WASD/Keyboard movement

Feedback and Suggestions
41

I don’t think this is a case of Blizzard dictating trends. I think it’s just a case of a newer generation of players coming to ARPGs that are used to controllers so WASD is a logical control method for them.

Even in the early days of D3 there have been plenty of requests for it, just like in PoE. Neither of those games did that, but recently they are implementing that option simply because the amount of players asking for it is significant enough to justify it.

Diablo Immortal had WASD because it’s a mobile game. It makes sense in that context. Whether it should have ever had a PC port is another issue entirely.
Just like Undecember.

Also, to be fair, I’m pretty sure D4 only implemented WASD after GGG announced PoE2 would have this. So they didn’t so much set the trend as were sort of forced to it to not fall (even more) behind.

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42

Small sidenote: I’m from the Spectrum days where the standard layout was QA-OP :laughing:

43

Ah ah, I agree, I was trolling.

I have always strongly believed that if Diablo got such an enormous success, it was in large part because it was so easy to pick up and go. Many players back then had very little experience with computers, let alone games (old geeks like you or I excepted). But they were still able to enjoy Diablo because it was so simple to use.
Nowadays audience has played many other games, and is ready for more complex systems. Makes sense.

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44

Really? Which Spectrum didn’t have the standard qwerty keyboard? 'Cause when I google it they only have qwerty. Unless you’re French or something, we all know they do things a bit weird.

45

The keyboard was qwerty, but the game controls most games used was QA-OP. WASD only became standard later.

46

What???
AZERTY is a great setup for a keyboard.
Rolls off the tongue.

(Joking, I have used weird British keyboards for so long now I probably wouldn’t know how to use a French one anymore. I even struggle to drive on the right.)

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47

From my point of view, if I worked at Eleventh Hour Games I would find ways to do it soon, until PoE2 launches it. If indeed enough people care, WASD will be a great addition.
People indeed are used with WASD from twin-stick shooters…I still remember Crimsonland
Alas, waiting for WASD to make the game 100% perfect.

48

To be fair, I’d spent a 2 week holiday driving around Italy & when we got back home I was still driving on the right… for a few seconds until I came across another vehicle coming towards me.

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49

Did give Diablo IV a go and the WASD method can work for Last Epoch too.
No need for PoE2 style of feet and body animation.
As a bonus, it would free the left click for another spell which would be even better in terms of accessibility!

50

It’s worrisome that they’re considering fundamental changes to the game like adding WASD after leaving early access.

I hope they never implement WASD, and instead use the resources they would have wasted rebalancing the game on more productive aspects of development. Looks like this is the request of only a small vocal minority anyway.

51

WASD is a fundamental change only if you want to shoot while moving. They don’t need to do that. Shooting and moving will still be separate. If you play with the controller you already have that option. Just imagine that on keyboard instead. It’s not a big deal on balance, it hardly does a dent in it… WASD as the game is, no more than that.

52

So I finally bought D4 when they added WASD, it works great and feels great. As someone who plays different genres of games all the time, having as many keys do the same for all the different games just makes life easy. I came back to LE today and completely had a brain fart cause Id forgotten this game doesnt have WASD… instantly lost my desire to play.
Just my opinion that it would only do the game and its community a service to add it, honestly feel they should have already done it, and sinse they haven’t they reallllly need to put it a lil higher on their priority list.

1 Like
53

LOL Same, installed the game to wait until the new Diablo 4 Season and remembered this doesn’t have WASD just because the devs don’t want to modify their game for this to work and lost the will to play instantly,

54

Look, i’m one of these dudes, which would argue: If Devs geniunly don’t want to add it, because it doesn’t fit their vision, because maybe they want to be super traditional, than they shouldn’t forced too, despite what people try to push as standarts.

BUT it really doesn’t take anything away or drastically change it, esp. if you consider that Gamepad with direct-controls already exist. It really reminds me of the whole “Evade/Dodge” controversy, where people try to push that it will have such an huge impact, that it pretty much becomes a souls or hades… ignore however that the entire game is build around that level of active combat with dodging and everything from the getgo. At best you’ll see some minor changes, but in the greater scheme it wan’t really make it that differently, just give it some extra layer and qol for people who want to play more active.
Similiar here… slapping an WASD in a traditional ARPG is more of an gimmick which is for a certain part of player a QoL - not really a gamechanger in general. For that the whole Game would need to completly reworked.

Again, WASD implementation itself wouldn’t waste any ressources on rebalancing, because they would’ve done rebalancing already when they introduced Gamepad Controls which have an more active / direct controll-scheme like WASD with Mouse.

It’s weird that people always assume the most extreme and worst case scenario, meanwhile it’s just a simplistic implemtation which won’t have much effect on it.
IF they start after the implementation to highly rework combat and stuff, than it’s differently and we can a topic about it, but that’s pretty much doomposting.

But can you be sure that’s really a vocal minority. Because considering that so many games push them now, would rather tell me that a vital size of people want to have that, and you can be pretty sure they have the statistics for it.
I mean yeah i know there exist ‘elements’ in the gaming industry right now, which cater to a vocal minority in the sacrifice of the majority and loyal longterm fans, and i won’t go into speicifics what i mean by that, BUT mechanical / gamedesign stuff itself is hardly effected by that.

AND especially, let’s assume you are correct, if it’s really the vocal minority, than you can be sure that they won’t do any drastic changes anyway and would add it more as i mentioned above as a mere gimmick/qol feature. Not build Last Hades: Die Souls Edition 2.0

55

So, are we getting WASD movement this patch?

56

No. All the major features have been announced already.

57

That is not true. The devs are not against it, it is just a matter of priority and resources.

The devs already said that it is not that easy to implement and would require extensive amount of work and testing.

2 Likes
58

Not to discount the work it would take to implement WASD in a way that is fair to all/most players and metas, but to further emphasize the point or the energy of where players wanting WASD are coming from, look no further than one of the most popular titles out currently BG3 and the modding scene it has.

In particular, if you go onto nexus mods and look at the top mods across all categories of all time, you will find that as of writing there is a mod to add WASD control (aptly named WASD Character Movement) that is ranked #19 out of 8000+ mods. Granted this is not a perfect apples to apples comparison in terms of genre, game mechanics, and general resources available, but it’s analogous and illustrates that people are not crazy for wanting – begging :laughing: – to have this control option at their disposal.

59

There are some horrible arguments in this topic.

  1. Baldur’s Gate 3 is a completely different game.

  2. In a completely different game.

  3. The WASD mod is currently in 15th place.

  4. It adds WASD movement but also changes the point of view to third person.

You may as well say that EHG should drop everything and work on more character appearance options (multiple Baldur’s Gate 3 mods ranked higher than the WASD one are about this).

1 Like
60

Looking past the somewhat negative tone of your post (which might be construed by some as getting close to being in violation of the forum’s ToS, see posting policy #7), I never said the developers should drop everything to work on this request.

I fully support the idea of them working on higher priority and meaningful additions/fixes/optimizations to the game before things like WASD. But I also do not think it’s a totally “horrible” accessibility feature. And I know you were mocking me in that last sentence but I’ll give you the decency to politely reply that appearance options are one thing, but allowing people to play the game in a manner that makes it easier for them to enjoy (again without making it unfair for them/others), as in making it more accessible, is something all games should strive for not just Last Epoch.