Keybinding Issues with Controller - Other buttons registering

[trink202]

So I haven't played for a while, and just downloaded the new launcher. I play with an Xbox controller, and whenever I press A to confirm something, the game things I am also pressing enter. B is connected to spacebar, and the other buttons are other keyboard buttons.

I've checked the keybindings, and tried another keyboard, as well as using no keyboard and I have the same issue. Anybody know what I can do?

 

[Dillon Fallon]

That is a weird one. While I have no idea what could do that, I can at least say that since I bought a new X-box controller to use on PC myself yesterday that the fact that this works without the issue you're seeing should mean it'll be something fixable at your end.

Might be worth rechecking your keyboard settings for anything weird that's got in there - might be your PC thinks the controller is a keyboard.

 

[aRJay]

If your controller isn’t connected to the same port as the one it was on when you set your bindings the game won’t recognise it and will use default bindings, is the name of the bindings the game is displaying the same as the one you renamed after you set them up?

 

[Montrose]

I had to give up on Elite after years of playing and enjoying. I can't get HOTAS buttons to bind and I know it is the 32 button limit but every work aorund is flaky and breaks other titles. I have tried for 6 months to come up with something as a work around but honestly, I have no issues with any other software titles and in this day and age it's ridiculous. Hopefully one day they will fix this or come up with some kind of workable solution

 

[Jack Winter]

What hotas do you have, and is it just a few or all buttons that won't bind?

 

[Montrose]

I have a winwing F18 HOTAs and Stick Throttle and Stick - lots wont bind as the throttle has over 100

Stick
Three 4-Directional Switch (Press)
One 8-Directional Switch (Press)
2 Press Switch
1 Brake/Trigger (On/Off Switch)
1 Long-travel, two-stage metal trigger

Throttle
4 x Dual Stage Switch;
4 x 3-Stage Switch;
3 x Press Switch;
1 x 3 Step Switch (With Press Gear);
4 x Encoder. (Press/Axis);
2 x AA/AG Programmable Backlight Switch;
2 x Hi-Res Hall Thumbwheels (Switchable Between Axis and Button Mode)
Two 4-Directional Switches (Press)
3 Press Switches
1 Mini Joystick (Press)
1 Spring-Loaded Hall Sensor Thumb Wheel
One 3-Stage Switch
One 1-side Spring-Loaded Switch (SPD BRK)

My backup HOATS has about the same

 

[Jack Winter]

Sorry can't help you with this. A quick google seemed to suggest that it has a mode splitting it up into several virtual units to work around this issue, but apparently it doesn't work well.

I had the same issue with my Virpil gear, but lucky for me it was easy to reprogram it.

Frontier really ought to attend to this issue..

 

[Montrose]

Ya when I use the 4X32 function it breaks other titles. I also tried vJoy but it was flaky and rebinding all of those buttons isnt fun. thank you for trying they need to realise that Elite benefits from these great HOTAS options with the pages of binding options. I am in VR so keyboard sucks!

 

[Jack Winter]

Yes, I've heard that splitting the HOTAS into several devices will break other games.

I suppose you could try joystick gremlin to translate buttons to keystrokes, or possibly voice attack could do the same.

AFAIK, it's not only Elite that has this limit, but that doesn't make it any better. IIRC windows started supporting 128 inputs with direct input 8... But I guess it's also possible that this is a limit of the middleware used for Elite and that they can't fix it without tearing the entire program apart and replacing the UI.

Seeing the situation at Frontier right now, I wouldn't hold my breath for any changes coming soon if ever.

 

[Montrose]

I tried vJoy and joystick gremlin and it kept breaking. All my other titles. Star citizen, DCS to name a couple do not have this limitation. Ya I found it's been mentioned for a few years and hey have done nothing. No surprised they are loosing players

 

[Jack Winter]

Hmm, I don't really want to try to defend Frontier on this issue (as it sucks that this hasn't been taken care of), but one could also argue that other titles ought to support multiple devices so splitting the hotas into multiple devices would work for all games

Still if you are interested in getting it going, give voice attack a try. AFAIK it's free to use for a single profile and up to 20 commands (so free to test) and you can use it to map joystick input to keystrokes or macros which ought to get you up and running.

It's also quite nice for a VR environment as you can do a lot with it, even controlling stuff with your voice. There are also lots of voice packs giving you vocal feedback recorded by many scifi actors.

In many ways it can really enrich the gaming experience.

 

[Montrose]

why would they do that and actually they do. the issue is when you take it in and out of 4X32 mode Windows doesnt track their order or ID. DCS and SC both support for me at least 5 controllers. I have a HOTAS , ICP and 2 MFDs. the other titles dont break because of the number of controllers but rather how turing it off and on messes with controller ids.

 

[Jack Winter]

Yes, switching between the 2 modes would be problematic (and frankly not something I'd like to do). But why wouldn't DCS (as an example) support my HOTAS when it's been configured to appear as 2 devices? Or have I been misinformed and it does?

Seems to me that it would be the best of two worlds as then the gear would be supported by both ED and DCS without any reconfiguration.

 

[Montrose]

it is just flaky and works for a bit then breaks and then yoiu have to do everything over again which is a lot of work

 

[Jack Winter]

Ah, if it breaks then it's no good. At least I have no issues at all with my Virpil gear split into 2 devices with ED, but I don't want to experiment with putting it into a single device mode and have to redo my bindings.

Well I'm out of ideas, but if you're interested in getting it going, then try Voice Attack and mapping the buttons to keybindings instead, I'm pretty sure that has a good chance to work.

IMO, VA all on it's own is a nice addition to the VR experience.

 

[redthorne]

Step one is what does windows say in control panel when you are pushing the button? Make sure that the controller isn't being dumb.
Step two, just bite the bullet and rebind everything. Back up those binds, and then rename that profile to something like 'xboxcntrlr' and they most likely will never get wiped again.
I use an Xbox controller on PC, so I'm just passing along what I've done.