[Welks]

First of all, hello everybody. I don't know if I made the thread on the right place but as long as my question wasn't anything software-related I thought technical support subforum wasn't the best place for this. If I am wrong, please move the thread to the place it should be.

Few days ago I discovered this game via GOG.com and I decided to give it a try and I saw lots of opinions stating that the game was better with a joystick, so I as long as I am a completely ignorant of the pc gaming world I thought this would be a nice chance to try some flight sim games. Thus, I bought a Thrustmaster T. flight hotas X (http://www.thrustmaster.com/product.aspx?ProductID=149&PlatformID=12) for 35€ and although the general opinion about this joystick is good, I'm having a LOT of problems with it in the game. My accuracy is awful no matter how I configure the joystick, it's nearly impossible taking just ONE enemy fighter down.

My question is: What am I doing wrong? Did I bought a terrible joystick or I have messed it up with something?

I would appreciate if you answer quickly, because in the worst case I would be able to return it to the shop and get a different model.

I believe this is a sensibility configuration problem or something because I've been reading and the general opinion about this stick is good, but It is not working properly with me, or with this game, but I don't know how to solve it.

[Herra Tohtori]

You're probably on the right track.

FS2_Open's joystick sensitivity curve is sort of weird and works best at highest sensitivity setting, where it is a linear control input curve. However, this does not work well with nearly all joysticks, and requires a high amount of skill and experience from the player to be truly effective with a joystick.

If the stick comes with some utility that allows you to edit the control input curves on Windows, look into that; aside from that, practice is the only thing that works pretty much.


If you want to confirm that it is in fact FS2_Open's input curves not playing nice with the joystick, you could try downloading and testing the joystick test builds from this thread. Personally I hope that next version of FS2_Open will include customizeable control input curves, because it really is a pain to fly at highest sensitivity settings all the time - but the lower sensitivity settings are somehow even worse.

If you can't simply get it working with joystick, you could just play with mouse and keyboard... it's not the same as a joystick, but it's still a nice game to play that way as well.

[Welks]

I appreciate your response, Herra.

Would you please explain me what do you mean by "control input curves"? As it is my first experience with joysticks and simulators I'm a bit lost with this kind of technical stuff.

I already found that thread before getting your response and just checked the 5645 which felt like a great improvement from the original control in the game, I still don't play as good as I'd like, but with that build now I feel like it is a matter of skill and learning and not a problem with the game or the stick.

The game is great, and when I played at first with mouse was incredible so It was highly dissappointing when I tried the stick and saw how worse the overall experience was.

[Herra Tohtori]

Well, the joystick's control input range is from -100% to 100% on each axis, but the curve which it makes on the way does not need to be linear.

On a linear response curve, if you move the stick 50% to a direction, the control input will be 50% to that direction. And certain angle change of the joystick's handle is always the same change in input values, whether it's near the center area or close to the edges. As a function plot, this curve is linear, ie. straight with constant slope.

However, if the input curve is exponential (or logarithmic depending on your viewpoint on the matter), it means that N degrees movement near the center affects the input values less than towards the edges of the range of movement. If the curve is smooth, it is a very instinctive way of adjusting the sensitivity and allows far greater accuracy near the deadzone, which is especialyl important for game like FS2. However, the curve that retail FS2 and FS2_Open uses is not exactly smooth, which causes the transitions from "low sensitivity" to "high sensitivity" to be rather abrupt, and in the end I have noticed it serves almost no purpose at all.

Test the joystick builds at lower sensitivity settings, and you should be able to tell the difference pretty soon.

[Wanderer]

The new sensitivity settings should now be in all the builds, just make sure to test different sensitivity settings (via options screen).

[Thaeris]

3.6.12 should be very nice then. I can't recall how much time I spent trying to get my stick into good working order with FS2/FSO. Even after that, I still need the mouse for precision shooting...

[Herra Tohtori]

The new sensitivity settings should now be in all the builds, just make sure to test different sensitivity settings (via options screen).

Awesome. Does it use the 5645 build's curve or something else?

[Welks]

Thank you everybody for the help.


I don't know I have understood well (I'm no t a native english speaker), do you say there is already aviable those new test sensitivity settings?

And thank you again for the explanation. That was useful.

[Wanderer]

Welks... Try the setting the 'sensitivity' in ingame options screen into lower or even lowest value.

[Welks]

I'm doing fine with the 5645 build but I'll try what you say. Do you mean in the build I am using now or in the original one?

[ran22147]

I have the same joystick but i cant map anything to the stick help plz

[Thaeris]

First of all FSO needs to recognize that you've got a stick. This can be dealt with in the launcher, as you're probably already aware.

Next, normally you should be able to change the joystick keymap in the main FS program in a similar manner to the way you configure your keyboard.

If that's not the case, it might be time to get creative. I've got a Logitech stick, so it's certainly not the same brand. However, most every stick comes with software for you to edit what controls on the device do what - even if they must override the capabilities "hard-limited" by the game. If necessary, find the keystroke you want to slave to a joystick key and have the stick use that stroke for the game in question: FreeSpace 2. Again, do this through the external software.

All software is different, but if you must do it this way (and your software allows it), this might let you get somewhere... 

For example, to use the hatstick effectively for TBP, I needed to use the external Logitech software - doing up and right thruster movements with the joy alone would have otherwise been impossible.