Star Wars: Squadrons Catch All - Lock S-Foils in Attack Position!

I played in VR last night using my Thrustmaster 16000.m and TWCS. I admit the menus are a bit odd, but it really isn't that hard. The first 6 buttons on your main joystick and the hat are used to navigate. It isn't really that much different then Elite Dangerous. When you see it tells you to press button 11, it also tells you on what device to press it. In the screenshot Veloxi posted, it shows joystick 1 button 11. If you can't figure out which button that is, go into the windows joystick config and see.

I saw BadKen was worried about aim accuracy using a controller but so far it seems like my lasers heatseak. If I am close to the path they are flying, you just hit. It is way more forgiving then the X-Wing series. I am using a HOTAS setup but I don't think that would change with controller or mouse/keyboard.

The thing that I am disliking the most is how spongy the ship movements are. To be fair, if you watch the trench run in A New Hope, you see the starships doing the same thing, but I do like the crispness of X-Wing. I think playing with the deadzone on my joystick will help a bit. Not sure if there is in game settings for that, but if not I know Thrustmaster will let me control it.

Veloxi wrote:
PaladinTom wrote:
Veloxi wrote:
PaladinTom wrote:

Shouldn't the rudder pedals be yaw?

f*ck YOU I LIKE WHAT I LIKE.

Cripes man, chill the f*ck out. I wasn’t implying you were doing it wrong.

I think you need to put this game down for a while.

Apologies, I was just being silly, not really yelling at you.

FYI I found your “silly” performative anger in your last few posts pretty off-putting. Guessing you didn’t mean for it to come off that way but maybe remember that stuff doesn’t always translate through text.

From what I’ve seen of this I’m looking forward to checking this out. I’ll either use mouse and keyboard or a 360 since I haven’t owned a joystick, much less a full hotas setup, in over ten years.

kazar wrote:

To be fair, if you watch the trench run in A New Hope...

I did a trench run in the game this afternoon.

OK, I ran between the hulls of a transport during the first mission. I remember doing exactly the same thing during an early mission in X-Wing. Felt exactly the same only with much, much better graphics.

Still haven't dusted off my Rift yet. This Sunday, I think. Supposed to be rainy here. I've a golf league final match tomorrow followed by guests coming for dinner in our outdoor area, so no gaming tomorrow.

I suck so bad at this in MP so far. Playing on HOTAS and have run it both in VR and regular screen. I love the sharper visuals on a monitor, but experiencing this in VR is, I think, the better option.

Just want to get better so I am not the worst player in every damn match.

PaladinTom wrote:
Veloxi wrote:

Okay so I got into the options using the mouse, after someone told me I just had to move the mouse to get it to work. Ugh. So I set everything up as best I can with my HOTAS. I go into the single player, and the camera in the hangar keeps veering to the left, because OH GOD THE FIRST PERSON CAMERA IS CONTROLLED NOW BY THE RUDDER PEDALS?! I set those to roll. WTF?!

Shouldn't the rudder pedals be yaw?

Does anyone know if the deadzone issue affects all joysticks? I've got an old Logitech 3D Pro.

To answer this: yes the deadzone disaster is a global parameter in the configuration files which are untouchable due to EA anti cheat that set the default deadzone of zero at 20%.

As Wayfarer mentioned up thread, there’s supposedly a fix incoming.

Re control schemes: they each have pros and cons. M&K are thé most précise by a country mile (while the deadzone issue is still here) but the actual flying feels awful. HOTAS is a royal PITA to set up currently and the aforementioned deadzone issues kill it for me. Controller hits the sweet spot. Flying is smooth, aim is a little rough but for the single player campaign in VR I’m looking for fun not god tier aim bot level accuracy.

Thé VR implementation is mostly really really well done, it’s a shame the controls absolutely sewer the experience. Spent 100 of my 115 minute of game play tweaking and not playing. Feels like I’m trying to order Skyrim load orders correctly not a game.

