The Biggest Issue with the Steam Controller was Proper Support

[Kickfister]

Kind of a random topic but this is an idea that bounces around my head every time I want to dig out the steam controller and play something with it. By far the biggest thing working against the steam controller was the lack of proper in-game support from developers. I don't know what Valve did to make supporting the controller itself easy, but I can't recall a single game that even had prompts for it (I'm guessing some Valve titles would have, but other than that there was nothing I played with them). But prompts aren't the big thing that held it back, because you can adapt to not having accurate prompts. What really killed the steam controller for me was the vast majority of games not working well with simultaneous use of a keyboard + mouse and a controller. Some games would hitch when the input swapped, some games would flat out not allow them to work together, and other games would rapidly swap the input prompts (honestly this was the best case because it's at least usable in an optimal fashion). This often left you with picking between good aim (mouse + keyboard) or good movement/button mapping (controller). To be honest here, that "mouse-like joystick" was at best serviceable, and at worst unusable with the way thumbstick acceleration worked in a game, and outright using that touchpad as a thumbstick replacement was clunky and bad. These issues culminated in the steam controller being a good option for an absolutely minuscule amount of games in my library (and I own like 800 of em), which is a damning situation to be in when your controller also requires you to really practice with it to become proficient.

Really, it's a damn shame. I honestly love the hardware for certain types of games, but I can't remember the last time I thought "wow the steam controller would work well for this" and it actually worked out well. Normally I'd hit one of those issues that prevents me from using the controller how I'd hoped, and end up reaching for the trusty Xbox/PS4 controller.

I suppose the ultimate point of this thread is that, while I'd love a hardware revision of the steam controller, what I'd love even more is a more focused software push. Valve put so much effort into making the controller technically work for anything, and not enough effort into getting developers to just properly support the damn thing so you'd want to use it for anything.

Curious to see what Era largely thinks about the steam controller. Did you love the hardware and hate the software side of things like me? Do you just want touch pads to die in a fire? Might as well make it a poll thread as well.

 

[Bentendo24]

Man I loved the Steam Controller. Wish the trackpad would become adopted by more companies as it solved my issue with first person games and controllers

 

[TheDanimal]

I tried it on a whim from that fire sale, and the hardware just kinda felt cheap. I tried playing destiny and it was very hard lol

 

[Spacejaws]

Yea it was really frustrating how some games would not let you lock the promts down. If I remember Vermintide 1 or 2 was particularly bad because when the inputs changed the entrie HUD changed too, not sure why they need 2 different HUDS. They also didnt have vertical controller sensitivity only horizontal (it was there then they removed it in an update for some reason I even raised a support case with them that went nowhere).

I would go full mouse and keyboard, but navigating menu systems is much easier in controller mode and any other ease of use systems too.

Damn shame Steam Controller deserved better and I think games need to do better on PC for control options in general rather than simply throwing the base xbox 360 buttons at us and calling it a day.

 

[SteveWinwood]

I love the controller.

Yes the individual games could do things better but a huge majority of them never thought anyone would ever need controller and mouse input at the same time. And it's clearly not a trivial thing to just add it in really quick for tons of games. It's not like Valve could do much there.

Ultimately I don't think that's a huge issue honestly. It's an annoyance sure, but not much past that. And there were a bunch of little things like that.

The biggest issue is that people are very impatient and don't want an incredibly useful and flexible controller that can make any game playable in any way you want if it takes any amount of set up or practice to do so.

 

[Kickfister]

I love the controller.

Yes the individual games could do things better but a huge majority of them never thought anyone would ever need controller and mouse input at the same time. And it's clearly not a trivial thing to just add it in really quick for tons of games. It's not like Valve could do much there.

Ultimately I don't think that's a huge issue honestly. It's an annoyance sure, but not much past that.

The biggest issue is that people are very impatient and don't want an incredibly useful and flexible controller that can make any game playable in any way you want if it takes any amount of set up or practice to do so.

Click to shrink...

Valve has the steam input API, which should have been pushed to properly implement the steam controller. Maybe it was a bear to work with, I don't really know, but the controller never should have been about developers making sure their games are fit for hacking together a keyboard+mouse + controller solution.

