movement: what about "wasd"-keys?

Mario Donick wrote:
> Some of you may have recognized the discussion about the unusual, but
> (in my eyes) rather easy keymapping in LambdaRogue. Most of you want to
> have cursor keys and numpad-support.
>
> What about WASD ? (W: up, a:left, s:south, d: right) This keymapping is
> done in many 3D-games to move and could be used for roguelikes, too.
>

Numpad suppor is intended to handle the eight directions. Cursor keys
(as well as the wasd) only handle 4 by themselves. In general, you
want to handle eight directions in roguelikes - otherwise you'll create
the pillar-trick scenario without any pillars.

As a side note, if you want to have a left-handed movement, you
probably want an entire circle around the 's' or 'd' keys - as well as
permit reconfigurable keybindings for Dvorak and AZERTY keyboards.
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

Mario Donick wrote:
> Some of you may have recognized the discussion about the unusual, but
> (in my eyes) rather easy keymapping in LambdaRogue. Most of you want to
> have cursor keys and numpad-support.

I want vi-keys support :>

> What about WASD ? (W: up, a:left, s:south, d: right) This keymapping is
> done in many 3D-games to move and could be used for roguelikes, too.

Except it isn't up/south. It is forward/back.

The real problem with WASD is that it is left handed. This is a good
feature in a 3d shooter where you use the mouse and most people are
right handed (and perhaps your roguelike if it is mouse centric with
keyboard movement) but a bad feature when most people use cursor
keys/numpad which is on their right hand.

If you were to support both WASD and cursor keys, you have the problem
that a cursor key user will find all the common commands on the right
side of the keyboard (having been displaced there by the WASD (and
likely QEZC as well) keys being used), making it troublesome to issue
commands and move with two hands.
--
Jeff Lait
(POWDER: http://www.zincland.com/powder)
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

Mario Donick wrote:
> > Azerty users (i and all frenchs) would have trouble using WASD.
>
> Okay. Concerning AZERTY... Currently I'm using "W" to open and "E" to
> close doors. I do it mainly because until now moving is done by
> 789uojkl, so "o" is already used.
>
> Although it seems that I'll use the numpad soon (as it made no big
> problems under Win and Linux), I don't like the o-key to use, because
> on my laptop NUMRIGHT is the same key like O. So if "o" is for "open" I
> only could play this way:
>
> Always hold down "Fn" to use the numpad and don't hold down "Fn" to use
> "o"
>
> OR
>
> Switch "NumLock" on to move, switch "NumLock" off to use "o" and switch
> it on again to move.

Azerty is the layout of french keyboards? I did not know that. So what
keys are there which don't inflict with any layout? What about
"ertdfgcvb"? That should fit qwerty, qwertz and aserty I think...
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

Gerry Quinn wrote:
> Most laptops have four arrow keys anyway! The issue is that it's
> difficult to get a good mapping for diagonal movement. (Pressing two
> arrow keys simultaneously is okay for arcade games, but would not be
> feasible for roguelikes.)
>
> - Gerry Quinn

Hm... I tried to enable the arrows and home(pos1),end,pageup,pagedown.
This should work on laptops, but I don't know if it's convenient for
most people.
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

On 2006-07-26 09:53:57, "Mario Donick" <mario.donick DeleteThis @googlemail.com> wrote:

> Some of you may have recognized the discussion about the unusual, but
> (in my eyes) rather easy keymapping in LambdaRogue. Most of you want to
> have cursor keys and numpad-support.
>
> What about WASD ? (W: up, a:left, s:south, d: right) This keymapping is
> done in many 3D-games to move and could be used for roguelikes, too.
>
> Mario
>
>
>

Azerty users (i and all frenchs) would have trouble using WASD.

IMO the numpad is the best solution.
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

kalikiana wrote:
> Hm... I tried to enable the arrows and home(pos1),end,pageup,pagedown.
> This should work on laptops, but I don't know if it's convenient for
> most people.

laptop keyboards are bastard keyboards withi pge up/down/home etc
mapped
all over the place.

my old keyboard used to do FN-Left for Home and FN-Right for End, pge
up+down
were FN-Up and FN-Dn respectivly.

the best option is to just let users assign whatever keys to actions
they want.
problem solved.