Somehow the dead zone thing doesn't affect solo joysticks like the Logitech Extreme 3D pro. Must be a separate config. I'm in the camp of not liking to guess at wtf Button 5 on my joystick is. Iirc Elite made visual guides to common joysticks to help.

My brother and I were annoyed we had to play with pubbies in coop. The mode specifically says you can fly with bot teammates but we couldn't figure out a way. We turned off voice completely and went in. Space is big enough that we had no concept of what was going on with the teammates, so I guess that's fine, but we bought the game understanding that we'd be able to enjoy some good old coop comp stomps.

staygold wrote:

HOTAS is a royal PITA to set up currently and the aforementioned deadzone issues kill it for me.

HOTAS works fine out of the box and I don't notice any deadzone problem. I rearranged most of the mappings to my preferences after a couple hours but there's no reason you couldn't be happy with the defaults. Perhaps the T-Flight requires less setup because it's likely to be popular on the consoles and so they coded for it as a kind of baseline HOTAS configuration. The T-Flight has all of its buttons labeled with numbers that correspond exactly to what's in the game.

I suspect people using controller will get absolutely pansted in multiplayer.

staygold wrote:

To answer this: yes the deadzone disaster is a global parameter in the configuration files which are untouchable due to EA anti cheat that set the default deadzone of zero at 20%.

As Wayfarer mentioned up thread, there’s supposedly a fix incoming.

After playing a bit more I'm starting to feel what you're talking about. I think I didn't notice because I never played enough Elite to get used to this stick. Also Elite's flight model is pretty different from the Wing Commander and X-Wing games I grew up with. Anyway, I wouldn't call it a disaster but it's definitely making the ships feel more sluggish than they should. They've already got some weight to them, which is a good thing, but they don't need the controls compounding it.

I'm absolutely crap in any ship that doesn't have shields. In a ship that does have shields I win awards for absorbing the most damage. If X-Wing tank is a legit niche in this game then I think I may have found mine.

Speaking of shields, it looks like they hold their overcharge longer than weapons or engines. It's worth building them up to 200% at the start before switching your power to your chosen default state.

One note in the campaign: the character conversations were obviously written with an interactive dialog system in mind. Every chunk stands alone. It sounds kinda awkward, but I definitely prefer this "just tell me everything" approach to having to do a bunch of clicking to get through it. I hope the Horizion: Zero Dawn developers are taking notes.

VR setup tips.

Still trying to get through mission 1 without Gunny just flying in circles, making it impossible to progress.

I thought I'd have FOMO for this one but reading comments here and elsewhere, nope. Still, I'm kinda bummed that my skepticism over EA's ability to put out a decent SW game continues to save me money. Maybe they'll fix this one up like they did Battlefront 2 and I can grab it for $5 at that point, but it'd be nice for one of these games to actually be good at launch.

billt721 wrote:

I thought I'd have FOMO for this one but reading comments here and elsewhere, nope. Still, I'm kinda bummed that my skepticism over EA's ability to put out a decent SW game continues to save me money. Maybe they'll fix this one up like they did Battlefront 2 and I can grab it for $5 at that point, but it'd be nice for one of these games to actually be good at launch.

Its got some bugs that would take a decent dev team a few weeks to fix at most. Its unfair to say its not a decent Star Wars game. Its theatrical, intense, challenging, and pushes a lot of those 'why we love Star Wars' buttons. If it becomes a bit of platform for more mission types, especially campaign-style, I'll be extremely happy.

billt721 wrote:

I thought I'd have FOMO for this one but reading comments here and elsewhere, nope. Still, I'm kinda bummed that my skepticism over EA's ability to put out a decent SW game continues to save me money. Maybe they'll fix this one up like they did Battlefront 2 and I can grab it for $5 at that point, but it'd be nice for one of these games to actually be good at launch.

It's more than decent, it's a ton of fun, and you are missing out. The only serious issue right now is the control dead zone thing, which is being worked on and I think is blown out of proportion anyhow. But hey if you're in "I'm relieved to hear something that makes me think this new game isn't good because I have too much to play and/or not enough money," I guess I've been there.

