquidation sale. Someone commented that the Vive wands use the same track pads and other parts, so it’s a no brainer to buy one to have the parts on hand. At this point the Vive wands are extra parts for keeping my steam controllers going.
I loooove my steam controller for first-person games. The right track pad for camera controls just clicks with me. I guess it’s because I’m a PC gamer first and foremost, so I’m used to mouse-like aiming rather than the analog-style stick aiming.
I never really used the left track pad though…
That being said, I was let down by the steam deck trackpads. Maybe I just have big hands, but I could never use the right track pad the same way I do with the steam controller.
Also a general comment: AA/AAA is the best if you get some rechargable batteries. No waiting for charging when something is out of juice! Plus you can just get a new set of batteries if they ever die instead of a whole new controller
It’s weird how quickly Sony discovered the perfect layout and how little it’s changed since.
Analogue triggers are the only really great addition since the original Dual Shock.
The gyro aim on the PS5 (well technically all the way back to the PS3, only not as good) are actually really nice too, but I can count the games that use it on one hand. I’ve no idea why devs are so adverse to using them.
The PS4/5 touch pad would be OK if it wasn’t just used as a giant Select button, because for some reason the actual Select button is now “Share” which literally nobody ever asked for.
The entire industry has agreed on a de-facto standard for controllers, which is pretty much the PS1 controller:
Two clickable thumbsticks
Four face buttons
D-pad
Four triggers
Two menu buttons
The only thing the PS1 didn’t have (but games can’t use it, so maybe it doesn’t count?) - a button for showing the platform’s menu
You can add things on top of that (trackpads, gyros, making some of these digital buttons analog), but if you don’t have that - your controller won’t work for games that expect these inputs to be available.
If I had to put a date on when this became the established standard, I’d say 2005 or 2006 - the years when the XBox 360 and the PS3 were released, since both consoles had these capabilities (Nintendo kept doing its own thing, and only supported this standard starting with the Wii U). So when the Steam controller was released in 2015 - this standard was already established, controllers for PC made sure to support it - and even PC games stuck to it.
This is why I think the Steam Controller failed - you had to map it. You couldn’t use it like you would a standard controller even if the game was made for standard controllers.
The original PS1 controller didn’t have joysticks, and when it did, the position sucked for larger hands. I have always preferred the XBox layout.
you had to map it
Did you? I thought most games worked fine, though admittedly I only played a couple because I never got used to the trackpads.
I think it wasn’t very post all popular because it was so different. Even if it worked as expected out of the box, a lot of people dismissed it at first glance. It was also only available through steam, so there was less reach.
But even then, I still don’t think it failed on its own merits. I think there wasn’t a compelling reason to get it without a Steam Machine, which flopped because Valve didn’t commit to it.
The original PS1 controller didn’t have joysticks, and when it did, the position sucked for larger hands. I have always preferred the XBox layout.
Right. I meant the second PS1 controller, not the original one. The design changed over the years, but the general specs stayed as the baseline of controllers.
The XBox layout with its six face buttons did not stick, and the XBox 360 conformed with Sony’s design of four face buttons and two triggers. Which makes more sense for shooters (since you have more buttons while keeping your thumb on the right thumbstick)
It’s important to note that the PS1 also borrowed from previous designs, namely the Super Nintendo with 4 face buttons and N64 (the controller with joysticks came out a year after).
Xbox’s main innovation was the offset joysticks, which may have been due to patents more than anything, but I preferred it. I also didn’t mind the two extra buttons, and was a little sad when they went away, because they were largely replaced by the joystick buttons, which I think are hard to use properly.
But yeah, design stagnated a bit after the PS1 controller.
I find I keep accidentally clicking the thumbstick buttons, and I have the same problem with clicking the trackpads on the stream controllers. When the game gets tense I tend to increase my grip causing the clicks.
I also didn’t mind the two extra buttons, and was a little sad when they went away, because they were largely replaced by the joystick buttons, which I think are hard to use properly.
Weren’t the black and white buttons replaced by triggers? The joystick buttons already existed in the first XBox.
Sort of, but the functions changed a bit. For example, in Halo, the black button changed the type of grenade and the white button triggered the flashlight, both of which weren’t really needed frequently. On the XBox 360, it changed to:
throw grenades - B - used to be melee attack (which switched to a bumper button)
flashlight - D-pad - replaced the “lower weapon” action, which was no longer available (was moved to a bumper button in one other game, and removed from others)
Both control schemes are fine, but I honestly thought the black/white buttons were decent. Having some buttons you rarely push but can is nice.
Singleplayer games with time-based farming simulator minigames you won’t complete without gaming the date\time in your system (easter eggs are welcome tho). Grindy platinum achievements well outside even a dedicated minority’s norms, just getting bigger numbers or save skamming for opposing endings. Button-mashers with an undisclosed randomization of a final result under the hood.
Toby Fox was forced to add trophies to the PlayStation release of undertale and deltarune, and made them oppressively annoying in protest, so I feel like there are exceptions to this
It’s interesting to try to separate those two categories. Why else would a dev do those things unless they’re out of touch with actual gaming? I mean, adding a way to skip a cut scene is definitely not a budget issue.
Probably priority? They have a tight deadline and skipping cut scenes is not a priority feature.
I have also seen game where dev deliberately ignore call for adding a skip scene button because they want their players to read the story. You can disagree with it but maybe the dev really think their cut scene is worth watching. That doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t play games, its just that they have high pride in their work.
I know the above is a controversial take. But I have no problem watching cut scenes if that is the dev’s intention.
It would be cool if they were smart about it. Like, make you watch a cutscene once, but if, say, the cutscene is just before a tough boss and you saved just before the cutscene, then if you lose to the boss and need to try again, you won’t have to watch the cutscene a second time. Especially if it’s a long one.
There should always be an option to pause a cut scene though.
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Aktywne