 

[molnizzle]

Agreed, I don't want to have to mess with a bunch of shit just to start playing my games. PC gaming has enough of that as it is. Yes there are profiles to download, but the nerds who make those public profiles almost always have weird preferences that aren't what I want. With native support -- i.e. a developer taking the time to go through the hassle of tailoring the control scheme to the device -- the Steam controller would've been awesome.

I love the controller.

Yes the individual games could do things better but a huge majority of them never thought anyone would ever need controller and mouse input at the same time. And it's clearly not a trivial thing to just add it in really quick for tons of games. It's not like Valve could do much there.

Ultimately I don't think that's a huge issue honestly. It's an annoyance sure, but not much past that. And there were a bunch of little things like that.

The biggest issue is that people are very impatient and don't want an incredibly useful and flexible controller that can make any game playable in any way you want if it takes any amount of set up or practice to do so.

Click to shrink...

Native support would mean the developer designed for the Steam controller specifically rather than just creating a wonky hybrid controller/mouse combo as a public profile. I wanted devs to treat the Steam controller as a dedicated 3rd input option.

 

[Bentendo24]

I think a big part of the problem was that some people didn't realize that it was pivotal that you customize the experience per game. I remember booting up Fallout NV and the default settings made aiming literally impossible . After some modifications the aiming was a thing of true magic. My god.... what a shame.

 

[SapientWolf]

Only thing I didn't like was the dpad. Unfortunately, that was all it took for me. It can't ever be the one controller to rule them all.

 

[SteveWinwood]

Valve has the steam input API, which should have been pushed to properly implement the steam controller. Maybe it was a bear to work with, I don't really know, but the controller never should have been about developers making sure their games are fit for hacking together a keyboard+mouse + controller solution.

Click to shrink...

Native support would mean the developer designed for the Steam controller specifically rather than just creating a wonky hybrid controller/mouse combo as a public profile. I wanted devs to treat the Steam controller as a dedicated 3rd input option.

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and you know how many games came out before the steam input api was out? a lot

tons of games still come out now that dont have very basic features built into steamworks, expecting devs to natively implement the steam controller is very lofty

 

[MechaMarmaset]

I loved that it made steam input, but the controller itself was a huge piece of crap. Cheap and hollow feeling, triggers required too much movement and most of the buttons required too hard of a click. Terrible shoulder buttons. All the face buttons were too close together and too small. I have two of these things and have used them for years but finally switched back to using my DS4 when the tiny face buttons caused me issues in the Megaman x legacy collection. Just got tired of always fucking with the settings the right track pad too.

 

[molnizzle]

and you know how many games came out before the steam input api was out? a lot

tons of games still come out now that dont have very basic features built into steamworks, expecting devs to natively implement the steam controller is very lofty

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Right, but that's what would have made the controller useable for me. That's the premise of this thread.

 

[Kickfister]

tons of games still come out now that dont have very basic features built into steamworks, expecting devs to natively implement the steam controller is very lofty

Click to shrink...

I don't think it's as lofty as you're thinking, I just think it's a complete afterthought. The steam input api is quite good these days, and supporting it means you natively support virtually every controller someone would reasonably plug into their PC (xbox, ds4, switch, steam controller) with appropriate prompts. It's not so much about making an actual profile for the game on the steam controller, it's about supporting the api that enables the community to make a good profile for the steam controller, not one that hinges on hacked together functionality and buggy input prompts.

Actually this just reminded me that there are a handful of games that support the steam controller natively (by supporting the steam input api), such as FFXV and Monster Hunter World.

 

[FaceHugger]

The hardware seemed fine, if on the cheaper side. The software was a real disappointment. Just leaving it up largely to the community to tinker with profiles? No thanks. It only ever felt OK to me in games like Civ or Cities Skylines. It was atrocious in any other kind of game.

 

[inner-G]

The Xbox one controller "just works".

 

[Etrian Darkness]

I can remap everything through Steam so I think it works fine enough.

