Today i had a conversation on IRC with kharnov about a HUD for left handed players. I asked for this quite a while ago and a few days ago kharnov told me that gimhael made a cvar to mirror the gun. that cvar will be included in the next alpha version and can allready be found here >> https://github.com/Unvanquished/Unvanqu ... 28cab8f2f2
So this is the first step to a decent HUD for lefties - if the devs decide to give it a go.
I want to give you guys some ideas what this might include and maybe some other players leave a comment here.
mirror the gun to the left side (allready done with the mentioned cvar)
but what about particles/reflexions/bullet casings? do those get mirrored too or what happens to them?
make a decent set of keybinds for lefties. e.g. instead 'WASD' use 'IJKL'. this is actually a shot in the dark since things get a bit fuzzy on the right side of the keyboard: different countries have different keyboard layouts and some of them use the right side to place their shiny local characters. e.g. on my keyboard we find here ö,ä and ü. But IJKL might be safe to use for all. If not, just make a better suggestion. I have no idea how to place the rest of the binds, e.g. those for jump, dodge, taunt, etc.
My personal binds for Tremulous are not a good example since they are a mess actually. Since there is no set of binds for lefties i had to improvise a lot. I use the arrow keys as a replacement for WASD. This is actually bad because right next to the arrow keys are .... no keys at all. So i had to put some binds on the sixpack above the arrow keys (DEL,END,Pagedown, etc), the NUM-Block on the very very right side of the keyboard. I also use CTRL and the keys on the left side of CTRL. My shiny 'Hi-Alt-Greetings' bind is on the Space bar. And yes: i have big hands.
After all this actually is a good example - for what happens when a leftie starts playing and the Game itself does not give him a decent set of default binds: you start improvising and end up with a set of binds that even a clockspider hardly could handle.
to make things simple, make an entry in the options menu, that lets the player choose between leftie and normal HUD. normal HUD should be default, but being able to set all things leftie style with a single menu option would be cool.
the mouse is a problem. Many lefties still use the normal mouse layout and use the right hand to control the mouse. others just switch the mouse to the left side but still keep the mouse layout. so they do the left-click with their middle finger and right-click with their forefinger. Only a minority of frrrrreaks- i am one of them - buys a lefthander mouse (i have a Razer Deathadder for lefties) and switches the settings for the mouse buttons on OS level.
A simple solution might be an extra option to switch binds for the mouse keys.
sugar on top would be a leftie character model. Allthough i have no idea, how much coding this would involve. but it would be really cool.
I'm shure there is more but it won't come up my mind atm and why the beep should i do all the thinking here. Write down your own comments and ideas here.
Also i'm pretty shure that there is no FPS with a HUD for lefties. Make Unvanquished the first.
I think it would be a nice idea to ask the user questions on profile creation: "What is your handedness?", "What kind of mouse are you using? Right/Left handed?", "On which side do you want your gun?". At the same point we could ask for the "sex" cvar and assign either the male or female model, etc. Once the profile is set up and binds get customzied it would be a mess to switch to another default keyboard layout.
Oh and welcome to the forums jackforward! :)
PS: I häve these stränge dötted chäräcters on my keyßöärd, töö. :p
make a decent set of keybinds for lefties. e.g. instead 'WASD' use 'IJKL'. this is actually a shot in the dark since things get a bit fuzzy on the right side of the keyboard: different countries have different keyboard layouts and some of them use the right side to place their shiny local characters. e.g. on my keyboard we find here ö,ä and ü. But IJKL might be safe to use for all. If not, just make a better suggestion. I have no idea how to place the rest of the binds, e.g. those for jump, dodge, taunt, etc.
My personal binds for Tremulous are not a good example since they are a mess actually. Since there is no set of binds for lefties i had to improvise a lot. I use the arrow keys as a replacement for WASD. This is actually bad because right next to the arrow keys are .... no keys at all. So i had to put some binds on the sixpack above the arrow keys (DEL,END,Pagedown, etc), the NUM-Block on the very very right side of the keyboard. I also use CTRL and the keys on the left side of CTRL. My shiny 'Hi-Alt-Greetings' bind is on the Space bar. And yes: i have big hands.
After all this actually is a good example - for what happens when a leftie starts playing and the Game itself does not give him a decent set of default binds: you start improvising and end up with a set of binds that even a clockspider hardly could handle.
All binds are editable using the console and in the options (like most games where you choose what bind you want for what action).
jackforward wrote:
the mouse is a problem. Many lefties still use the normal mouse layout and use the right hand to control the mouse. others just switch the mouse to the left side but still keep the mouse layout. so they do the left-click with their middle finger and right-click with their forefinger. Only a minority of frrrrreaks- i am one of them - buys a lefthander mouse (i have a Razer Deathadder for lefties) and switches the settings for the mouse buttons on OS level.
A simple solution might be an extra option to switch binds for the mouse keys.
As mentioned above
jackforward wrote:
sugar on top would be a leftie character model. Allthough i have no idea, how much coding this would involve. but it would be really cool.
Hmm I don't really see the point as you only see your character in first person. Unless you would assume everyone is left handed and therefor has left-handed models.
5. sugar on top would be a leftie character model. Allthough i have no idea, how much coding this would involve. but it would be really cool.
Hmm I don't really see the point as you only see your character in first person. Unless you would assume everyone is left handed and therefor has left-handed models.
I think what he means is that you can see which player is left handed, so that not only in first person the model is left handed, but in third person as well.
