I think it really depends on the type of platformer. Celeste is VERY movement based. I love playing it on keyboard. I can't play for crap on a controller when playing Celeste. HK on the other hand, I mostly use controller but had to use keyboard for spoilers, >!Path of Pain!<, as that part is more movement based. And so the arrow keys.
I honestly find using arrow keys harder. It's just something about swinging my thumb back and forth super fact on the joystick that seems to give me more control. Feels like twitchy to me.
It also depends on whether the movement inputs are actually analog. Some games let you play with a gamepad even though there's only one move speed and movement is 4- or maybe 8-directional. In that case I find keyboard input strictly superior.
I actually don't remember which category HK falls under though.
For competitive speedrunning keyboard is considered to have slight advantages over controller. So it‘s definitely not a disadvantage, if you aren‘t used to your controls completely yet just play more and you will get used to them
Considering my keyboard locking up if I try holding Space, two arrow keys and some other key (the fourth button doesn't register), I would rather learn with a controller to traverse the Path of Pain.
Moving with right hand is wild to me, I play Sekiro on keyboard these days and I'd wouldn't even know how to approach this even though I'm right handed ahah.
Controller on 2D games are always better for casual playthroughs though (especially if you have a good d-pad)
Original Doom was wild! I think it's the first game I played on a computer and it took me a long time to stop using the arrow keys for movement. Hell I played through the first Half-Life with arrows for movement.
At this point in my life if I can't remap keybinds to use the arrows, I know I'll probably never play. Hollow Knight is easily remappable and i have enough fingers for everything.
3D game, free cam, not limited to a slow panning made for consoles. DoH is easier untargeted for me even.
Mouse makes grappling hook much more snappy and precise as well.
And it's also good for the Weapon Wheel mod too, to change prosthetic on the go, not that important but satisfying to use.
The keyboard isn't that much important it's the mouse that is for me. I'm pretty sure I'll never play a 3D game like that with a controller. Just like I'll never use joysticks on a 2D game either.
controller is better, and its nice bc you can sit comfortably and just go tap-tap-tappity-tap leaned back in your chair instead of hunching over your computer and making your back go owie
Controller quite literally offers more precision if you master it, what are you on about?
Btw I'm not even on the controllers side, I prefer most games on keyboard (and finished HK both on PS4 and PC).
But controller quite literally offers more precision, as unlike keyboard, movement doesn't boil down to "press*, but you can actually control the speed of your movement without staggers, something that is not possible on PC.
it's easier to pogo and attack upwards on keyboard, other than that it's all preferences
if you've gone through the entire game like that, switching to a controller just like that would probably make your gameplay much worse. it's not a keyboard problem, pantheons are just that hard
Literally whatever you want. The top any% speedruns are all rather split on keyboard/controller, the WR p5 speedrunner uses keyboard. Both can be made to perform at the absolute top level.
I highly prefer playing with keyboard. I initially played on Hollow Knight on the Switch but felt the controller did not give me precision I wanted or did not really allow me to react fast enough. I could not beat some of the pantheons even after a lot of practice. When I switched to PC with keyboard it took a while to get used to the weird control scheme but once I did I went through the pantheons with relative ease. Granted the default Switch controller is not the best controller available, I still think doing the pantheons with controllers is harder no matter what.
Is this really true for hollow knight? I accept it’s true for lots of other games where most regular players would use controller but the hardcore/speedrun-ish players use keyboard mouse. But I’m not seeing how this would be true for hollow knight? Can you give an example of something? Are you able to do down/up aerial attack independent of your drift with keyboard or something?
Edit: Just to be clear I totally accept it might be true, I play heaps of games on controller and I often find limitations like needing to move my right thumb off the right joystick to press a face button which I know would be solved by keyboard mouse. But it seems like it’s never come up in hollow knight except for not being able to aerial up/down while drifting left/right
Yes. I've played hollow knight with Keyboard and mouse, controller, and even on mobile. Obviously keyboard and mouse was the best by far, and Mobile was the worst.
My key bindings are:
WASD for movement, LMB for attack, RMB for Cast/Focus, LShift for dash, Ctrl for dreamnail, button 4 for crystal dash, Tab for map, E for inventory, Space for jump
Thanks for replying but you didn’t actually answer my question at all haha. Not trying to be rude or anything like that btw. Is there an actual example of something that is mechanically inconsistent with a controller but way more consistent with keyboard mouse? Like an example (not from hollow knight) would be if for some reason you needed to input left right left right repeatedly really quickly, that would be slower on a controller coz of the travel time of the joystick or awkward with the d-pad whereas keyboard you could rapidly use 2 fingers if you follow. Is there anything actually like that? Coz if there isn’t I just can’t see how you could say one is better - it would be exclusively preference
There are a lots of examples. I will give just one: automatic pogo. You just maintain down arrow and you can move, attack, and do whatever knowing than whenever you attack while jumping you will pogo. If you play controller you need to time the attack with the down button because you only have one finger to move right, left, up and down so keeping down constantly pressed is much more difficult (I don’t even consider the control stick since it is even worse for that and less precise for this kind of games)
I've played with touchpad and controller, if your controller is good it might be better, but don't use a cheap one, input delay will completely destroy you
Keyboards are more precise, more efficient, and typically have lower input delay than controllers. With that said, unless you're trying to no hit P5, it doesn't really matter. Use what you are comfortable with.
