Left Handed Gaming

I remember being good friends with one of Norways best quake players back when quake 3 had just come out. He was left handed and played with the arrow keys (right hand) and the mouse (left hand). He used the right cltr+shift and keypad extensively as well in other games that required more keys.

I'm right handed and use the arrow keys. Being whatever handed makes screw all difference. Why, do you ask? BECAUSE CONSOLE GAMEPADS ARE UNIHAND! trotrotlrtorl

Que disagreement with this comment.

[Blocked Image: http://i.imgur.com/ULHGU.jpg]

Also, I really don't think it matters. People with the mouse in their right hand can still use WASD, cursor keys, numpad or whatever just fine. The main attraction of WASD is there's so many more keys over there.

I am a lefty and use the arrow keys. I find it annoying every time I play a game that I have to re-bind everything to be based around the arrow keys, mainly just because there are less keys around the arrow keys than there are around WASD.

My reasoning for using the arrow keys makes sense... As a kid, I thought, oh I wanna move left, I'll press that left arrow there on my keyboard. Who in their right mind would think, I wanna move left, I'll press A!

There was no helping for left handing in video games when I was young and I got used to it. I don't need to change anything in binds, they are all fine on any platforms. I was playing Q3A on WSAD and I had no problems with getting all the weapon binds and even some "say " shit near my right hand.

I know a guy that is playing on IJKL instead of WSAD but he's a freak anyway. Don't bother with left handed binds

Quote from Marvin.Star

Pogo, you specifically mention disliking having to re-bind keys, we do intend to have the arrow keys function properly by default, but if I said you have three skills to use what hotkeys would you rather use to activate them? My best guess might be the Right CTRL, keypad 0(zero), and keypad 1?

Sucks for any lefty's on laptops.

Quote from Marvin.Star

What would your hotkeys of choice be if you had three or four skills to assign hotkeys to?

I use ctrl, shift, enter, ~ @ : }{ / . , delete end insert pgup pgdown and the numpad. Plenty of available keys.

Here are the binds I use for most FPS games if they have these commands.

Ctrl - Crouch

Shift - Jump

Enter - Sometimes as the 'use' button, used it for wall walk in AVP2 recently.

Del - Sprint or melee attack etc.

End - Flashlight/Map.

Page Down - Reload

I also use Insert, Home, and Page Up. 0, 1 and 4 are handy on the num pad too actually.

I'm left handed too, I use the mouse with my left hand and I also use the arrow keys.

Some of my binds if you're interested:

RCTRL: Jump (I used MOUSE2 to jump in Natural Selection)

RSHIFT: Run/Walk (depends)

ENTER: Use

MOUSE3: Reload

': Lean left

\: Lean right

/: Crouch

DEL/HOME etc: Inventory or that kind of stuff.

I'm right handed and I tend to use the arrow keys out of sheer habit. Unless it's a game that makes use of like five buttons it really annoys me when I can't completely customise the controls to suit my convoluted life-long habit of putting certain functions on certain buttons, and puts me off playing it altogether.

I remember when Dead Space was first released, you couldn't rebind the keys from WASD to anything else. I felt like an absolute retard playing that game.

I am also a lefty. Been playing PC games since back in the 1950's (or 90s?) Anyway, I use the NUMPAD all the time for shooters, RPGs, MMOs, etc. and love it. My typical bind:

NP5 = forward

NP2 = back

NP4 = strafe left

NP6 = strafe right

NP delete = reload

NP enter = use/enter/action

NP 0 (on a mac KB) = run/sprint toggle usually

NP 7 = jump

NP 1 = crouch

The arrow keys between the main KB and the numpad are also useful but I admit I only got good with them after some practice and of course their use depends on the game. In Half-Life and its mods I would use NP 9 for swim up and NP 3 for swim down. The NP + and - keys can be useful for weapon or inventory cycling or other quick binds game dependent.

Off to the Leftorium to buy a left handed can opener...

Left-handed too ! \0_

The most annoying key for me is the W (Z in Qwerty) because my right thumb finger is already used for the CTRL key (that I use to crouch). I use Space to jump with the base of my hand.

ZQSD (or WASD in Qwerty) to move. A and E (Q & E in qwerty) to lean when I can.

R for reload of course.

This also mean I mostly use my scroll wheel to change my weapons and not the shortcut with the numbers.

X,C,V and F are also hard to reach.

I never reused the arrows since Half-life 1 ! x]

At least for FPS, for racing games I use the arrows.