 

[Ploid 6.0]

When I got the Steam Controller I understood it would have a learning process. What I did was play a 3rd person game (Saints Row 4) and went to town collecting orbs, shooting, super jumping, and adjusting to the controller making tweaks to the control settings as I went. Over time I learned what sensitivity I wanting certain things at like mouse look, and now the controller is the best I'll likely ever have. Gyro, touch pads, a good enough game profiler (steam input) it all works together well.

I'm getting Dual Sense to be able to use reWASD (it looks a lot better than Steam Input), and use Flick Stick for big movements in the place of the right touch pad. It has gyro and a touch pad, and maybe the people that make reWASD will do some good things with the haptics. I wish SC wasn't so tied to steam, and I wish better controllers or SC2 came out, but game developers outside of Nintendo system are so stuck on dual analog.

I voted awesome hardware, annoying software. Steam updates a lot and messes up stuff with my profiles every now and then. I used to be able to use profiles outside of Big Picture on non steam games, and now I have to be in BPM. It was also tedious to get games working too.

 

[EVIL]

most uncomfortable controller to use for me. the bumper buttons are so stiff that I press the circle pads instead.

 

[dsk1210]

Great controller when you get used to it.

Gyro and mouse on the right trackpad is way more accurate than controller, the controller needed a higher polling rate for me though, it could feel a little jittery but I would love to see a V2.

We need a controller revolution imo.

Edit. It also needed a team that understood its advantages and created profiles for everyone that made sense. You do get used to creating your own pretty quickly but it would have been great if everything just worked as you hoped.

 

[Ploid 6.0]

most uncomfortable controller to use for me. the bumper buttons are so stiff that I press the circle pads instead.

Click to shrink...

Uncomfortable? That's pretty wild to me, it's the most comfortable for me.

The pads, you can play on it for hours and hours and not get a sore thumb like with a controller and the dpad for example. I could play SFV all day on this thing.

The way it's made with your thumbs resting down into the pads instead of the face area elevated helps a lot for endurance too. My thumbs feel like they are in a natural relaxed state when it's over the pads, vs having to raise them a bit more over the face buttons of a DS4.

 

[Lork]

The biggest issues holding the Steam Controller back were bad defaults and a near total lack of care for the out of the box / no customization experience. Issues like simultaneous mouse/controller incompatibility were frustrating, but developers would've taken notice and addressed them if a significant critical mass of Steam Controller users were to actually arise.

But that was never going to happen in a million years when most people's first impressions with the controller were of launching a game and being presented with some really awful analog stick emulation mode on the right touchpad, touch based d-pad input and triggers that were set up to cause double inputs for some reason. Success would by no means have been guaranteed without these particular issues, but with them there was zero chance the controller would ever gain any traction at all.

I think they expected developers to go in and manually tune the default layout for each game themselves, but... they didn't. It's the typical Valve solution of "building the tools" and then sitting back and expecting developers and players to do all of the actual work themselves. Works great when you already have a monopoly and everyone's just forced to put up with it, but in an actually competitive market like gamepads it's a non starter.

 

[Ploid 6.0]

You gotta give Nintendo gamers flowers, and praise. They get developers to do things like add gyro controls to Nintendo games after it launched. Warframe, and Fortnite put them in because the Nintendo gamers were done with dual analog (a lot of them at least), and realized gyro was better and more accurate. Warframe and Fortnite probably still don't have a gyro option for PS4.

Thankfully every PC game can have gyro thanks to apps.

 

[Kickfister]

The biggest issues holding the Steam Controller back were bad defaults and a near total lack of care for the out of the box / no customization experience. Issues like simultaneous mouse/controller incompatibility were frustrating, but developers would've taken notice and addressed them if a significant critical mass of Steam Controller users were to actually arise.

But that was never going to happen in a million years when most people's first impressions with the controller were of launching a game and being presented with some really awful analog stick emulation mode on the right touchpad, touch based d-pad input and triggers that were set up to cause double inputs for some reason. Success would by no means have been guaranteed without these particular issues, but with them there was zero chance the controller would ever gain any traction at all.