I have played a lot of flight sims, flight combat sims, and space games...

I am not sure if this game is like World of Warplanes where HOTAS and Controller are at a disadvantage to Mouse and Keyboard, but so far it feels just like that experience. Every kill feed I watched felt like a Keyboard Mouse player with very smooth movements keeping the reticle on me. Maybe I am missing something and I feel like I am fighting my HOTAS.

About half the time when I bother to watch the kill cam after I die it shows someone spamming laser blasts into empty space my ship already passed through. This seems like a game similar to Rainbow Six Siege (at least in its early days) where the kill cam has a lot of desync and is not actually a useful accurate representation of what happened.

Picked it up for xbone. See you online.

Playing on PC with a Rift S and a Thrustmaster T.Flight Hotas X. I haven't had any issues with the Hotas but I did take a pretty big patch today. I think that the game is pretty amazing in VR.

I fired it up this morning and am running a Thrustmaster One hotas.

Works great. I can seamlessly transition between K/M and controller.

The game is pretty dang fun. It feels like a solid update to the old Xwing games.

For anyone looking to eek out more performance, changing to custom VR settings and lowering VR shadows to low has given me the best result. Everything else can be on Ultra (but YMMV).

Naterstein wrote:

I have played a lot of flight sims, flight combat sims, and space games...

I am not sure if this game is like World of Warplanes where HOTAS and Controller are at a disadvantage to Mouse and Keyboard, but so far it feels just like that experience. Every kill feed I watched felt like a Keyboard Mouse player with very smooth movements keeping the reticle on me. Maybe I am missing something and I feel like I am fighting my HOTAS.

I suspect that’s the HOTAS deadzone issue. I’ve definitely felt the same way. At first I chalked it up to me not having flown much of anything since SWG died, but a bit of PvP made me reconsider.

I’m still enjoying the campaign though.

PWAlessi wrote:

Playing on PC with a Rift S and a Thrustmaster T.Flight Hotas X. I haven't had any issues with the Hotas but I did take a pretty big patch today. I think that the game is pretty amazing in VR.

Are you playing through Origin? Or did you go with a different platform? I’m hearing varying things about Rift S depending where it was purchased. I haven’t dove in yet but would like to.

I've been engrossed with Squadrons since it came out, already Pilot level 12.

I'm playing the Steam version using a 360 controller.

Some of my gameplay: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/760131646

I started with mouse + keyboard but it really started to click after I switched to the controller. Loving this!

I guess everybody must be setting New Republic as their faction preference because I don't set preference and I feel like I end up as Imperial about 75% of the time. This suits me fine because it gives me lots of X-Wings piloted by people flying with their feet to shoot at.

I still try to make the X-Wing work myself sometimes in my rare NR matches but I have yet to find a build that feels effective. It just doesn't excel at anything enough to form your tactics around that, although with the repair droid it -can- hang in a fight a really long time.

For balance's sake they made the two fighter class ships (X-Wing and TIE Fighter) have much stronger hulls than the faster interceptor pair (TIE Interceptor and A-Wing). It intuitively makes sense looking at them that the XW is sturdier than the AW. The Eyeball being sturdier than the Squint... Is not as intuitive. The basic TIE can feel absurdly resilient when you're shooting at one in this game. And because the two sides get basically equivalent equipment, it can get a repair kit analogous to the XW's droid to fix itself up, too. Somewhat weirdly, the Y-Wing and TIE Bomber -don't- get the repair Droid equipment despite an R2 unit of course being visible on the YW model and even making noises when you fly it. Maybe they worried the bombers hull and shields plus a heal would make them functionally immortal? But the interceptors -do- get repair kits, which I guess is supposed to be a balancing factor for their lack of hull strength, although I never carry them.

I don't think you have an actual preferred faction. It has been pretty 50/50 for me so far.

Middcore wrote:

The basic TIE can feel absurdly resilient when you're shooting at one in this game.

