Comments on: What the Hell! No Southpaw Controls?!? http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/ (Were you expecting a witty tagline?) Sun, 25 Jul 2010 05:41:15 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0 By: zebulon35 http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-2960 zebulon35 Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:45:07 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-2960 This was my post to MS, Rare and 4J; I just wanted to let you know that my wife and I are very upset about the lack of a South Paw option in the new Perfect Dark remake. We are simply shocked at the oversight! This was THE game that hooked us on FPSs! And you bungle the control scheme?! We refuse to believe that it was that expensive or difficult to replicate a SP control scheme on the 360 when the BLOODY N64 was able to handle it just fine! Absolutely inexcusable, and sad. Rare and Microsoft what happened? How has, what was, one of gaming’s best, and most user friendly, developers fallen so low..........We are always defending our love of the 360 to others and now this is how our loyalty is repaid? Well...it's sad. Please for the sake of Lefties and Legacy players everywhere add back the original control schemes from the N64 game....or give us back our damn points! For crying out loud you would have gotten THREE SEPERATE PURCHASES of the SAME freaking game in the SAME FREAKING household if it wouldn't be screwed up!!!!! The bottom line is that for us the game is unplayable, and for that we are deeply disappointed. This was my post to MS, Rare and 4J;

I just wanted to let you know that my wife and I are very upset about the lack of a South Paw option in the new Perfect Dark remake.
We are simply shocked at the oversight! This was THE game that hooked us on FPSs! And you bungle the control scheme?! We refuse to believe that it was that expensive or difficult to replicate a SP control scheme on the 360 when the BLOODY N64 was able to handle it just fine! Absolutely inexcusable, and sad. Rare and Microsoft what happened? How has, what was, one of gaming’s best, and most user friendly, developers fallen so low……….We are always defending our love of the 360 to others and now this is how our loyalty is repaid? Well…it’s sad. Please for the sake of Lefties and Legacy players everywhere add back the original control schemes from the N64 game….or give us back our damn points! For crying out loud you would have gotten THREE SEPERATE PURCHASES of the SAME freaking game in the SAME FREAKING household if it wouldn’t be screwed up!!!!! The bottom line is that for us the game is unplayable, and for that we are deeply disappointed.

]]> By: Wargasm http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-2959 Wargasm Thu, 18 Mar 2010 01:05:51 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-2959 I purchased PD re-release for XBA too. I just shut off my XBOX. So pissed off. One of the original games that molded us into Southpaw (right handed, I might add) players. Those stupid sons of bitches. Unbelievable. I'm so bummed. I really want a refund. Absolute douchery. They insisted the ONLY changes from the N64 version was upgraded visuals and live for vs. They said even the bugs were left in (like the level one 6 second completion bug). My story is the same - started with Golden Eye and Turok and switched to the thumbstick for aiming and started beating all my friends. All but one of us from that era are right handed Southpaw players now. There's no way to switch - it's hard wired at this point. Default is designed for children. Really, it is. Southpaw is proper. So is "inverted". Picture yourself holding a machine gun. Which hand controls your aim? Yep, left. To look up you lean back - "inverted" in other words. Anything other than Southpaw or Legacy Southpaw is for children and Lemmings. BTW, as a software programmer I can confirm that it is REALLY easy to implement control customization. 15 minutes to program in swapped sticks - at the most (plus compiling). Honestly, it's as easy as identifying a control as a variable and defining it. I purchased PD re-release for XBA too. I just shut off my XBOX. So pissed off. One of the original games that molded us into Southpaw (right handed, I might add) players. Those stupid sons of bitches. Unbelievable. I’m so bummed. I really want a refund. Absolute douchery. They insisted the ONLY changes from the N64 version was upgraded visuals and live for vs. They said even the bugs were left in (like the level one 6 second completion bug).

My story is the same – started with Golden Eye and Turok and switched to the thumbstick for aiming and started beating all my friends. All but one of us from that era are right handed Southpaw players now. There’s no way to switch – it’s hard wired at this point.

Default is designed for children. Really, it is. Southpaw is proper. So is “inverted”. Picture yourself holding a machine gun. Which hand controls your aim? Yep, left. To look up you lean back – “inverted” in other words. Anything other than Southpaw or Legacy Southpaw is for children and Lemmings.

BTW, as a software programmer I can confirm that it is REALLY easy to implement control customization. 15 minutes to program in swapped sticks – at the most (plus compiling). Honestly, it’s as easy as identifying a control as a variable and defining it.

]]> By: James Lewitzke http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-2958 James Lewitzke Wed, 17 Mar 2010 22:29:39 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-2958 Unfortunately, It's going to be up to each and every game developer whether they want to include customizations such as these or not. Because of this, I just went ahead and purchased a modded controller, and it works great for any game. Here specifically: http://www.teknoguild.com/index.htm And the controller still works like a charm. You may have to pay a few extra dollars, but at least you get an additional controller out of the deal, in addition to the customizations they offer. Although, as I state in my most recent blog post, Mass Effect 2 does allow southpaw control customizations, so maybe the developers actually are listening. (Don't know about Bioshock 2, though.) Unfortunately, It’s going to be up to each and every game developer whether they want to include customizations such as these or not.

Because of this, I just went ahead and purchased a modded controller, and it works great for any game. Here specifically:
http://www.teknoguild.com/index.htm

And the controller still works like a charm. You may have to pay a few extra dollars, but at least you get an additional controller out of the deal, in addition to the customizations they offer.

