methods of input (Part 1)

I use a diaper bag. It has served me well.

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My Qanba has a handle.

If theyā€™re small enough to fit in my bag (not likely), in that. Otherwise, Iā€™ve got that probably overpriced shoulder strap for the TE2 Madcatz sells, which is certainly more convenient than the traditional method of just carrying the stupid thing under-arm for hours.

:musical_note: Itā€™s O S C A R :musical_note: ?

My Qanba has a second handle :musical_note:

Iā€™ve now tried the Negcon, and Zero Tech
I like the Negcon a lot. It feels really good.
I think Iā€™d like the Zero Tech if I didnā€™t have a Negcon, but I strongly prefer the Negcon.

The onehanded controller is an ascii grip

Hereā€™s someone elseā€™s picture of one next to a mouse

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I have something like this called a Splitfish FragFX (lol), used it to play Gears 3 as there was no damn way I was gonna try multiplayer shootmanning with stickaiming

I have a PS1 Ascii Grip, itā€™s pretty comfortable! Definitely recommended if you can find one for like $10 like I did.

I once had this controller for the PC that looked like the cockpit of the Millennium Falcon. It was essentially a toyset in itself and grafted onto your keyboard such that interacting with specific parts of the cockpit would depress the proper keyboard keys to play the bundled PC game. This meant you could use it for anything on the PC if you mapped the keys right, albeit with a limited amount of usable keys. I canā€™t remember it very well but it must have been this thing.

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the magazine ads for the ascii grip were all about masturbating while playing video games.

Iā€™m not sure where to go with this

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What else would you do with a free hand while paying a game that only requires the attention of one

At least itā€™s not like the legions of VN players who buy those USB pedals for the ultimate in hands-free playing

That reminds me, I wonder where that PS2 pedal I bought for Time Crisisā€¦ Three went

Thank you kindly.

I just played for a few hours using this guy and itā€™s comfortable. Six big buttons, adjustable D-pad angle and rigidity. Works on PS4/PS3/PC.

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We need to buy 4 USB controllers for game dev. We need good Dpads. Suggestions?

I tried one of these once and the buttons felt very mushy. Do they feel fine to press rapidly? I had the same complaint with the new MadCatz fightpads coming out in February.

@anothergod Xbox One controllers have good clicky-style D-pads and are very widely supported. Work over USB with Xinput or with a $25 wireless adapter on PC. One adapter would work for four controllers. Itā€™s a little lopsided to hold it and play with D-pad + face buttons, but no weirder than a Dualshock layout if youā€™re not accustomed to symmetrical stick placement.

@Drem the buttons have about as much travel as the DS2/DS3. More travel than the equivalent buttons on the DS4/XBO controllers and more difficult to ā€œtrillā€.

I found some USB foot pedals a couple months back, and Iā€™ve been meaning to try to set them up for Mechwarrior or as effects pedals in a DAW or something. Theyā€™re intended for some kind of dictation set-up I think.

Iā€™ve always dug that intersection between game controllers and MIDI controllers. Iā€™ve tried the Max plugins that use Guitar Hero controllers. One of them cleverly uses the five fret buttons in binary-style combinations to play a scale. Thereā€™s those videos of people who have mapped out Steel Battalion sticks for music and video control too. Thereā€™s also that related phenomenon of the people who prefer matrices of arcade buttons to MPC-style pads. Iā€™ve never really been able to think in terms of live sample playback to get into those myself though.

I got a Sega Saturn pad and a Sega Saturn to USB adapter today.

Itā€™s the first time Iā€™ve owned a Sega Saturn pad and an SS Hori pad at the same time.

The Sega Saturn dpad is real good.
I remembered the L and R buttons were weird. Comparing them with the SS Hori, they kind of make sense.
Their curvature is to make them not feel in the way if you arenā€™t using them.
I still prefer the the SS Hori pad face buttons though.

My wired Xbox 360 controller seems like it has some damage to its cable (likely due to my lamentable habit of tightly winding it around the controller when itā€™s not in use/being stored). Unless the cable is just so it drops its connection. I think all thatā€™s left to do is get a replacement.

I have a MadCatz fightpad that I use for 2D games which works pretty well so Iā€™m not overly concerned with Dpads though I suppose itā€™s good to have a second option just in case that pad dies too. The 360 controller was otherwise perfectly sufficient for the PC games I played (which tended to mostly be ports of Xbox games anyway). I can get another wired 360 controller for pretty cheap these days, it seems, but Iā€™m wondering if the Xbox One controller is a significant upgrade in any way and justifies the additional expense?

Or I could go exotic and get a Steam controller which happens to sit between those two previous options in cost.

I guess I could monkey around with getting my PS4 controllers to work with my PC, but when I tried to do it with PS3 controllers back in the day it just never worked.

Itā€™s a piece of piss to get a DS4 working on PC. It supports DirectInput by default, and you can find little wrapper programs like this to make your rig think itā€™s a 360 pad (for dumb games that only like XInput). Itā€™ll even mate happily with a Bluetooth dongle, if youā€™re into that. I will say the battery life on my DS4 has been awful as of late though, so I just use a USB cable.

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