-stu
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

In article <1153900437.084379.234970.DeleteThis@h48g2000cwc.googlegroups.com>,
mario.donick.DeleteThis@googlemail.com says...
> Some of you may have recognized the discussion about the unusual, but
> (in my eyes) rather easy keymapping in LambdaRogue. Most of you want to
> have cursor keys and numpad-support.
>
> What about WASD ? (W: up, a:left, s:south, d: right) This keymapping is
> done in many 3D-games to move and could be used for roguelikes, too.

Most laptops have four arrow keys anyway! The issue is that it's
difficult to get a good mapping for diagonal movement. (Pressing two
arrow keys simultaneously is okay for arcade games, but would not be
feasible for roguelikes.)

- Gerry Quinn
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

On 2006-07-26 14:36:12, Gerry Quinn <gerryq.TakeThisOut@DELETETHISindigo.ie> wrote:

> In article ,
> mario.donick.TakeThisOut@googlemail.com says...
> > Some of you may have recognized the discussion about the unusual, but
> > (in my eyes) rather easy keymapping in LambdaRogue. Most of you want to
> > have cursor keys and numpad-support.
> >
> > What about WASD ? (W: up, a:left, s:south, d: right) This keymapping is
> > done in many 3D-games to move and could be used for roguelikes, too.
>
> Most laptops have four arrow keys anyway! The issue is that it's
> difficult to get a good mapping for diagonal movement. (Pressing two
> arrow keys simultaneously is okay for arcade games, but would not be
> feasible for roguelikes.)
>
> - Gerry Quinn
>
>


the Psion version of Nethack use a fonction key to solve the 4 arrows problem.
The function key (for instance alt) rotate the movement 45 degrees clockwise.

for instance :
alt + west =>north-west
atl + north =>north-east

I may appear non-user friendly at first but actually it's very quick and easy to
get used to. (ps: i'm not sure the sentence is in good english....)
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

Ilya Bely wrote:
> [...]
> Why not simply make the keys user-configurable?

Custom key settings should be no problem, but I think a recommended
setting for most players gives some initial motivation.
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

Ilya Bely wrote:
> [...]
> Why not simply make the keys user-configurable?

Custom key settings should be no problem, but I think a recommended
setting for most players gives some initial motivation.
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

Hi there!

kalikiana wrote in message <1153918184.089247.187310.RemoveThis@b28g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>:

> Mario Donick wrote:
>> > Azerty users (i and all frenchs) would have trouble using WASD.
> Azerty is the layout of french keyboards? I did not know that. So what
> keys are there which don't inflict with any layout? What about
> "ertdfgcvb"? That should fit qwerty, qwertz and aserty I think...
>

Why not simply make the keys user-configurable?


--
May your code work forever and never have a bug.
At your service, Ilya Bely
i e l y @ l . c o
l y a b g m a i m
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

> On the downside, the graphics must be upgraded at the same time - what
> is needed is almost a turn-based Diablo. For the moment I am working
> with tiles, but bearing in mind that there must be a relatively small
> FOV.

Perhaps you should check out Vulture's (a fork of Falcon's Eye). This
nethack- and slash'em-interface shows very good how a modern roguelike
could look. Of course there would be much more possible.

http://darkarts.co.za

Mario
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys? 

In article <1153918454.262897.93490.DeleteThis@75g2000cwc.googlegroups.com>,
kalikiana.DeleteThis@web.de says...
> Gerry Quinn wrote:
> > Most laptops have four arrow keys anyway! The issue is that it's
> > difficult to get a good mapping for diagonal movement. (Pressing two
> > arrow keys simultaneously is okay for arcade games, but would not be
> > feasible for roguelikes.)
> >
> > - Gerry Quinn
>
> Hm... I tried to enable the arrows and home(pos1),end,pageup,pagedown.
> This should work on laptops, but I don't know if it's convenient for
> most people.

Unfortunately, laptops can have these keys just about anywhere.
Clearly not a single laptop manufacturer is a roguelike fan, or else
they started before there were keypads...

It is actually part of my motivation for a mouse-based roguelike; I
think even extensive use of the keyboard is not accessible enough for
most roguelike players. And once key-based movement is done away with,
possibilities to make almost everything mouse-based become obvious.

On the downside, the graphics must be upgraded at the same time - what
is needed is almost a turn-based Diablo. For the moment I am working
with tiles, but bearing in mind that there must be a relatively small
FOV.

- Gerry Quinn
 >> Stay informed about: movement: what about "wasd"-keys?