I think they expected developers to go in and manually tune the default layout for each game themselves, but... they didn't. It's the typical Valve solution of "building the tools" and then sitting back and expecting developers and players to do all of the actual work themselves. Works great when you already have a monopoly and everyone's just forced to put up with it, but in an actually competitive market like gamepads it's a non starter.

Click to shrink...

Excellent point here.

 

[Arulan]

It's my favorite modern controller, and the software that came out of it (Steam Input) is incredible.

The right analog stick on traditional controllers is just terrible. Even after all the design compromises and ridiculous aim assists, you never feel fully in-control of what you're doing like you do with a mouse. It doesn't matter if it's CS: GO or playing The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. The Steam controller's pads are as close as a controller has gotten to that.

This controller also tackles a problem controllers have had since they introduced analog sticks: you have to lift your thumb to do important actions. Having to completely stop all camera movement to jump, melee, throw a grenade, or whatever other actions your game might be using is ridiculous. The controller's back buttons, dual-stage triggers, multi-purpose pads, and software make it so you have more button options than you could ever use. You don't have to use the four face buttons. You don't have to contort your hands in unnatural positions just to accomplish basic functionality.

And if all of that wasn't enough to make it my favorite controller, it also has "HD haptics", gyro, a 80+ hour battery life, back buttons, and was regularly on sale for ~$25.

 

[Rodney McKay]

My main issue was that none of the different configurations I tried were perfect for games designed around regular controller support.
MGSV was one of the first games I tried my hardest to get used to the Steam Controller.

One config was the straight keyboard+mouse config which gives you amazing accuracy with the right touch pad, but then movement is limited to WASD which always feels bad to me on an analog stick, and I don't like using a touch pad for aiming either. Apart from the 8-way movement, you also have to configure walking and running to either be a toggle or based on how far you press the analog stick, neither of which feel right to me when using an analog stick either.

The other config is full gamepad with emulated mouse look which fixes all the gamepad issues I had, but the emulated mouse movement was always too jerky for me to be beneficial enough, especially when doing small aim adjustments.

And the final configuration is using gamepad for analogs stick and buttons, but then switching to mouse look when aiming (like when you press the left trigger down).
This one I'd always get to work pretty well, but there'd always be something weird about it. I never loved how the control prompts switch between keyboard and gamepad when you switch to aiming with the mouse look.

Mass Effect Andromeda was another game I tried to get used to the Steam Controller with, but I was getting weird errors with it.
One annoying one was that in conversations to skip to the next line of dialog you press X, but on my Steam controller config, it was pressing X twice, so I was skipping dialog before I could read it.
The other issue was the trigger buttons to activate powers. On a gamepad you press one, or the other, or both to activate 3 powers. You can also hold them to charge some powers.
With the Steam Controller it wouldn't register when I'd press both buttons, and it would charge attacks when I'd hold the button down.

most uncomfortable controller to use for me. the bumper buttons are so stiff that I press the circle pads instead.

Click to shrink...

Bumpers and touch pad buttons were both too stiff for me to use as regular as most games require.

I could probably have dealt with my issues with different configurations eventually with enough tinkering, but the stiffness of the bumpers and touch pad buttons were deal breakers for me.

I've considered adding electrical tape or tiny strips of foam to the I side of those buttons to make it feel better, I just haven't had the time to take it apart yet.

 

[Yarbskoo]

It's a great controller, but it's kind of a pain in the ass to set up, and a lot of games aren't designed for simultaneous gamepad and mouse inputs. I never did get it to work well with Direct Input games

 

[ss_lemonade]

Uncomfortable? That's pretty wild to me, it's the most comfortable for me.

The pads, you can play on it for hours and hours and not get a sore thumb like with a controller and the dpad for example. I could play SFV all day on this thing.

The way it's made with your thumbs resting down into the pads instead of the face area elevated helps a lot for endurance too. My thumbs feel like they are in a natural relaxed state when it's over the pads, vs having to raise them a bit more over the face buttons of a DS4.

Click to shrink...

Using it as a standard drop in for xinput controllers is very uncomfortable. The positioning of the analog stick and buttons and the stiff shoulder buttons always gave me an awful experience. They're just too close to the center and puts my thumbs in an uncomfortable position to reach them. Never had this type of problem with any controller I've used in the past.

