KSP Console First Thoughts

[polimerjones]

Well now that KSP is out on PS4 I figured I would let people know my first thoughts just in case you are on the edge of buying it.

Pro list-

Its KSP. Its a great game and it allows people without a PC to play on consoles.

If you have a vita you can also to share play which i did and its pretty cool having ksp on the go. The text is small but the game it playable.

 

Con list-

You still use a cursor to build ships and it moves really fast. You can slow it down but at the lowest settings I still thinks its a little too fast.

There is no custom controller setup. If you don't like what joystick rotates or which button is the throttle you are out of luck.

There are too many things you need to press and not enough buttons on a controller so pressing triangle on the controller slows time and brings up a menu with more action buttons.

Button layout is not intuitive.

The game is definitely slower than on a decent PC.

 

As expected-

Building can be a little difficult. Especially if you are used to playing on PC. Clicking a part jumps it to the center of the screen which took me a long time to get used to.

 

Again this is after just a little while of playing. I will try to update more once I get a better feel for the game.

 

[justidutch]

Maybe I don't know the PS4 controls yet, but timewarp is an issue.  In flight (started a career, managed to get into orbit), I could only timewarp 4x!  And, not the regular good timewarp but the bad kind that at 4x shows up red (physics warp?), the kind of warp normally only done when burning.  But when just floating in orbit, I could not warp faster than 4x.  Even got a message saying that time warp can screw with the physics and don't use it with large ships.

 

Also, when in the map view during flight, it's really difficult to check the altitudes of PE and AP; as OP says you need to press too many buttons to get that info.  To be precise, you need to switch out of the controls that allow throttling and manoeuvring to get the cursor so you can place it over the nodes and see the altitude values, then switch the controller back to get the throttle again.  I can only imagine trying to set precise orbits will be incredibly frustrating if not impossible, at least the way I'm used to doing it on my laptop.

 

[HoloYolo]

4 hours ago, justidutch said:

Maybe I don't know the PS4 controls yet, but timewarp is an issue.  In flight (started a career, managed to get into orbit), I could only timewarp 4x!  And, not the regular good timewarp but the bad kind that at 4x shows up red (physics warp?), the kind of warp normally only done when burning.  But when just floating in orbit, I could not warp faster than 4x.  Even got a message saying that time warp can screw with the physics and don't use it with large ships.

 

Also, when in the map view during flight, it's really difficult to check the altitudes of PE and AP; as OP says you need to press too many buttons to get that info.  To be precise, you need to switch out of the controls that allow throttling and manoeuvring to get the cursor so you can place it over the nodes and see the altitude values, then switch the controller back to get the throttle again.  I can only imagine trying to set precise orbits will be incredibly frustrating if not impossible, at least the way I'm used to doing it on my laptop.

 

If your in physics warp in the atmosphere, then you most likely will remain that way until you warp back to 1x then warp again.

[klesh]

Has it crashed much on you yet?

[Nailbach]

2 hours ago, klesh said:

Has it crashed much on you yet?

played a good 3 hours yesterday, no crash sofar.

I can also confirm that the US version works on an EU account (it does with every game anyway, just to confirm it)

[timmers_uk]

8 hours ago, HoloYolo said:

If your in physics warp in the atmosphere, then you most likely will remain that way until you warp back to 1x then warp again.

If you use the controller to enable timewarp, it seems you always get physwarp, whether in or out of atmosphere. The only way I could see to engage 'proper' timewarp was to either use the mouse pointer and click the arrows on the top left view of warp level, or to use map view and warp to a point on the orbit... but I could be missing something.

[ZooNamedGames]

I had a layout designed long before the console release for the PS4/Xbox 1. Kind of saddening that they had to toss the extra buttons to one single one. Hm... from what I know the PS4/Xbox 1 controller (as far as buttons alone go) is identical to the previous systems' controllers.

I'll give it a whirl and try to make my own layout and let you guess critique it.