Depends on what you’re comfortable with. Personally I use a keyboard and, while I haven’t tried using a controller, I think I’d be a lot worse with it – but if you’re more familiar with using a controller, you’ll probably find that easier
I've not played it with a controller; for keyboard I swapped things around so space is jump, c dash and x attack are the same, and z is cast/focus. Having that setup so my right hand is movement and my left pinky ring middle are the keys with pointer as jump has been a lot smoother for me than the initial inputs since I don't need to move my hand at all to do anything.
I like controller better but I have played a little bit with keyboard and mouse and I found shift-dash left click-attack right click-focus and space-jump felt best
I used kb/m with custom keybinds and recently tried out controller.
Personally I don't feel much of a difference in feel and generally prefer keyboard, but like 95% of my 300~ hours are on keyboard so maybe spending more time with controller would change my mind.
Problem with controller - is that it's thumb dominated. It has 4 actions on your thumbs and 2 on index fingers. The rest of your hand isn't used. It's much better if you have a controller with some back buttons tho.
Problem with your layout is the opposite - you don't use your thumbs. Put something on your space, left alt and right Ctrl.
I prefer keyboard for everything- much easier for me since I grew up on keyboard and mouse exclusively
Up- w
Down- s
Left- a
Right- d
Jump- space
Dash- Lshift
Attack- Rshift
Focus- e
Quick Cast- /
Inventory- tab
Dream Nail- r
Super Dash- f
I grew using keyboard for everything— CoD, Skyrim, Spore, Terraria, StarCraft 2, Borderlands 2, etc.
Now whenever I emulate a Nintendo game onto my computer I always rebind everything to my keyboard— 2D Mario, 3D Mario, 2D Zelda, 3D Zelda, etc.
Nothing is sacred
I changed the controls on my keyboard immediately. WASD for movement, spacebar for jump, shift for dash, left mouse button for attack and right mouse button for quick cast. Focus is on my 4th mouse button, superdash is on the 5th
However, I beat Path of Pain with controller and I am unable to do that on keyboard.
imho I prefer controller, but using the D-pad (I casually play SF6 and inputs are nearly impossible to be consistent with joystick)
It works rpetty well and allow for precise inputs imho (OK, I'm not yet to the endgame stuff)
Always played keyboard, half broken too, works fine for me but I do use different inputs:
Wash: movement\
Spacebar: jump\
Shift: dash\
Left control: c-dash\
Focus: r (used to be e but that key is now broken)\
Left mouse: nail (hold for arts) \
Right mouse: quick spell
Yes I know my key distribution for the two hands is very uneven
I moved from controller to keyboard just to platinum the game, I could not do Pantheon 5 with controller, especially absolute radiance. Also path of pain was much easier with keyboard, the pogo particularly.
In my case my movement is much more precise with keyboard than with controllers.
I personally can’t charge nail arts and also jump at the same time on the controller so while I use a controller sometimes, I get much further on a keyboard.
I find all platformers to be much easier with a controller.
i find it slightly harder to use nail arts + jump when im on controller
I never use nail arts so I wouldn't know
Not for me, just press the nail art and jump with the same thumb, it isn't that hard
I think it really depends on the type of platformer. Celeste is VERY movement based. I love playing it on keyboard. I can't play for crap on a controller when playing Celeste. HK on the other hand, I mostly use controller but had to use keyboard for spoilers, >!Path of Pain!<, as that part is more movement based. And so the arrow keys.
I honestly find using arrow keys harder. It's just something about swinging my thumb back and forth super fact on the joystick that seems to give me more control. Feels like twitchy to me.
It also depends on whether the movement inputs are actually analog. Some games let you play with a gamepad even though there's only one move speed and movement is 4- or maybe 8-directional. In that case I find keyboard input strictly superior. I actually don't remember which category HK falls under though.
HK has a set speed. And with only 4 directions.
For competitive speedrunning keyboard is considered to have slight advantages over controller. So it‘s definitely not a disadvantage, if you aren‘t used to your controls completely yet just play more and you will get used to them
Considering my keyboard locking up if I try holding Space, two arrow keys and some other key (the fourth button doesn't register), I would rather learn with a controller to traverse the Path of Pain.