Using the controller for games without controller support like older PC FPS games is interesting but it still (to me at least) doesn't work as well as just using a m/kb because of the lack of precision compared to a mouse. I tried playing some older games like Fear, Far Cry 1 and Unreal 2 for instance and I could barely make any meaningful progress through them with the controller

 

[EVIL]

Uncomfortable? That's pretty wild to me, it's the most comfortable for me.

The pads, you can play on it for hours and hours and not get a sore thumb like with a controller and the dpad for example. I could play SFV all day on this thing.

The way it's made with your thumbs resting down into the pads instead of the face area elevated helps a lot for endurance too. My thumbs feel like they are in a natural relaxed state when it's over the pads, vs having to raise them a bit more over the face buttons of a DS4.

Click to shrink...

To clarify, its a comfortable controller to hold, but not use.. the bumpers and pads are so stiff to click, that it fatigued my hand after only 10 minutes

 

[Ploid 6.0]

For touch pad commands I tend to not have confirmation requiring the click. Touch and release, or just plain touch, fighting games for example, I just activate the command on touch, no release needed. Trying to play a fighter where you need to click would be too much for the way the click is designed with SC. Maybe a Steam Controller 2 could have fixed that.

Also I hate the loud bumper sound and stiffness. I actually modded mine after the plastic inside broke, and it felt a lot better after. No strong click, and easier to activate.

The beauty of this controller to me, is that the software gives so much purpose to the touch pads and grip/paddle buttons. I play rpgs where the movement is on the left touch pad instead of the analog. I don't need to do it but I got so used to the touch pads that it seemed good enough to adjust to it. This prevented me from wearing out the rubber on the analog like my first controller, and it was better for extended play.

It's hard to get into customizing the controller though, especially with Steam Input. Sometimes SI works well enough, sometimes there are phantom activators that make you want to start over just to get rid of the bug causing other commands to happen when you press two buttons at the same time. This is just one of the issues with Steam Input. Thankfully I like figuring out why stuff broke, so it's like a puzzle to me.

 

[Kittens McMittens]

Echoing the sentiment that it's uncomfortable in games that expect a regular controller. Where it shines is allowing you to play more traditional PC games like strategy or isometric RPGs using a controller. For that purpose it's totally amazing. I used it all the time when I had my PC hooked up to my TV. It did feel super cheap though.

 

[Lothars]

I'm not a fan of it at all, I thought it was uncomfortable to use and it wasn't fun to setup.

 

[EloKa]

I still use mine on a regular basis but usually not to play games because I prefer either kb/m or twin sticks as my default control scheme.

But I can chill on my couch and with a single button press the Steam Link starts, which turns on the TV and 5 secs later I can continue to watch my stream over WiFi. Controlling the PC with it from your couch to browse the web or use Discord feels also fine enough. Figuring out that you can use the Steam Controller without (or outside of) the Big Picture mode was a game changer. It's probably not one of the best controllers out there but it's one of the best PC centric peripherals.

 

[Rodney McKay]

I wish my Steam link worked well with my setup, I'd probably use my Steam controller a lot more if it did work well.

Nvidia Shield/Moonlight streaming works flawlessly, and PS4 Remote Play isn't half bad either, but Stream Streaming is always flaky with a bad connection or shitty video quality.

99% of my PC game playing these days is streaming, and the Moonlight app doesn't support the Steam Controller unfortunately.
I should really just being my PC downstairs, then I could at least have my controller connected directly through the PC instead of through the streaming app.

 

[ScoobsJoestar]

I loved the remapping software. I loved the paddles.

I hated the touchpad. Guess I didn't want something to play PC games with a controller so much as a highly customizable regular controller.

 

[BeI]

The software (Steam input) ended up really good and the hardware had good ideas, but I think the Steam controller ended up in an unfortunate middle ground somewhere between a m+kb and a twin stick gamepad, assuming you could overcome the learning curve, but a lot of people could not. I say get rid of the learning curve in a V2 controller by making it twin stick and packing it with all sorts of extra hardware to make it amazing with Steam input. Capacitive buttons, gyro, force sensing grips and bumpers, middle trackpad(s), etc.

