Creation engine games and mouse settings

[VaultDuke]

Greetings,

 

today i come to you with maybe an odd problem.

I am left handed, and among the very few, that even use their mouse like this. Aside from the need for a symmetrical (or the rare left hand shaped) mouse, this has in general been no problem.

Windows has a setting to switch the left and right mouse button, which is usually understood by any god damn program.

Well except Bethesda games it seems.

The problem hasn't come up before, since i used a Logitech mouse, that has a software running, that switched the button OS independent. i now moved to a new mouse without support from this software, and now face the issue again.

 

So i was wondering, does anyone know another solution, maybe something that fixes the issue just specifically for the creation engine games' bug? I kind of feel like it's time to ditch programs that hack my mouse drivers on a system level, just for some shitty company that doesn't know how to fucking read the regular OS input properly.

While i currently circumvent the problem with a controller, every once in a while i'd like to game my Fallouts and Elder Scrolls with a K&M.

So please, if you can, share your knowledge to help a (fellow) leftie out. Thanks.

 

Cheers.

[Nico coiN]

I suppose just remapping the controls doesn't work, or isn't extended enough to allow mouse buttons swapping ingame ?

 

Well, xpadder allows a complete remap and support for gamepads (my xbox gamepad analog triggers just don't work on old games without it). I don't know if its functionalities are extended to the mouse buttons, though. Maybe some other programs which have the same goal allow it.

 

You also have the 'hardware' solution (and I'm very serious) :

1. Open your mouse.
2. Identify the 2 copper tracks affected to your left and right switches (not the tracks connected to ground, that would have no effect at all). You might need a digital multimeter for this.
3. Grind them in a small area with sandpaper if they have a varnish layer. The tracks must find themselves naked.
4. CUT them with a knife/cutter.
5. Swap & relink the tracks with copper wire and tin soldering.
6. Reassemble your mouse.
7. Enjoy ! 

If you don't have the material to do it I guess any electric/electronic shopkeeper can do it for a decent amount of € (8-16). I could myself do it for you if you weren't hundreds of kilometers away...

[VaultDuke]

Heyhey, thanks for the suggestions.

 

No, remapping controls doesn't work. It works for attack/hand options, but not menu controls. This quite frankly is even worse than a completely flipped setup imho. When everything is wrong, your mind can adapt after a while, the remaining issue that you use your weak finger for most everything. When every secod action is wrong, it just messes with your brain.

 

Xpadder doesn't seem to allow mouse remapping, and honstely, i'd rather not apply my measly soldering skills on a 40€ plastic mouse that i couldn't even find a teardown guide on the net for

 

i was hoping for something as straight forwards as a modified dxinput.dll (or whatever the appropriate dll might be called) to drop in my creation engine game folders. I'm actually quite surprised that this issue doesn't seem to have come up before, seeing as how 10% of the world population are left handed. But then again, most of them use the mouse right handed since forever, because issues like that used to be way more common. I can do the desktop right handed, and i  can use a right hand mapped mouse left handed with just a few minutes of adjustment. But this doesn't work for extensive gaming sessions. Precision with the right hand is too low for aiming, and the left ring finger is too weak for continued spamming of attacks.

 

oh well, keep the ideas coming...

[Nico coiN]

[...] i was hoping for something as straight forwards as a modified dxinput.dll (or whatever the appropriate dll might be called) to drop in my creation engine game folders. [...]

If only this would exist for switching an azerty-fr keyboard to a qwerty-us one...   With an azerty keyboard the FO3/NV/4 keyboard layout is fubared in VATS and games.

[VaultDuke]

Yeah, tat one is super annoying. That was the reason i got my controller to begin with. not only is it fubar, it also can't be remapped for large parts.

At least keyboard layouts can be quickly toggled with a setting in the task bar, if the relevant languages have been downloaded. I can switch between full German, full US or US with German keyboard layout here within seconds.

Or is the system setting for keyboard layout also ignored by creation engine games? Haven't actually tried any of the VATS games without controller in a while.

[lmstearn]

AFAIK DirectX uses the settings from the old Win32 mouse APIs. Well had for years- has it changed?
Does the reg hack work at all?
What kind of mouse do you have, and did the mfgs provide any reason for not providing a driver?

