7 ms·

I got to hold one of these a few months ago. It's solid. The ergonomics are there. The same designer[1] was previously at {one of the other three very large gam

I got to hold one of these a few months ago. It's solid. The ergonomics are there. The same designer[1] was previously at {one of the other three very large gaming console manufacturers} and knows a thing or two about controllers. My understanding is it will be significantly more accurate than traditional joysticks and competitive with a mouse (with a mouse you have a single 'large' plane of motion, with this, you have two smaller independent planes for each thumb). For FPS's it will really shine, but keep in mind that Valve also makes DOTA2 so I'm sure they're more than aware of the need to make this work across genres. For Valve to bring PC gaming to your TV/Couch, they really needed to nail the interface. I imagine they have spent many iterations on the problem, and I am very excited to see the fruits of their labor. [1] Full disclosure, by some odd coincidence she happens to be my sister and also did the industrial design for Lockitron so I am wayy biased here.

deletes 13y ago
What do you mean by having an extra plane. The mouse already covers a 2d surface, how would an extra plane help you with that? The analog trackpad does have an advantage over a keyboard but not over a mouse, i think.
- mbrubeck 13y ago
  In a typical keyboard+mouse FPS game, for example, you get 2D analog "look" controls with the mouse, but much more limited 2D "move" controls with the keyboard. With two analog sticks/trackpads/mice/etc. you can get the same range of control over both. That's what the two "planes" give you.
  - skorgu 13y ago
    To expand on this: In most FPSes your move commands are binary, "W" or nothing. You can alter them a bit with combinations, Shift-W to sprint or perhaps Ctrl-W to crawl but you're still limited to a handful of preset speeds. I could easily imagine being able to use a continuous axis to encapsulate walk/jog/sprint being quite a bit more intuitive and precise.
    - mietek 13y ago
      Splinter Cell did this to great effect, with the scroll wheel used to smoothly progress between creeping/walking/jogging/sprinting.
    - trippy_biscuits 13y ago
      What about circle strafing a moving target while jumping/ducking and shooting? For me, that takes 3 simultaneous inputs on my left hand and 3 on my right hand. On each hand, some of those inputs vary or alternate. I can't speak for "most FPS" but competitive FPS require this coordinated action.
alexeisadeski3 13y ago
>For Valve to bring PC gaming to your TV/Couch, they really needed to nail the interface. I don't understand the problem with traditional mouse+kb for couch gaming. I've been using it for years and haven't encountered any drawbacks (using wireless mouse+kb combo). Am able to play online FPS and RTS, both of which require extreme precision and extreme low latency, at very high levels. You use a solid mousemat, place that on the couch beside you. The keyboard goes in your lap. Kick your feet up and game away. It works great. This controller looks like trying to reinvent the wheel, and I just don't think that it'll work. The problem which all of these schemes have is that they make you uncomptetive versus mouse+kb foes in multiplayer games. No one has ever been able to match the precision and control of mouse+kb, and even if this solution is far better than previously attempts, it will still likely not be anywhere near the traditional control. For 'casual' single player games, it'll work great. I'm sure that's a large part of the market for SteamBox. But for the hardcore, it probably won't work at all. I think they'd be better off finding a solution which incorporates traditional mouse+kb than trying to work around it, but that's just my opinion from the outside looking in.
- icambron 13y ago
  Are you suggesting that most hardcore console gamers use a keyboard and mouse? I don't think that's true... Edit: Rereading your comment, I guess you might mean PC gamers who are sitting on their couches. I don't think that's the market this is after; it's trying to get console gamers onto Steam by providing them a cool new product that will work well with the games they have. This makes that a much smaller shift for those gamers than the keyboard and mouse. Will they still get owned by more traditional PC gamers (since they're now competing directly), as you suggest? I guess that's possible, but that's just saying "console gaming needs to stay separate", not "they should use a keyboard and mouse for console games", which just isn't on the table any more than PC gamers are going to switch to a handheld controller.
  - zanny 13y ago