Although, as I state in my most recent blog post, Mass Effect 2 does allow southpaw control customizations, so maybe the developers actually are listening. (Don’t know about Bioshock 2, though.)

]]> By: Vertigo http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-2957 Vertigo Wed, 17 Mar 2010 20:19:42 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-2957 Oh and to echo your original post, I too could not play Bioshock but luckily I got the demo for that. Sadly, I paid half price for Gun on GC and couldn't play that either. You could call it discrimination, in fact, but it makes you wonder how hard it is to just let the player redefine their own controls. Not hard at all. Oh and to echo your original post, I too could not play Bioshock but luckily I got the demo for that. Sadly, I paid half price for Gun on GC and couldn’t play that either. You could call it discrimination, in fact, but it makes you wonder how hard it is to just let the player redefine their own controls. Not hard at all.

]]> By: Vertigo http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-2956 Vertigo Wed, 17 Mar 2010 20:18:14 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-2956 Hello mate. Guess what I just downloaded. Perfect Dark on XBLA. Guess what's missing. There is NO SOUTHPAW SUPPORT! Rage. Hello mate. Guess what I just downloaded. Perfect Dark on XBLA. Guess what’s missing. There is NO SOUTHPAW SUPPORT! Rage.

]]> By: James Lewitzke http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-1426 James Lewitzke Thu, 15 Jan 2009 19:21:37 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-1426 Are you sure the settings aren't on "Southpaw" in the 360's Dashboard? Are you sure the settings aren’t on “Southpaw” in the 360′s Dashboard?

]]> By: BmB http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-1422 BmB Sun, 11 Jan 2009 01:47:26 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-1422 wtf mine some how turned south paw and only for oblivion all my other games arent south paw but oblivion is i cant even play it. wtf mine some how turned south paw and only for oblivion all my other games arent south paw but oblivion is i cant even play it.

]]> By: James Lewitzke http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-1215 James Lewitzke Mon, 21 Jul 2008 06:01:10 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-1215 It's too bad to hear about BioShock and Battlefield: Bad Company, they looked like really fun games. Good mention of Timesplitters there also, I use to play that game years ago too. Hopefully the developers get their heads out of there asses soon, or at least provide a downloadable patch for customizable controls or something. I don't know what's stopping them. It’s too bad to hear about BioShock and Battlefield: Bad Company, they looked like really fun games. Good mention of Timesplitters there also, I use to play that game years ago too.

Hopefully the developers get their heads out of there asses soon, or at least provide a downloadable patch for customizable controls or something. I don’t know what’s stopping them.

]]> By: IRV1N3 http://www.lightningshock.com/2008/05/26/what-the-hell-no-southpaw-controls/#comment-1193 IRV1N3 Tue, 01 Jul 2008 07:34:58 +0000 http://www.lightningshock.com/?p=21#comment-1193 I'm in the same boat as you - I'm right handed but play Southpaw, because I too learned to play fps's on on the N64 with the games like Turok and Perfect Dark. For those unfamiliar with the N64 controller, there was only one stick on the controller which was used for aiming by the the left thumb. The right thumb used the 4 button on the right for movement. I played nearly every fps on the N64. When I played Halo for the first time on the Xbox it was extremely awkard, until I realized that the controls could be switched to "Southpaw" which allowed me to aim with the left stick and move with the right - just as I did on the N64. I've been playing console shooters for 10 years now with the Southpaw control scheme. I've tried a couple of times, on the Xbox and Xbox 360, to switch and learn to play default, but without success. Too many years of playing a certain way does not allow change. I've had to pass on a number of games over the years because they did not allow customization of the control scheme. I always used Timesplitters on the Xbox as a perfect example of game controls done right! It allowed complete customization of every stick and button on the controller. You could map any function to whatever button, stick or trigger you wanted to - complete freedom! Why every game developer doesn't do this is beyond me. They'll spend months and years developing a game, but won't take an hour or two to program the control scheme to allow for customization. Unbelievable! Failure to give us customizable controller settings, at least Southpaw, equals lost revenue for the developer. A couple of recent games that I've passed on, but would have liked to have purchased, include Bio Shock and Battlefield: Bad Company. I’m in the same boat as you – I’m right handed but play Southpaw, because I too learned to play fps’s on on the N64 with the games like Turok and Perfect Dark. For those unfamiliar with the N64 controller, there was only one stick on the controller which was used for aiming by the the left thumb. The right thumb used the 4 button on the right for movement. I played nearly every fps on the N64.
When I played Halo for the first time on the Xbox it was extremely awkard, until I realized that the controls could be switched to “Southpaw” which allowed me to aim with the left stick and move with the right – just as I did on the N64.
I’ve been playing console shooters for 10 years now with the Southpaw control scheme. I’ve tried a couple of times, on the Xbox and Xbox 360, to switch and learn to play default, but without success. Too many years of playing a certain way does not allow change. I’ve had to pass on a number of games over the years because they did not allow customization of the control scheme. I always used Timesplitters on the Xbox as a perfect example of game controls done right! It allowed complete customization of every stick and button on the controller. You could map any function to whatever button, stick or trigger you wanted to – complete freedom! Why every game developer doesn’t do this is beyond me. They’ll spend months and years developing a game, but won’t take an hour or two to program the control scheme to allow for customization. Unbelievable!

Failure to give us customizable controller settings, at least Southpaw, equals lost revenue for the developer. A couple of recent games that I’ve passed on, but would have liked to have purchased, include Bio Shock and Battlefield: Bad Company.

]]>