Honestly that may be my biggest complaint. If it were up to me the TIE would be faster, more agile, and a bit fragile. Maybe not the 2-3 hit wonder it was in its own game, but closer to that than its current amount. I do like the auto-repair. Maybe reduce the cooldown on that so if it survives a fight it’ll basically be at full strength again for the next one. Then once it feels right I’d balance it with a quicker respawn timer and a reduced morale hit when one dies.

Or just use the TIE Advanced as the baseline Imperial ship, and have “call in backup TIE Fighters” be somebody’s cooldown kinda like a souped up version of the turret mines.

Unfortunately, my Rift seems to be functionally dead. The cable plugged into the headset is loose and will lose connection randomly as I move my head around.

I've been moderately successful in securing the plug in the socket using blue tape as a pad, but it looks like there may be a loose connection between the socket and the circuit board inside the headset. I assume this as even though the plug can't move within the socket, the headset still loses connection to my PC and, if I'm using the headset at the time, the world goes black. Sometimes sound continues, sometimes not. The power indication light inside the headset (at the front, just above the lenses) will also go on or off randomly based upon slight movement.

I was unable to launch SteamVR or Squadrons in VR successfully, though some of the Oculus Store bought apps worked fine (until the world went black).

Ah well.

Not ready to pay (or wait) for a new headset at the moment, so I'll go back to my flat world for now.

I've sunk a decent quantity of hours into the game, and I really dig the single player campaign. Great to live all these cinematic moments. Multiplayer is super immersive and adrenaline inducing to say the least. Overall, just fantastic to experience this game. Buuuuut, it has been frustrating in a couple of areas. I'm curious to see if I change my tune, but so far

  • Empire ships are way less fun to fly in VR. The small viewing window gives you an FOV of like 35 degrees.
  • Radar and instruments are too rudimentary to maintain good situational awareness.
  • I really want to fly in formation and deliberately coordinate with wing mates (when it happens it is effing glorious), but the game kinda disincentivizes highly coordinated group action. Maybe I just need to be more deliberate.
ToxicWaltz wrote:
PWAlessi wrote:

Playing on PC with a Rift S and a Thrustmaster T.Flight Hotas X. I haven't had any issues with the Hotas but I did take a pretty big patch today. I think that the game is pretty amazing in VR.

Are you playing through Origin? Or did you go with a different platform? I’m hearing varying things about Rift S depending where it was purchased. I haven’t dove in yet but would like to.

Yes, I'm playing through Origin.

Zebulon wrote:

I really want to fly in formation and deliberately coordinate with wing mates (when it happens it is effing glorious), but the game kinda disincentivizes highly coordinated group action. Maybe I just need to be more deliberate.

I haven't tried formation flying but teamwork definitely pays off. If I get someone on my tail I can usually boost > drift > boost around obstacles long enough for a teammate to come after them if we're sticking together and know when the other has been targeted. Staying near each other, group targeting and helping when targeted make a huge difference.

There's one map that has nothing in it, no obstacles and I hate it. One of the teams will gain a lead and if they stick together there's nothing to be done until the match ends. I've had matches go 30-4, 2-30, 8-30, 30-6, etc on this map. I haven't had matches that lopsided on any other map.

I've only dipped my toe into Fleet Battles but in Dogfighting I don't see the support ships being that useful.

mrwynd wrote:

I haven't tried formation flying but teamwork definitely pays off. If I get someone on my tail I can usually boost > drift > boost around obstacles long enough for a teammate to come after them if we're sticking together and know when the other has been targeted.

This is why the furballs in the middle of the maps are a sucker's game IMO and I usually stick to hit and run tactics. Chasing one guy at maneuvering (low) speed long enough is asking for it.

And yes I groan when I see a U-Wing or Reaper on my team in Dogfight, don't think I've ever once gotten repaired by one, and when I see one on the enemy team my reaction can best be described as YEET.

I've played about half in VR and half on a monitor, and so far I am flying and shooting better in VR thanks to the depth perception. Not that I'm any better than below-mediocre either way. The TIE cockpit view took a little getting used to but isn't too hindering to me.