    Any game with a PC version that is vetted as a competitive esport will find its pc version, with superior and portable control interfaces, to be the choice for competition. See: CoD, Battlefield, Quake, etc. All prefer exact aiming with a mouse over fudging analog input sticks with aim assist. By your wording, no, console gamers don't use keyboards / mice, because the games they play on consoles are not compatible with them, and are not designed to use them. Very few genres (fighting, brawlers) sometimes prefer controllers to keyboards, and when they do it is usually a personal choice, or the market has better alternatives to both (ie, fight sticks).
anonymous 13y ago
I don't see how my right thumb could be as precise as moving the mouse, which I do with all 5 of my fingers (for tiny movements) or from my shoulder (for larger movements). If thumb touchpads were good for FPS games, how come nobody is playing them with their thumb on their laptop's touchpad? Maybe I'm just old, but I don't see myself ever being able to use this.
- hayksaakian 13y ago
  Long time users of trackball mice will disagree with you http://mobile.logitech.com/en-us/mice-pointers/trackballs http://mobile.logitech.com/en-us/mice-pointers/trackballs
  - jjkmk 13y ago
    Using Counter Strike as the flag ship FPS for Valve there currently aren't any professional players using a trackball: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AkghPvIh7ZVwdGZ3WXE0dDlTdk5rT1ZKZm91VXVzREE&output=html https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AkghPvIh7ZVwdGZ...
    - gcb0 13y ago
      As a trackball heavy user (i use both thumb and index ones, with both hands) I avoid playing FPS without a mouse! the thumbs trackball is more precise. But still not good. A good and cheap microsoft mouse is always with me when i'm playing FPSs. Also, even if the control wasn't an issue, no trackball has more than 300DPI. EVER. The minimum for mouses is 400. I don't know why that is. But even the overly expensive Kensington ones are crappy even to click on a 10x10 button on regular usage, let alone to headshot in a FPS.
      - jwpeddle 13y ago
        no trackball has more than 300DPI My 1600DPI L-Trac disagrees.
        13y ago
laeus 13y ago
I got a chance to try this out with a first-person shooter. I was not very happy with it. It felt worse than mouse+keyboard and simultaneously worse than dual-analog gamepads. Everybody in the room had issues calibrating and re-centering themselves. I'm sure it gets better with more use, but that's just the problem: it fails a fundamental usability test, because the initial experience of using it is pretty awful and requires a significant learning curve to achieve results that aren't necessarily or obviously better than either of the current standards.
- vacri 13y ago
  My first impression on viewing the controller is that reporting the 'location' of the thumb is going to be hard. Unlike a joystick or mouse that has a well-defined point, the thumb touches over a large area. You can find the centroid of this area - and the area will change size and shape as the thumb is rolled around. Different people will roll their thumbs differently, and there may be a mismatch between intent and physical interaction. It'll be interesting to see how well they manage to deal with this.
  - PhasmaFelis 13y ago
    I suspect that will be a feature, not a bug. I already use finger-rolling on my laptop trackpad when I need pixel-level precision. For noobs, the difference probably won't be noticeable; for experts, I expect they'll be using that technique on purpose.
- Pxtl 13y ago
  To be fair, dual-stick FPS gaming and mouse+keyboard gaming has a vicious learning-curve the first time out as well. The question is whether it's worth struggling through that.
- nslamberth 13y ago
  Out of curiosity, was the haptic tech in the build you tried out? Keeping thumbs oriented seems to be the biggest challenge of a controller like this, but I as hoping the haptic feedback would help keep your thumbs in place.
xerophtye 13y ago
Regarding your comment about DOTA2, i see how they have a stake in making this good for rts, but i am not sure how it will work. Me and a cousin hacked an old XBOX (not 360) controller and made it into a usb controller and i tried playing League Of Legends with it... hellishly tough man. I figured it would be more suited to a controller than other rts games because it involves a lot of button action, instead of just the point-and-click of rts games. so while the controller was pretty cool for casting spells, but mouse movement is a pain. because u have to click all over the screen pretty rapidly (MOBA games get pretty intense) and such rapid precision is very VERY hard to obtain from a controller. Maybe its just all of us aren't used to doing those tasks with a controller as we are used to it by a mouse (btw long time halo veteran so am more comfortable on controllers for FPS games) but i think a learning curve would prevent high level players from switching to controllers becuase it would (albeit temporarily) really shunt their skills