The following is of no use, but of interest: In the old Skyrim Prefs there was:

bInvertYValues = 0 (or 1) 

But no corresponding bInvertXValues or bInvertZValues? Anyone know why?

[VaultDuke]

like i said, there is an OS setting to switch the mouse buttons. It's just that creation engine games completely ignore it. It wasn't a problem before, since i used a mouse, that had it's own software, that switched the buttons on a different level, without even letting the OS know. Now i use a mouse that comes with a software, that simply utilizes the OS setting and the issue with the creation engine is (was!, read on) now coming back at me. For various reasons i don't want to switch back to the old mouse, so here i am.

 

luckily, on the nexus forum, there was a user who knew the solution instantly and provided a fix for me:

https://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/5030165-creation-engine-games-skyrim-fallot-4-etc-and-left-handed-mouse-settings/

 

there is a file in the misc bsa, that controls all the settings, with more options than the custom_controls in the game folder. Once you know what each setting means (there or other files in the bsa to tell you) you can switch all kinds of menu controls there.

Works for me, so i'm happy and can now use my more modern mouse (that, among other things, doesn't have inconsistent mouse acceleration on my 144 Hz screen).

 

re inverted values you mentioned: I think that is mouse look.

Inverting Y-axis is like an airplane mode for mouse look, where you look up when pulling the mouse back. Some like it, especially on controllers.

Inverting X-axis would result in switching the left and right look, and inverting z axis probably would change the direction of zoom in and zoom out with the mouse wheel. I can see why nobody ever asked for the latter two

[InsanePlumber]

Gruftlord have you tried playing with "Interface\controls\pc\mouse.txt"

 

For SSE unpack Skyrim - Patch.bsa

For SKY unpack Skyrim - Interface.bsa

 

mouse.txt Orginal

// 1st field: Mouse button name.  DO NOT ALTER!  This field is used to ID events in the code
// 2nd: Key hardware value.
// 3rd: Flash key code.  Used by Scaleform IO.  Not every key has a Flash key code.
Mouse1    0x0    0
Mouse2    0x1    1
Mouse3    0x2    2
Mouse4    0x3    
Mouse5    0x4    
Mouse6    0x5    
Mouse7    0x6    
Mouse8    0x7    
MouseWheelUp    0x8    
MouseWheelDown    0x9    
MouseMove    0xa    

mouse.txt swapped buttons

 

// 1st field: Mouse button name.  DO NOT ALTER!  This field is used to ID events in the code
// 2nd: Key hardware value.
// 3rd: Flash key code.  Used by Scaleform IO.  Not every key has a Flash key code.
Mouse1    0x1    0
Mouse2    0x0    1
Mouse3    0x2    2
Mouse4    0x3    
Mouse5    0x4    
Mouse6    0x5    
Mouse7    0x6    
Mouse8    0x7    
MouseWheelUp    0x8    
MouseWheelDown    0x9    
MouseMove    0xa    

[VaultDuke]

Yes, that didn't do a thing. I looks like those files are purely informative, with the actual settings handled by controlmap.txt.

[lmstearn]

It's just that creation engine games completely ignore it.

...

 

luckily, on the nexus forum, there was a user who knew the solution instantly and provided a fix for me:

https://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/5030165-creation-engine-games-skyrim-fallot-4-etc-and-left-handed-mouse-settings/

...

 I can see why nobody ever asked for the latter two

...

It looks like the Logitech ignored the User32 settings completely. But Logitech drivers are weird.

...

Good to know.

...

Might be more amenable for us upside down dudes in the Southern Hemisphere. But then again, here as an inveterate leftie, have gotten very much used to the cack (er... right) handed default settings of stuff.

[VaultDuke]

It looks like the Logitech ignored the User32 settings completely. But Logitech drivers are weird.

...

Good to know.

...

Might be more amenable for us upside down dudes in the Southern Hemisphere. But then again, here as an inveterate leftie, have gotten very much used to the cack (er... right) handed default settings of stuff.

Yep they did. Switch mouse buttons in logitech setpoint software and also switch in windows setting: Right handed mouse again.

Then again, was a god sent for all games that ignored the user32 setting. It seems with the latest mice logitech are abandoning their 'non-conformant' ways (a bit)