At least the latest Steam controller patents point towards add-ons for a joystick / dpad on the trackpads as an option.

 

[Deleted member 1839]

I really like the steam controller but I find it to be really situational. Like obviously it's more enjoyable playing shooters(especially TPS) and FromSoftware games on it than using an regular controller, but that's more middling than anything since I would rather play a shooter on M+KB and FromSoftware are one of the sole exceptions of a 3D action playing better on the Steam Controller rather than say an Xbox one.

I love the idea of it and but felt the execution could be better and hopefully with those recent patents there's a version two in the works. Also hope they improve build quality because it feels cheaper than the console controller

 

[Pargon]

I had far fewer issues with the hardware than most, it seems - especially once I spent some time to get used to it.
I remember playing through Prey (2006) from start-to-finish when I first got it, and tweaking things as I went. It's not a very long game, and by the end I felt quite comfortable with the controller.
After all, it's not like anyone had perfect control over analog sticks or a mouse the first time they used them; but some people seemed to expect that there would be no learning curve at all with the Steam Controller and you'd automatically be better at games for using it - or that it would be better than a keyboard & mouse when sitting at a desk.

The biggest downside certainly is that the quality of the experience was dependent on the game/developer.
It's not even that developers had to include specific support for it, but that the way many games handled input interfered with proper operation of the controller.

Games which supported simultaneous gamepad & mouse input, and locked the prompts to Xbox ones - or had that option - were totally fine with the Steam Controller even if they did not have specific Steam Input support.
Some third-party games did include proper support though - Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, XCOM2, and Prey (2017) are a few that come to mind.

I could even take keyboard prompts if they stayed constant - especially if they could be remapped to LRABXY rather than typical keyboard defaults.
But constant switching back-and-forth - particularly since some games would hitch up as it happened - was more than a little annoying:

Worse, some games just wouldn't support gamepad and mouse at all - so you would be stuck compromising with digital movement and mouse control, or analog movement but with an emulated analog stick on the right touchpad.
I don't mind digital movement on a keyboard, but it feels wrong to me on a touchpad or analog stick.

While I know that some people did not have an issue with it, I was never able to get the emulated analog sticks to feel right for camera control.
I actually didn't mind having analog movement on the left touchpad - in many games I preferred it, since the touchpad could support many more inputs via edge bindings and mode-switching - but I just couldn't deal with the right analog stick being placed on the right touchpad. Same thing applies to gyro aiming: it only worked well when it could be assigned to 1:1 mouse inputs.

In games where everything went right - and even in games where it was only serviceable - I still prefer the Steam Controller to a DualShock 4.
And in games which lack any kind of controller support, or are bad with typical controllers, the Steam Controller would often work very well. I still use it all the time for point & click games, visual novels, puzzle games etc.
But there were too many "controller games" - games which were built for controllers and had no real problem with them, aside for the inaccuracies of analog sticks - where the experience ended up worse with the Steam Controller than using a dual-analog one; even though it was not the fault of the device itself.

Right, but that's what would have made the controller useable for me. That's the premise of this thread.

Click to shrink...

What are you proposing? That Valve said "hey, you can't publish on Steam unless you support our controller" ?

most uncomfortable controller to use for me. the bumper buttons are so stiff that I press the circle pads instead.

Click to shrink...

There's no way to say this without sounding condescending: but you're probably holding it wrong.
The controller should rest in your hands, and your thumbs should be angled down (arched) over the touchpads, not flat on them.
The shoulder buttons actuate on the outside, not the inside - and with the "inner" part of your index fingers (first or second knuckle). You shouldn't even need your fingertips on the button to press it.

The angle of the shoulder button is the angle that your index fingers should be resting.

The positioning of the analog stick and buttons and the stiff shoulder buttons always gave me an awful experience. They're just too close to the center and puts my thumbs in an uncomfortable position to reach them. Never had this type of problem with any controller I've used in the past.

Click to shrink...

That sounds like the controller is sitting too high in your hands. The grips should be held in your palms.
The controller's weight should not be on your fingers. You should be able to remove all fingers while holding it without dropping the controller.

