I have a Switch, Steam Deck, PS4, and Steam Controller all with gyro controls. I have used gyro controls in a few games but every time I do it feels odd and I never quite get the hang of it. I keep hearing that gyro controls are really great for precision in shooters but I feel like I just can’t quite get the hang of it.
I’m a long time PC and console gamer so it kind of frustrates me that I can’t seem to get the hang of it. What are some recommendations for getting better at using gyro controls?
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I’ve spent a lot of hours playing Splatoon through Splatoon 3. Once I found that the Steam Controller a few years ago I was sold that I could play PC games with motion controls and prefer it to keyboard and mouse. I’ve played keyboard and mouse games over the years and still do on occasion. It is just hard to go back to have the better joystick movement than wasd and motion control aiming. By far my favorite way to play games now.
First how you sit and hold the controller matters. I’ve found that holding the controller and resting my elbows/forearms on my knees (or an office chair) so that my wrists can move freely is the best. If my wrists are not relaxed aiming is much much harder. In all cases I can my gyro is on by default, but on PC I dedicate a face button to turn off motion control while held to recenter. Better is a button like Splatoon has that recenters the view, but that requires games support.
Just practice aiming, and if it is too hard turn down sensitivity until it feels better. Continue practicing and once you feel comfortable you probably feel like you cannot turn fast enough with gyro aiming. At this point turn the sensitivity up. Practice and repeat until you feel you can turn fast enough or you can’t keep a good aim and then turn it down slightly. After thousands of hours of motion control I do sometimes have to tweak sensitivity for certain games, especially when first playing with motion control on the game. Some games I have higher sensitivity, some I have lower, it really depends on the game. For PC games all camera control is through motion control on my steam controller with a dedicated turn off motion when held face button.
If you can try a Splatoon the motion tutorial is pretty good, and the single player campaign good practice (or Octo Expansion on Splatoon 2). I personally find that motion control while using the Switch as a mobile console is uncomfortable, the switch pro-controller is much better but separating the two joycons works well enough.
Thanks for the advice. I may try playing Metroid Prime focusing on using gyro controls. I don’t have Splatoon 2 yet but I appreciate the idea of having a tutorial for learning it. I may pick it up or emulate on steam deck to try that out.
What Switch games?
What sort of control schemes have you used outside of Switch, activate on touchpad, capacitive stick, left trigger, or instead leave gyro always on but with an off button?
How much sensitivity, measured in how many camera rotations you do per controller rotation?
Mostly Metroid Prime, Breath of the Wild, and Tears of the Kingdom. I found I will accidentally move the aim with gyro controls when manually aiming with stick and it threw me off enough that I turned it off in Metroid.
I haven’t played around with customizing gyro controls much on steam controller or the deck so I can’t quite say what I’ve used for those. I imagine whatever default settings were. I attempted playing Portal on steam deck with the default gyro controls and ended up turning them off as well.
Sounds like you’re having issues processing two camera inputs happening at the same time in some part because you are unfamiliar with one of them. I’d suggest using the methods in isolation, e.g. in Zelda moving the camera close enough to targets that you can do all the rest with gyro, and only then pressing ZL to aim with gyro alone.
I expect this may help enough with getting used to gyro that you can eventually start combining the methods more fluidly, while still receiving some benefit while you get there. Playing in low pressure situations can also help with not getting overstimulated by unfamiliar game responses to your actions.
I think the mistake I made starying out was using too low of a sensitivity, and still using the joystick a lot. I switched to flick stick to force myself to use the gyro more, and eventually you just get used to it pretty naturally.
Id recommend starting with a single player game so it’s less frustrating. I started with Valheim, but now I also play Halo Infinite etc. with gyro and flick stick
I could try giving some advice for the Steam Controller.
This isn’t an updated video with the new Steam Input, but here is the approach I took
- Touchpad sensitivity on full swipe set to 180
- First person gyro sensitivity: 675 degree rotation (when I turn the controller 90 degrees the in game camera moves that 675 degrees)
- Third person gyro sensitivity: 450 degree rotation
I found it difficult to aim when I started out when I had the sensitivity low. Increasing it higher allowed me to not have to made gigantic movements to aim.
If you find the gyro sensitivity you like it helps to stick with it from game to game so you have consistency. Otherwise, each new game can be frustrating and you are stuck once again trying to figure out a sensitivity that doesn’t feel right.
Also, I use mouse input for gyro. I don’t do mouse joystick. That attempts to translate joystick to a mouse and introduces inverse acceleration. It’s okay for some games, but I generally do not use it.
Thanks for the tips. I don’t think I ever truly tried to customize my steam controller in that way. I’ll give it a try. I know with a mouse I’m pretty sensitive to sensitivity differences so keeping a consistent setting makes a lot of sense for maintaining learned muscle memory.
Yeah, when you find a gyro sensitivity you like try the rotation approach to find a general idea of what the sensitivity you like is. Really helps reduce the time blindly fiddling around with the gyro trying to get it to feel right like it did in a game before that.