deletes 13y ago

What do you mean by having an extra plane. The mouse already covers a 2d surface, how would an extra plane help you with that? The analog trackpad does have an advantage over a keyboard but not over a mouse, i think.

mbrubeck 13y ago
In a typical keyboard+mouse FPS game, for example, you get 2D analog "look" controls with the mouse, but much more limited 2D "move" controls with the keyboard. With two analog sticks/trackpads/mice/etc. you can get the same range of control over both. That's what the two "planes" give you.
- skorgu 13y ago
  To expand on this: In most FPSes your move commands are binary, "W" or nothing. You can alter them a bit with combinations, Shift-W to sprint or perhaps Ctrl-W to crawl but you're still limited to a handful of preset speeds. I could easily imagine being able to use a continuous axis to encapsulate walk/jog/sprint being quite a bit more intuitive and precise.
  - mietek 13y ago
    Splinter Cell did this to great effect, with the scroll wheel used to smoothly progress between creeping/walking/jogging/sprinting.
  - trippy_biscuits 13y ago
    What about circle strafing a moving target while jumping/ducking and shooting? For me, that takes 3 simultaneous inputs on my left hand and 3 on my right hand. On each hand, some of those inputs vary or alternate. I can't speak for "most FPS" but competitive FPS require this coordinated action.

alexeisadeski3 13y ago

>For Valve to bring PC gaming to your TV/Couch, they really needed to nail the interface. I don't understand the problem with traditional mouse+kb for couch gaming. I've been using it for years and haven't encountered any drawbacks (using wireless mouse+kb combo). Am able to play online FPS and RTS, both of which require extreme precision and extreme low latency, at very high levels. You use a solid mousemat, place that on the couch beside you. The keyboard goes in your lap. Kick your feet up and game away. It works great. This controller looks like trying to reinvent the wheel, and I just don't think that it'll work. The problem which all of these schemes have is that they make you uncomptetive versus mouse+kb foes in multiplayer games. No one has ever been able to match the precision and control of mouse+kb, and even if this solution is far better than previously attempts, it will still likely not be anywhere near the traditional control. For 'casual' single player games, it'll work great. I'm sure that's a large part of the market for SteamBox. But for the hardcore, it probably won't work at all. I think they'd be better off finding a solution which incorporates traditional mouse+kb than trying to work around it, but that's just my opinion from the outside looking in.

icambron 13y ago
Are you suggesting that most hardcore console gamers use a keyboard and mouse? I don't think that's true... Edit: Rereading your comment, I guess you might mean PC gamers who are sitting on their couches. I don't think that's the market this is after; it's trying to get console gamers onto Steam by providing them a cool new product that will work well with the games they have. This makes that a much smaller shift for those gamers than the keyboard and mouse. Will they still get owned by more traditional PC gamers (since they're now competing directly), as you suggest? I guess that's possible, but that's just saying "console gaming needs to stay separate", not "they should use a keyboard and mouse for console games", which just isn't on the table any more than PC gamers are going to switch to a handheld controller.
- zanny 13y ago
  Any game with a PC version that is vetted as a competitive esport will find its pc version, with superior and portable control interfaces, to be the choice for competition. See: CoD, Battlefield, Quake, etc. All prefer exact aiming with a mouse over fudging analog input sticks with aim assist. By your wording, no, console gamers don't use keyboards / mice, because the games they play on consoles are not compatible with them, and are not designed to use them. Very few genres (fighting, brawlers) sometimes prefer controllers to keyboards, and when they do it is usually a personal choice, or the market has better alternatives to both (ie, fight sticks).