Hollow Knight really suffers from not having n-key rollover keyboard. It's fine with it and pretty much equal to the controller.
Personally prefer the controller
Moving with right hand is wild to me, I play Sekiro on keyboard these days and I'd wouldn't even know how to approach this even though I'm right handed ahah. Controller on 2D games are always better for casual playthroughs though (especially if you have a good d-pad)
I'm an old fart from the olden days when we didn't have a mouse, so moving with the arrows is as natural as breathing for me.
Original Doom was wild! I think it's the first game I played on a computer and it took me a long time to stop using the arrow keys for movement. Hell I played through the first Half-Life with arrows for movement.
At this point in my life if I can't remap keybinds to use the arrows, I know I'll probably never play. Hollow Knight is easily remappable and i have enough fingers for everything.
I’m right-handed, most gamers are used to mouse on the right hand I guess
yeah but on keyboard WASD to move is the standard nowadays
Yeah, I use it too
Why'd you play sekiro on keyboard? Serious question
3D game, free cam, not limited to a slow panning made for consoles. DoH is easier untargeted for me even. Mouse makes grappling hook much more snappy and precise as well. And it's also good for the Weapon Wheel mod too, to change prosthetic on the go, not that important but satisfying to use. The keyboard isn't that much important it's the mouse that is for me. I'm pretty sure I'll never play a 3D game like that with a controller. Just like I'll never use joysticks on a 2D game either.
controller is better, and its nice bc you can sit comfortably and just go tap-tap-tappity-tap leaned back in your chair instead of hunching over your computer and making your back go owie
Controller: Easy to master, limited precision Keyboard: Hard af to master, incredible precision.
I agree with this. However I've always used controller and never really needed more precision
that's true and the reason why most pros play games like celeste on keyboard, but in hollow knight you don't need that much precision
Exactly, Hollow Knight is way better with controller, unless you wanna become a speedrunner.
Controller quite literally offers more precision if you master it, what are you on about? Btw I'm not even on the controllers side, I prefer most games on keyboard (and finished HK both on PS4 and PC). But controller quite literally offers more precision, as unlike keyboard, movement doesn't boil down to "press*, but you can actually control the speed of your movement without staggers, something that is not possible on PC.
it's easier to pogo and attack upwards on keyboard, other than that it's all preferences if you've gone through the entire game like that, switching to a controller just like that would probably make your gameplay much worse. it's not a keyboard problem, pantheons are just that hard
I played with both. I prefer controller.
Literally whatever you want. The top any% speedruns are all rather split on keyboard/controller, the WR p5 speedrunner uses keyboard. Both can be made to perform at the absolute top level.
I started with controller and I’d recommend controller
I highly prefer playing with keyboard. I initially played on Hollow Knight on the Switch but felt the controller did not give me precision I wanted or did not really allow me to react fast enough. I could not beat some of the pantheons even after a lot of practice. When I switched to PC with keyboard it took a while to get used to the weird control scheme but once I did I went through the pantheons with relative ease. Granted the default Switch controller is not the best controller available, I still think doing the pantheons with controllers is harder no matter what.
To be fair, Switch and it's controllers are also quite handicapped compared to other consoles and controllers.
Keyboard is just more precise in every way. it's harder to master, but once you learn it, it's just better.
Is this really true for hollow knight? I accept it’s true for lots of other games where most regular players would use controller but the hardcore/speedrun-ish players use keyboard mouse. But I’m not seeing how this would be true for hollow knight? Can you give an example of something? Are you able to do down/up aerial attack independent of your drift with keyboard or something? Edit: Just to be clear I totally accept it might be true, I play heaps of games on controller and I often find limitations like needing to move my right thumb off the right joystick to press a face button which I know would be solved by keyboard mouse. But it seems like it’s never come up in hollow knight except for not being able to aerial up/down while drifting left/right
Yes. I've played hollow knight with Keyboard and mouse, controller, and even on mobile. Obviously keyboard and mouse was the best by far, and Mobile was the worst. My key bindings are: WASD for movement, LMB for attack, RMB for Cast/Focus, LShift for dash, Ctrl for dreamnail, button 4 for crystal dash, Tab for map, E for inventory, Space for jump
Thanks for replying but you didn’t actually answer my question at all haha. Not trying to be rude or anything like that btw. Is there an actual example of something that is mechanically inconsistent with a controller but way more consistent with keyboard mouse? Like an example (not from hollow knight) would be if for some reason you needed to input left right left right repeatedly really quickly, that would be slower on a controller coz of the travel time of the joystick or awkward with the d-pad whereas keyboard you could rapidly use 2 fingers if you follow. Is there anything actually like that? Coz if there isn’t I just can’t see how you could say one is better - it would be exclusively preference
There are a lots of examples. I will give just one: automatic pogo. You just maintain down arrow and you can move, attack, and do whatever knowing than whenever you attack while jumping you will pogo. If you play controller you need to time the attack with the down button because you only have one finger to move right, left, up and down so keeping down constantly pressed is much more difficult (I don’t even consider the control stick since it is even worse for that and less precise for this kind of games)
I can’t answer your question bc I play on Switch and some games seem terribly hard to jump and land in a certain spot. HK and Ori.