The Xbox one controller "just works".

Click to shrink...

An Xbox controller doesn't work at all with many of the games I use my Steam Controller for.

 

[TheRed]

Best controller ever made. Still far ahead of the others

 

[RoboitoAM]

The Xbox one controller "just works".

Click to shrink...

Yep, this is the big one. Not to mention that the Steam Controller itself is kinda crap.

I'd gladly welcome a second one though if it improved.

 

[Roshin]

If it had a second thumbstick somewhere, it would still be my default controller. That ended up being the big issue for me, big enough that I eventually went back to using an Xbox controller.

That said, I greatly respect that they were so ambitious in their design. Few other developers are and I hope they take another stab at it some day.

Edit: None of the poll options felt right to me, so I didn't vote.

 

[Captain of Outer Space]

The Steam controller is my main controller for Euro/American Truck Sim and it works great outside of some prompts for filling up the gas that don't work properly, so I have to use my keyboard for those parts of the experience. Maybe there's something I can fix in the Steam mapping set-up, but I didn't see any immediate ways to remedy it.

 

[Kickfister]

Thought I made the questions in the poll well, but I realize now that I wasn't clear enough on what I meant by "software issues were annoying". I meant the entire experience involving anything that could be considered a "software problem", or otherwise something that flat out wasn't a hardware limitation. This includes not enough games working well with the strengths of the controller (analog movement, with mouse aim being one for example). I get the feeling most people are answering based on the quality of steam input in a vacuum, and not the utter lack of support games have for it natively (and therefore the lack of good support games have for the steam controller). Feel like too many people have voted to update the poll at this point :/

 

[Crayon]

The few games that got support, i would end up remapping anyhow. The one really cool one was for XCOM 2. It gave you kind of two mice.

If a game has controller support, it defaults to a template that's a drop-in replacement for any regular controller. Literally takes no work or adjustment. And from there, you can get into the settings and do all kinds of crazy shit.

 

[Instro]

I bought it during the fire sale. Kind of neat to play around with, but wow does it look and feel incredibly cheap.

 

[molnizzle]

What are you proposing? That Valve said "hey, you can't publish on Steam unless you support our controller" ?

Click to shrink...

No? What the hell?

 

[EVIL]

I had far fewer issues with the hardware than most, it seems - especially once I spent some time to get used to it.
I remember playing through Prey (2006) from start-to-finish when I first got it, and tweaking things as I went. It's not a very long game, and by the end I felt quite comfortable with the controller.
After all, it's not like anyone had perfect control over analog sticks or a mouse the first time they used them; but some people seemed to expect that there would be no learning curve at all with the Steam Controller and you'd automatically be better at games for using it - or that it would be better than a keyboard & mouse when sitting at a desk.

The biggest downside certainly is that the quality of the experience was dependent on the game/developer.
It's not even that developers had to include specific support for it, but that the way many games handled input interfered with proper operation of the controller.

Games which supported simultaneous gamepad & mouse input, and locked the prompts to Xbox ones - or had that option - were totally fine with the Steam Controller even if they did not have specific Steam Input support.
Some third-party games did include proper support though - Deus Ex: Mankind Divided, XCOM2, and Prey (2017) are a few that come to mind.

I could even take keyboard prompts if they stayed constant - especially if they could be remapped to LRABXY rather than typical keyboard defaults.
But constant switching back-and-forth - particularly since some games would hitch up as it happened - was more than a little annoying:

Worse, some games just wouldn't support gamepad and mouse at all - so you would be stuck compromising with digital movement and mouse control, or analog movement but with an emulated analog stick on the right touchpad.
I don't mind digital movement on a keyboard, but it feels wrong to me on a touchpad or analog stick.

While I know that some people did not have an issue with it, I was never able to get the emulated analog sticks to feel right for camera control.
I actually didn't mind having analog movement on the left touchpad - in many games I preferred it, since the touchpad could support many more inputs via edge bindings and mode-switching - but I just couldn't deal with the right analog stick being placed on the right touchpad. Same thing applies to gyro aiming: it only worked well when it could be assigned to 1:1 mouse inputs.

