panbient wrote on Nov 11, 2015, 10:14:
So having said that, how well does the controller work for something like Civilization 5, a Total War title, or an old school RTS like Age of Empires 2? It seems most reviews I've found focused on using it to replace a traditional gamepad with a more multi-platform / console oriented title (like Tomb Raider or Assassin's Creed).
Those aren't my style of games, so I haven't tried any of those you mentioned...
The first game I played through on it was Portal 2, because I already knew it like the back of my hand, so I figured it would be ideal for just getting used to the controller... And, it took a fair bit of getting used to... But, I also think they've improved both the firmware and the SteamOS software several times since then, because that was immediately after I got it, and it has installed about a dozen updates since then... But, even that early on, by the end of the game, I was quite comfortable with the controller... But, then, Portal 2 was one of the games retrofitted with specific built-in Steam controller support, too...
But, I've played various other games, some with gamepad support, some with only mouse and keyboard support, and it works fine in either, even if you sometimes need to tweak the control setup a bit... And, I actually prefer it when it's a mouse and keyboard game, since the gamepad games tend to assume a right stick, and the trackpad emulating a stick is just kinda weird... It at least requires thinking of it behaving very differently than a normal mouse-style trackpad... Like it matters how long you hold your finger in place in one spot, just as if you were holding a stick in that spot... It's really just switching back and forth between that and games where it behaves as a mouse/trackball that causes temporary confusion...
Another potential issue I read about in previews was access to the battery compartment saying that it felt like you were breaking the controller the first few times you had to open it. Have you dealt with that yet? Or has that been refined leading up to release?
Yeah, it did strike me as kind of weird when opening it up to insert the batteries... The whole back plate that forms the 2 backside buttons pops off, and it does feel almost like you're breaking it or could easily break those buttons... But, I think that's just misperception... The real buttons lie under the plate, and the plate is just one solid hunk of plastic that rocks against those buttons when in use... That said, I've only put in the initial set of batteries it came with; so far, the thing seems to go quite a long while on one set of batteries, which is nice...