Thank you for understanding the plight of us old people. :)
IMO way too many controls was a factor in space sims crashing back in the day (along with obsession with realistic physics) - if you can’t fit all the game’s combat controls on a modern gamepad, the game is too complicated for normal people to play.
Let me guess - Lords of Midnight?
I may still have an overlay or cutout from the old MS-DOS sim F-19 (or F117?) boxed up somewhere.
And then you have stuff like these that you stick on each key.
One day in the distant future key caps will be programmable!
Wouldn’t be unusable, and it is a reasonable compromise if you tune gameplay so frequently managing your engine’s power to shields/lasers isn’t actually required to play at a high level.
In the Totally Games spacesims I did that stuff constantly, but if it’s moved to a higher-level strategic decision (I’m going for a torpedo run against a dreadnaught and know I’ll need frontal shields at max) rather than a moment-to-moment tactical one (I just took a couple hits and need to boost and equalize my shields right now) that wouldn’t take you out of the action at all.
Gonna stream here in 30, so if you got questions…
He’s showing the Durston in the stream!!!@ Yay!!!
Hmm, can’t watch it in the mobile app for some reason.
You can buy silicone keyboard covers for Mac keyboards today, for protection. In theory you could make a custom game centric one. They make an already bad typing experience into an unacceptable one though.
Weird, I was just watching it in the app.
I am now the proud owner of a shirt from the stream.
Take that losers!
So salty.
My last real keyboard overlay was for Red Storm Rising on my C-64. (And then my C-128) same keyboard though.
I played that game so much that I wore the ink off of the bottom. OTOH by then I had the keys memorized. Hell I have that last mission burnt into my brain.
That ship painting tool was actually batshit.
I’m not even a hardcore spaceship guy, but I think I’m sold.
That doesn’t look very ergonomic. But for a space sim, does it really need to be?
Colony Wars was when I realized a gamepad was good enough for a space game for me.
Missed the stream. Was this recorded for playback anywhere?
It’s still there on twitch.
I wish I had three hours to spare but will check it for highlights. Thanks.