PC gaming is about options. The PS4 is by far the most popular console out there - its controller should be supported.
Maybe it should conform to the standards of by far the most popular operating system and work as an xinput controller instead of letting politics get in the way of supporting their customers.
Maybe it should conform to the standards of by far the most popular operating system and work as an xinput controller instead of letting politics get in the way of supporting their customers.
You act as if DirectInput isn't a standard that wasn't around years before Xinput.
The Xbox Elite controller exists.
No need for DS4 support now.
Maybe it should conform to the standards of by far the most popular operating system and work as an xinput controller instead of letting politics get in the way of supporting their customers.
I know that DS4 support wouldn't necessarily mean less standardized controller support, but I have personally loved the dependability of my good old wired 360 controller knowing it's going to work on the vast majority of games with button prompts, etc. I really don't want to mess that up.
Yea, but it was a standard from when joypads weren't. A generic catch-all implementation simply leads to none of the devices being standard. XInput being specifically tailored for one type of controller, is why so many games actually have had decent controller support since.. just make it the same as you would for an Xbox port. The PlayStation controller should be a similar situation on PC, but it isn't because they can't be assed.
Maybe I'm just old enough to remember how much it sucked when gamepad support was iffy and there were tons of different gamepads out there and it was a nightmare to get them working, there were NO button prompts because they were all different - but it was terrible.
I know that DS4 support wouldn't necessarily mean less standardized controller support, but I have personally loved the dependability of my good old wired 360 controller knowing it's going to work on the vast majority of games with button prompts, etc. I really don't want to mess that up.
Upcoming releases like Dragons Dogma PC specifically only supports Xbox controllers.
Expecting developers to support a device that doesn't have official drivers is a pipedream.
It's cool that some put in the effort, but really the onus should be on Sony not game developers to get the pad working properly in windows.
It's especially weird when there's halfassed support. FO4 supports the lightbar, but double-maps the d-pad? Come ON.
What this boils down to is really an API deficiency.
A modern controller API (or really, gaming input API in general -- no reason for this not to work for keyboards, mice or anything else you can imagine!) should provide image mappings for arbitrary inputs of a given input device.
If MS doesn't provide such an API (and as far as I know, it doesn't exist on any other OS either) then what is needed is an additional, community-maintained intermediate layer games can be built on and profiles can easily be plugged into.
But any DS4 connected as a DirectInput controller will always connect with the buttons all bound the same way, so it's not like there's a question about whether Button1 = [] or not (for example, I have no idea which button [] on DS4 binds to), so it's not really any less standard.
Yea, but every make of controller shows the same mapping consistently with itself... the PS4's is just one of them. There's been pretty much no reason to provide special treatment to the DualShock 4 over any other generic controller, because Sony themselves don't even bother to. The situation has resulted in a chicken/egg scenario where developers don't need to worry about DualShock 4, because only a small minority of PC players will bother attempting to use one, and few people will bother to use one because it's not as well supported. This was the issue with all controllers using DirectInput prior to the Xbox 360 controller. When you specifically market your hardware as being PC compatible (and offer the drivers and API implementation to back it up) you can get the ball rolling on people actually wanting to use the device on that system, and consequently developers actually bothering to include standard configurations for it. As long as Sony pretends the device is purely a console peripheral, then developers will likely continue to treat it as one too.
We are on like 11 years of people trying to claim Xbox controllers are objectively better than Sony ones. Why?
I imagine it's because developers view it as a niche. Especially compared to how many people prepare the Xbox controller. That doesn't make them "evangelists", but it might to someone who themselves is one of something else.
What the fuxk?The Xbox Elite controller exists.
No need for DS4 support now.
I mean the bitmap part in particular. Basically, in the API I envision, every "action" (which would need to be some higher level abstraction than just buttons, including button presses of course but also stuff like moving a joystick in one direction) would have an image associated with it in addition to a string ID, and perhaps a description. Software could then use those images in configuration and on prompts.The SDL_GameController API is probably the best cross platform solution for this that I know of. It is used by almost all of the SteamOS/Linux games that support the standard console controllers(PS3/PS4/360). I am unsure what you mean by image mapping though. Do you mean like an identifier string for an individual button or axis? And possibly an associated bitmap?
I'm not disagreeing with you, as this is on Sony more than anyone else to develop proper drivers in order to open up acceptance of using the DS4 on Windows.
However, it wouldn't be hard for developers to incorporate DS4 support as many games are multiplatform and already have an established controls scheme designed for the DS4. A lot of newer games already do this. If Sony won't develop drivers, it'd be nice if developers took that extra step.
Even if I could casually afford it sometimes the PS4 layout is preferred, I.E. 2D platformers.The Xbox Elite controller exists.
No need for DS4 support now.
Why would they need to? It'd be nice, yes, but why should they care enough to?
Certain gamers avoid official drivers, because the official drivers are shit. That's still on the company that produces that hardware. What you're describing is something that would be "nice to have", sure... but you came in here saying that the only way this shit can be sorted if that MS work to make things better for Sony and Nintendo, simply so they don't have to get their own shit together (you even specifically stated "they are to blame", with nothing in regards to blame being in any way shared by the companies that can't be bothered to acknowledge users may want to use their hardware on PCs)... that's ridiculous. The PC is an open platform, but that means that everyone is free to provide functionality above and beyond the default support that MS offers. These external programs work well, because they have more specific goals. Anything MS would create would still have to be generic. DirectInput is already enough for general DS4 support, as evidenced by the games that do support it. The problem is that developers don't generally support it as a unique device, because as far as Windows is concerned... it isn't. It's just controller #76503 out of an infinitely long list of other similar controllers. If it wants to be anything more, than it should have a unique driver that'll cause the device to be reported specifically as a PlayStation device, along with an API that developers can quickly include which will map every function correctly akin to how it is to be configured for the PS4 itself... this would (like XInput) extend beyond the DS4 and towards any other PlayStation input device. It's Sony's job, nobody else's. Yes MS can theoretically create a workaround to make things better for companies that can't be bothered to do shit for themselves, but they are by no means obligated to. They've provided a standard fallback (which is shown to work when opted for), it's not their job to sell PlayStation or Nintendo controllers to PC gamers... and nothing about the OS is restricting anyone else from doing a non-shit job with their own hardware.
Because there are consumers that want it and having PS button icons as an option is extremely small thing to ask for especially from AAA games with huge budgets that have a PS4 version with all those icons already implemented.
Tell me why they shouldn't care.
Because there are consumers that want it and having PS button icons as an option is extremely small thing to ask for especially from AAA games with huge budgets that have a PS4 version with all those icons already implemented.
Tell me why they shouldn't care.
You know that Sony has an patent on these symbols, right?Like, the biggest problem isn't even about having the controller work since it's easy to emulate. Just having an option for the PS icons would be enough.
You know that Sony has an patent on these symbols, right?
The Xbox Elite controller exists.
No need for DS4 support now.
I can understand the OP that not having those icons is annoying. Its beyond me why anyone would use a Ds4 instead of an XBox controller though. Also, the steam controller blows both out of the water after you got used to it.
We are on like 11 years of people trying to claim Xbox controllers are objectively better than Sony ones. Why?