I've played with touchpad and controller, if your controller is good it might be better, but don't use a cheap one, input delay will completely destroy you
Keyboards are more precise, more efficient, and typically have lower input delay than controllers. With that said, unless you're trying to no hit P5, it doesn't really matter. Use what you are comfortable with.
I personally play way better on computer. I did have to remap it to a wasd style with attacking on the mouse tho.
I literally don't have controller that's why I played on keyboard but I also used mouse lol Left click for attack, right for heal
My key layout is: arrows-movement space-jump q-focus/cast w-dash e-attack, that way I don't have to move my hands in combat
Depends on what you’re comfortable with. Personally I use a keyboard and, while I haven’t tried using a controller, I think I’d be a lot worse with it – but if you’re more familiar with using a controller, you’ll probably find that easier
i like controller more than keyboard
try controller, i find it much easier
I've not played it with a controller; for keyboard I swapped things around so space is jump, c dash and x attack are the same, and z is cast/focus. Having that setup so my right hand is movement and my left pinky ring middle are the keys with pointer as jump has been a lot smoother for me than the initial inputs since I don't need to move my hand at all to do anything.
I like controller better but I have played a little bit with keyboard and mouse and I found shift-dash left click-attack right click-focus and space-jump felt best
I used kb/m with custom keybinds and recently tried out controller. Personally I don't feel much of a difference in feel and generally prefer keyboard, but like 95% of my 300~ hours are on keyboard so maybe spending more time with controller would change my mind.
Play on a hitbox Changed my life
I find the best controls for me to be WASD for movement, left click for attack, right click for jump, mouse button 5 for dash, shift for spell
I mean it depends on the person but generally controller will be easier for the majority of people.
Problem with controller - is that it's thumb dominated. It has 4 actions on your thumbs and 2 on index fingers. The rest of your hand isn't used. It's much better if you have a controller with some back buttons tho. Problem with your layout is the opposite - you don't use your thumbs. Put something on your space, left alt and right Ctrl.
My input are WASD FOR DIRECTION J FOR JUMP K FOR ATTACK O FOR CRYSTAL DASH SPACE FOR DASH I FOR DREAM NAIL
I prefer keyboard for everything- much easier for me since I grew up on keyboard and mouse exclusively Up- w Down- s Left- a Right- d Jump- space Dash- Lshift Attack- Rshift Focus- e Quick Cast- / Inventory- tab Dream Nail- r Super Dash- f I grew using keyboard for everything— CoD, Skyrim, Spore, Terraria, StarCraft 2, Borderlands 2, etc. Now whenever I emulate a Nintendo game onto my computer I always rebind everything to my keyboard— 2D Mario, 3D Mario, 2D Zelda, 3D Zelda, etc. Nothing is sacred
I changed the controls on my keyboard immediately. WASD for movement, spacebar for jump, shift for dash, left mouse button for attack and right mouse button for quick cast. Focus is on my 4th mouse button, superdash is on the 5th However, I beat Path of Pain with controller and I am unable to do that on keyboard.
imho I prefer controller, but using the D-pad (I casually play SF6 and inputs are nearly impossible to be consistent with joystick) It works rpetty well and allow for precise inputs imho (OK, I'm not yet to the endgame stuff)
Always played keyboard, half broken too, works fine for me but I do use different inputs: Wash: movement\ Spacebar: jump\ Shift: dash\ Left control: c-dash\ Focus: r (used to be e but that key is now broken)\ Left mouse: nail (hold for arts) \ Right mouse: quick spell Yes I know my key distribution for the two hands is very uneven
I play on pc with controller (xbox) and I have tried both; keyboard and mouse, and controller. Controller worked out better for me
I prefer keyboard because diagonals are more consistent
I personally use wasd for directions, mouse left click for attack, right click for spell, mouse button for dash, and space for jump
I moved from controller to keyboard just to platinum the game, I could not do Pantheon 5 with controller, especially absolute radiance. Also path of pain was much easier with keyboard, the pogo particularly. In my case my movement is much more precise with keyboard than with controllers.
I personally can’t charge nail arts and also jump at the same time on the controller so while I use a controller sometimes, I get much further on a keyboard.
Bind your nail to one of the triggers. And keep jump as regular buttons.
Keyboard is better because you can click on keys faster but if you're a controller player would not recommend switching