In games where everything went right - and even in games where it was only serviceable - I still prefer the Steam Controller to a DualShock 4.
And in games which lack any kind of controller support, or are bad with typical controllers, the Steam Controller would often work very well. I still use it all the time for point & click games, visual novels, puzzle games etc.
But there were too many "controller games" - games which were built for controllers and had no real problem with them, aside for the inaccuracies of analog sticks - where the experience ended up worse with the Steam Controller than using a dual-analog one; even though it was not the fault of the device itself.


What are you proposing? That Valve said "hey, you can't publish on Steam unless you support our controller" ?


There's no way to say this without sounding condescending: but you're probably holding it wrong.
The controller should rest in your hands, and your thumbs should be angled down (arched) over the touchpads, not flat on them.
The shoulder buttons actuate on the outside, not the inside - and with the "inner" part of your index fingers (first or second knuckle). You shouldn't even need your fingertips on the button to press it.

The angle of the shoulder button is the angle that your index fingers should be resting.


That sounds like the controller is sitting too high in your hands. The grips should be held in your palms.
The controller's weight should not be on your fingers. You should be able to remove all fingers while holding it without dropping the controller.


An Xbox controller doesn't work at all with many of the games I use my Steam Controller for.

Click to shrink...

No worries, you don't sound condescending
I have always held the controller exactly as you described and Its a strain to press the bumpers. it is not a comfortable experience at all

directly comparing it to my dualshocks, the steam bumpers require almost 2 to 3 times more force for me to press them at the location you described, and I have a bunch more of these at work and they have all the exact same stiff bumpers.

edit: I would have far less issues with the bumpers if they required the same force as the paddle clicks
but beside the stiff bumpers, the very stiff trackpad clicks are also a massive problem.

 

[TSM]

My biggest issue with the Steam controller was just how DIY doing anything useful with it was. Since the vast majority of developers never really cared about the controller enough to implement controls for it in their games I can't really blame players for not caring about it either. If they ever make another go at a universal controller again I'd hope that Valve would have partnerships with major developers set up ahead of time or it will have just as little impact as it did the first time around.

 

[molnizzle]

My biggest issue with the Steam controller was just how DIY doing anything useful with it was. Since the vast majority of developers never really cared about the controller enough to implement controls for it in their games I can't really blame players for not caring about it either. If they ever make another go at a universal controller again I'd hope that Valve would have partnerships with major developers set up ahead of time or it will have just as little impact as it did the first time around.

Click to shrink...

Yeah. The level of customization is awesome if you're invested and willing to tinker, but there has to be a baseline. Plenty of hardcore players enjoy tweaking their Xbox Elite controller mappings, analog dead zones, etc. — but the base experience is still there for the masses. That's what I needed from the Steam controller. I don't want all that customization at first, especially since I'm adjusting to a totally new input method. I want to pick it up and have a general audience approved control scheme that was thoroughly tested by a competent developer. Later on maybe I'll want to get nerdy with it, but you gotta hook me first.

 

[Csr]

It has replaced traditional controllers for me but i still prefer to use m/kb for games that require m/kb when i am on the desk.

Feature set for the price is really good, bumpers, gyro, long battery life, no major hardware issues but at the same time it has some faults and could be improved. As was mentioned software requires tweaking sometimes, bumpers and trackpads are too hard to press and the plastic used feels cheap.

The biggest issue for me is that the left trackpad is awful as a dpad, that is by far what i want most to change, either have a proper dpad or swappable modules like that patent. Other than that i don't think i would want to go back to a traditional controller, the trackpad is faster and more accurate for camera movement than analog sticks.

 

[ss_lemonade]

That sounds like the controller is sitting too high in your hands. The grips should be held in your palms.
The controller's weight should not be on your fingers. You should be able to remove all fingers while holding it without dropping the controller.

Click to shrink...

I would think I'm holding it correctly

My index fingers rest on the analog triggers and my thumbs are stretched down to the middle of the controller. I usually play games with native controller support so I use the analog stick a lot. For some reason, this kind of grip tires me a lot and feels frustrating to stay in after a while