anonymous 13y ago

I don't see how my right thumb could be as precise as moving the mouse, which I do with all 5 of my fingers (for tiny movements) or from my shoulder (for larger movements). If thumb touchpads were good for FPS games, how come nobody is playing them with their thumb on their laptop's touchpad? Maybe I'm just old, but I don't see myself ever being able to use this.

hayksaakian 13y ago
Long time users of trackball mice will disagree with you http://mobile.logitech.com/en-us/mice-pointers/trackballs http://mobile.logitech.com/en-us/mice-pointers/trackballs
- jjkmk 13y ago
  Using Counter Strike as the flag ship FPS for Valve there currently aren't any professional players using a trackball: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AkghPvIh7ZVwdGZ3WXE0dDlTdk5rT1ZKZm91VXVzREE&output=html https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AkghPvIh7ZVwdGZ...
  - gcb0 13y ago
    As a trackball heavy user (i use both thumb and index ones, with both hands) I avoid playing FPS without a mouse! the thumbs trackball is more precise. But still not good. A good and cheap microsoft mouse is always with me when i'm playing FPSs. Also, even if the control wasn't an issue, no trackball has more than 300DPI. EVER. The minimum for mouses is 400. I don't know why that is. But even the overly expensive Kensington ones are crappy even to click on a 10x10 button on regular usage, let alone to headshot in a FPS.
    - jwpeddle 13y ago
      no trackball has more than 300DPI My 1600DPI L-Trac disagrees.
      - 13y ago

laeus 13y ago

I got a chance to try this out with a first-person shooter. I was not very happy with it. It felt worse than mouse+keyboard and simultaneously worse than dual-analog gamepads. Everybody in the room had issues calibrating and re-centering themselves. I'm sure it gets better with more use, but that's just the problem: it fails a fundamental usability test, because the initial experience of using it is pretty awful and requires a significant learning curve to achieve results that aren't necessarily or obviously better than either of the current standards.

vacri 13y ago
My first impression on viewing the controller is that reporting the 'location' of the thumb is going to be hard. Unlike a joystick or mouse that has a well-defined point, the thumb touches over a large area. You can find the centroid of this area - and the area will change size and shape as the thumb is rolled around. Different people will roll their thumbs differently, and there may be a mismatch between intent and physical interaction. It'll be interesting to see how well they manage to deal with this.
- PhasmaFelis 13y ago
  I suspect that will be a feature, not a bug. I already use finger-rolling on my laptop trackpad when I need pixel-level precision. For noobs, the difference probably won't be noticeable; for experts, I expect they'll be using that technique on purpose.
Pxtl 13y ago
To be fair, dual-stick FPS gaming and mouse+keyboard gaming has a vicious learning-curve the first time out as well. The question is whether it's worth struggling through that.
nslamberth 13y ago
Out of curiosity, was the haptic tech in the build you tried out? Keeping thumbs oriented seems to be the biggest challenge of a controller like this, but I as hoping the haptic feedback would help keep your thumbs in place.

xerophtye 13y ago

Regarding your comment about DOTA2, i see how they have a stake in making this good for rts, but i am not sure how it will work. Me and a cousin hacked an old XBOX (not 360) controller and made it into a usb controller and i tried playing League Of Legends with it... hellishly tough man. I figured it would be more suited to a controller than other rts games because it involves a lot of button action, instead of just the point-and-click of rts games. so while the controller was pretty cool for casting spells, but mouse movement is a pain. because u have to click all over the screen pretty rapidly (MOBA games get pretty intense) and such rapid precision is very VERY hard to obtain from a controller. Maybe its just all of us aren't used to doing those tasks with a controller as we are used to it by a mouse (btw long time halo veteran so am more comfortable on controllers for FPS games) but i think a learning curve would prevent high level players from switching to controllers becuase it would (albeit temporarily) really shunt their skills