Edited July 13, 2016 by ZooNamedGames

[Gutterboy44]

There is definitely an issue with the time warp controller shortcut. It even lists it as time warp in the controller legend, yet it always does physics warp. Even when you are in space, it is strictly bound to physics warp, which is useless. I imagine this has to be a bug or mistake. I don't know why this wouldn't behave exactly like the warp keys on PC, where if you warp in atmosphere, it is physics warp, but as soon as you are in space, it does time warp.  This needs to be fixed asap as it makes it unnecessarily cumbersome.  Although custom button mapping would go a long way, I can live with the controls and they are becoming less of a hassle the more time I spend on PS4.  

The console release (I am playing on PS4) seems pretty solid so far and should be a good window into the wonderful world of KSP for console people. However, they absolutely need to add some Kerbal Engineer like onscreen data for real time Pe and Ap readouts.  It is far too complicated to switch to cursor, rotate your map, hover over the Ap or Pe, switch back off cursor to control your ship, switch back, etc to just simply keep tabs on your Pe and Ap while flying.  We need to see these two numbers at all times. A full fledged KER integration would be amazing, but for now just those two data points would solve many of my issues with playing KSP with a controller.

Edited July 13, 2016 by Gutterboy44

[timmers_uk]

I do agree with the KER bit.

I would really like full modding support, but I'm well aware why holding my breath waiting for that would not be a sensible plan, so in the meantime ... let me see my basic information in the flight view?

oh ... and UI size slider - I could really do with being able to slide that less than 100% - it was one of the first things I tried to do once I entered flight mode, and I got asked a few times by viewers on stream, who expressed surprise at how embiggened you could make the navball, but what they wanted was it to be smaller.

[Crookz]

The biggest killer for me is the inversion of the camera controls - a console game basic its really not pleasent to play because of this. 

[sPeaRr]

Just want to chime in as a person who had never played the pc version.  I'm sure I don't know what I'm missing when it comes to mods, but this has to be one of the coolest games I've ever played.  I surmise that I'll be doing a fair bit of over engineering and trial and error without the mods and precise control, but it seems the stock game is pretty amazing to me.  

[moogoob]

41 minutes ago, sPeaRr said:

Just want to chime in as a person who had never played the pc version.  I'm sure I don't know what I'm missing when it comes to mods, but this has to be one of the coolest games I've ever played.  I surmise that I'll be doing a fair bit of over engineering and trial and error without the mods and precise control, but it seems the stock game is pretty amazing to me.  

It is!

Many people who've put thousands of hours in tend to forget the original joy and glee that the game gave us when we each first played it - stock, buggy and incomplete as it was.  Have fun with it!

[Snotshot]

Long time KSP player and forum lurker here :]

With my first post I just wanted to share my experience with KSP console so far. I have been playing KSP on PC for long time but as soon as KSP appeared on Xbox One I bought it straight away. Yep I now own 2 copies of the same game. 

So far I am enjoying Xbox One version as much as PC. I remember a year or so ago many people wanted to play KSP on PC with Xbox controller. These forums were full of proposed controller setups for that perfect game play. And you know what, nothing can beat controller in piloting the plane or keeping your rocket on course on Xbox One and I personally think that the controller is far superior in doing that. So this is my personal pros and cons list.

Pros: Use of Xbox One controller with RT/LT pressure sensitivity which allows slow or fast banking and other slow or fast adjustments. Absolute pleasure to fly with.

Couch gaming on big telly with PIP and all your Xbox friends.

Almost instant recording & sharing of your KSP adventures and funny accidents.

Cons: No mods. But the only one I really care is environmental visual enhancements and that is it.

 

So far I have no major issues with building anything using the controller and I have not experienced any issues while flying, setting nodes etc. Buttons on Xbox One can be remapped via controller app.

Big thanks to Squad and FT. Fantastic game!

[Majorjim!]

4 minutes ago, Snotshot said:

And you know what, nothing can beat controller in piloting the plane or keeping your rocket on course

One word, Joystick.

 

[klesh]

21 hours ago, sPeaRr said:

this has to be one of the coolest games I've ever played.

 

Welcome to KSP. This guy gets it. 

[Majorjim!]

 

Just now, klesh said:

 

Welcome to KSP. This guy gets it. 

One of! Are there other video games?