20 ms·

Anything retro, pre-mouse era, was with the arrow keys, because it made sense. At least for player 1. (Besides, WASD is pretty bad for AZERTY keyboards which is

by keyle 5y ago

Anything retro, pre-mouse era, was with the arrow keys, because it made sense. At least for player 1. (Besides, WASD is pretty bad for AZERTY keyboards which is a lot of players.) Some player 2 layouts had a mix of letters, but were usually pretty thoughtful of AZERTY. Once the mouse came out and gaming started to become 3D "looking around", e.g. Quake, WASD appeared along side the mouse used to look around. So I take it you're a pretty young gamer :-) WASD only makes sense if you're holding a mouse on the other side of the keyboard. Otherwise, the OG is arrow keys, and even numpad keys, some mechanical keyboard still give the homage by having arrows on 8462 keys of the numpad on the right side. Many games in fact even supported diagonal movements on the other digits. Ref. https://cdn.thefpsreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/ibm-model-m-keyboard-german-layout.jpg https://cdn.thefpsreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/ibm-...

TulliusCicero 5y ago
I don’t really think of 36 as young, no. Yes, some old games used arrow keys for movement, and I hated that, too, since I started on the NES. Same deal for arcades as well; the stick has been on the left for decades now. Good point about AZERTY, though at least with some engines you can just map to the physical locations that corresponds to WASD for QWERTY, so different keyboards should mostly be a non-issue.
dspillett 5y ago
> Anything retro, pre-mouse era, was with the arrow keys, because it made sense. At least for player 1. As well as using arrow keys for directional movement, which just makes sense as you were already using them in other applications that way, it left the letter keys for named actions (attack, defend, ..., which I remember some games using) and/or the left hand free for using shift/ctrl/alt for movement modifiers (which I find a less convenient arrangement on the other side of keyboards I've used). Once mouse controls became common for aiming it made sense to move because WASD is close enough to the common modifier keys that the left can do all the work there. > WASD only makes sense if you're holding a mouse on the other side of the keyboard. I know lefties who were perfectly happy to use WASD+modifiers+other with their right hand and keep their mouse/similar on the left. They would often remap jump (frequently assigned to the space bar by default) to something else (maybe \ on a UK keyboard as that is near the thumb, or V to stretch the pinky less if their thumb is going to be occupied using shift or ctrl as a movement modifier (or fire if they didn't use a mouse button for that)). It was less convenient for them if a game didn't allow key remapping.
mysterydip 5y ago
I remember a lot of programmed games using IJKL or IJKM at the time as an alternative to arrow keys. WASD felt really weird the first time I tried it.
- jhbadger 5y ago
  The traditional controls on the Apple ][ in the 1980s was IJKM because the early models didn't have up and down arrow keys (they were introduced in the //e)

by keyle 5y ago

TulliusCicero 5y ago

I don’t really think of 36 as young, no. Yes, some old games used arrow keys for movement, and I hated that, too, since I started on the NES. Same deal for arcades as well; the stick has been on the left for decades now. Good point about AZERTY, though at least with some engines you can just map to the physical locations that corresponds to WASD for QWERTY, so different keyboards should mostly be a non-issue.

dspillett 5y ago

> Anything retro, pre-mouse era, was with the arrow keys, because it made sense. At least for player 1. As well as using arrow keys for directional movement, which just makes sense as you were already using them in other applications that way, it left the letter keys for named actions (attack, defend, ..., which I remember some games using) and/or the left hand free for using shift/ctrl/alt for movement modifiers (which I find a less convenient arrangement on the other side of keyboards I've used). Once mouse controls became common for aiming it made sense to move because WASD is close enough to the common modifier keys that the left can do all the work there. > WASD only makes sense if you're holding a mouse on the other side of the keyboard. I know lefties who were perfectly happy to use WASD+modifiers+other with their right hand and keep their mouse/similar on the left. They would often remap jump (frequently assigned to the space bar by default) to something else (maybe \ on a UK keyboard as that is near the thumb, or V to stretch the pinky less if their thumb is going to be occupied using shift or ctrl as a movement modifier (or fire if they didn't use a mouse button for that)). It was less convenient for them if a game didn't allow key remapping.

mysterydip 5y ago

I remember a lot of programmed games using IJKL or IJKM at the time as an alternative to arrow keys. WASD felt really weird the first time I tried it.

jhbadger 5y ago
The traditional controls on the Apple ][ in the 1980s was IJKM because the early models didn't have up and down arrow keys (they were introduced in the //e)