Does this control set up look good?

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3 comments, last by Iron Chef Carnage 10 years ago

So, this game I'm designing is an sci-fi "RPG". Combat is done via a 3rd person shooter when the characters are on foot, but as it is a sci-fi setting there ae space ships. You start as the captain of small ship, but as time goes on you are able to get bigger ships and put together a fleet. With the smaller ships I am thinking in the line that you are still in control of your character when you are in control of your ship, so in a small ship everything is laid out in such a way that 1 person can control all the systems where as in larger ships you need to issue orders which are followed by crew members. Larger ships are slightly more complicated to control, but you wield much more power, able to engage more enemies, and even lower tier stuff can seem more powerful due to expertise in an area... That's the idea anyways...

So here are the control schemes. Does this look good?

Side note: fleet controls I've not come up with ^.^

Side note 2: Obviously this is with the idea that the game will be controlled with a controller...

<- Character Controls ->
Analog left: Move Character
Analog right: Move Camera
d-pad: Switch Secondary Items
Start: Pause menu
Select: Map
A: Jump / cancel
B: Interact / accept
X: Reload
Y: Menu
L1: Use Secondary item
L2: Zoom
R1: Switch Gun
R2: Fire
L3: Crouch
R3: Reset camera
<- Ship Controls ->
----- Small Ships -----
Analog left: Move Ship
Analog right: Move Camera
d-pad: On/Off other systems
Start: Pause menu
Select: Open Astro-Nav Menu
A: Fire Forward Cannons / Cancel
B: Fire Torpedo / Accept
X: Ready Torpedo
Y: Menu
L1: Cycle targets
L2: Decrease Speed
R1: Cycle targets
R2: Increase Speed
L3: Emergency Break
R3: Emergency Boost
----- Large Ships -----
Analog left: Move Ship
Analog right: Move Camera
d-pad: On/Off other systems
Start: pause menu
Select: Open Astro-Nav Menu / Fleet Mode
A: Order Fire Cannons / Cancel
B: Order Fire Torpedoes / Accept
X: Open Deployment Menu
Y: Menu
L1: Open Cannon Target Assignment menu
L2: Open Mech Target Assignment menu
R1: Open Torpedo Target Assignment menu
R2: Open Fighter Target Assignment menu
L3: Emergency Boost
R3: Emergency Recall
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Tough to be sure without knowing a lot about the game, but it seems okay. Many games combine the "reload" and "interact" commands on a single button, which I generally prefer.

Since you're building the control scheme for a gamepad, I assume your "menus" will be some kind of radial quick-select system. If occurs to me that the "ship control" command doesn't change from small to large ships. You have a whole department that fires your cannons and torpedoes, but you fly the behemoth with a joystick from the captain's chair? Why not a helmsman? I imagine your dude standing on the bridge saying kickass things like, "Cannoneer! Target the cruiser's weapons! Fire all batteries!" so why not, "Ahead full! All stop! Come about to heading 123 azimuth -08!"?

Just to be clear if this is a 360 controller you are better of with chosing a: accept and b: cancel. This is because its the common practice for those controllers to have a be accept and b be cancel, its the reason behind them being green and red.

Worked on titles: CMR:DiRT2, DiRT 3, DiRT: Showdown, GRID 2, theHunter, theHunter: Primal, Mad Max, Watch Dogs: Legion

Tough to be sure without knowing a lot about the game, but it seems okay. Many games combine the "reload" and "interact" commands on a single button, which I generally prefer.

Since you're building the control scheme for a gamepad, I assume your "menus" will be some kind of radial quick-select system. If occurs to me that the "ship control" command doesn't change from small to large ships. You have a whole department that fires your cannons and torpedoes, but you fly the behemoth with a joystick from the captain's chair? Why not a helmsman? I imagine your dude standing on the bridge saying kickass things like, "Cannoneer! Target the cruiser's weapons! Fire all batteries!" so why not, "Ahead full! All stop! Come about to heading 123 azimuth -08!"?

I see. I'm not a huge player of shooters so wasn't sure,

Menu is not a radial menu. It's an RPG menu where it shows stats, equip, and other group data as well as ship load out and such.

With ship movement control I assume that is what is happening, but there is no reason to put those behind a menu as they'd end up just being fore, aft, etc which overlays to a control stick anyways.

Another thing I was thinking a long time ago for something like this is that you're put in character mode on the bridge and give orders from there... and then if you didn't have a crew for a station to use that station you'd have to run over to it and interface with it. I think that would be a bit sadistic though. Also trying to fly a ship through a view port doesn't seem like it'd be all that fun.

Just to be clear if this is a 360 controller you are better of with chosing a: accept and b: cancel. This is because its the common practice for those controllers to have a be accept and b be cancel, its the reason behind them being green and red.

Did not know that ^.^

Noted and will change.

Honestly, for 1 of the control schemes it was like that but then i changed it to be consistent. Looks like I went the wrong way ^.^

Another thing I was thinking a long time ago for something like this is that you're put in character mode on the bridge and give orders from there... and then if you didn't have a crew for a station to use that station you'd have to run over to it and interface with it. I think that would be a bit sadistic though.

You're exactly right on that one, I think. It's come up a few times before, the idea of being a guy walking the deck or standing on the bridge, doing the things that such guys do in order to make stuff happen, but it always falls apart when you wind up using a game interface to control a guy who is using another interface to control the world, like if the left analog stick was bound to the left thumb of a gamer who uses that thumb to manipulate an analog stick. Unnecessary and clunky.

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