2 points...
1. Oculus are aware of the issue - I read something to that effect in a recent interview. So it's a given that they are looking into that for the consumer version.
That's some good news, I'm looking forward to seeing what they come up with there.
2. The game will be playable to a great degree with an XBox controller... because that's what they want - you should be able to sit back and fly/fight just with the controller. So there should be no absolute reliance on a keyboard for the majority of the time. Typing messages might be a tad hard though!
This I sorta like, but mainly I worry about...
The XBox 360 controller has, 2 analogue joysticks, 1 D Pad, 4 buttons, 2 Bumpers and 2 Triggers... You can also press the analogue sticks
So for some finger in the air guessing the controls for Elite could use the analogue sticks for roll and yaw, throttle and pitch. Basically movement around the universe.
The triggers would presumably be for guns and missiles. Then we'd need to have some kind of weapon selector for each of those, maybe on the corresponding bumpers?
Targeting Next, Previous and Subsystems could be maybe 3 of the buttons.
Firing off ecm (or those heat dumps we recently saw) would be very handy to do in combat too, so lets put that on button 4.
One of the buttons on the sticks could be for 'shifting gear' for supercruise or hyperspace and the other for bringing up the navigation screen.
We can maybe compromise on buttons some what, adding more abilities at the expense of convenience. I.E. We could get rid of the previous target button in place of say your afterburners. Or you can only fire guns OR missiles, which would free up 2 buttons at the cost of having to toggle a lot more in the heat of battle. You get the idea.
I've included some of the keyboard guides for other games, just for reference...
Elite Manual
Oolite controls
Frontier Controls
Wing Commander 1 Controls
Tie Fighter
Freespace 2
Looking through these, even Elite used most of the buttons on the keyboard. I have serious concerns about some how munging 30 or 40 needed controls into a use on a game pad. Imagine trying to escape from a pirate, manoeuvring so you don't get hit and then having to navigate through a series of radial menus to get to the galactic map (most likely using your analogue stick that you're using to stop yourself getting shot at) in order to hyperspace out. vs pressing 'm'. Now obviously you could have a button for your hyperspace map, but then you loose it for something else. Not only that, but we've not even thought about target friendly, hostile, closest attacking ship, most recent ship in the area (surprisingly handy that some ship with the weapons to destroy your escort has just shown up and you need to concentrate on getting them out of the sky).
Anyway you hopefully get the idea. combining all the features we need to fit on to a gamepad (or most joysticks) is an exercise in compromise and an extremely difficult design challenge. One that many people will find beneficial since I've no doubt that a lot of people (myself included) would far rather use a gamepad than mouse and keyboard. However that convenience comes at a cost, that I find myself unwilling to pay.
I would prefer to take a hand off the controller to quickly use my keyboard than being forced to navigate through radial menus.
I would prefer to take a hand off the controller to quickly use my keyboard than having to toggle round 20 more targets to get back to where I wanted. (or some other compromise)
I would prefer to take a hand off the controller to quickly use my keyboard than have Elite Dangerous dumbed down so that it only needs 11 controls.
Eid
