How did the combination of WASD
For me, WASD is an intuitively understandable key combination for games. But the story could have taken a different path, and we would get an EDSF or ASXC. Let's find out why we play that way.
Today, WASD seems like an inevitable and indispensable key combination for games. As soon as the mouse control appeared in the 3D shooters, it became difficult, at least right-handed, to keep fingers on the arrows. The keys on the left side of the keyboard are more convenient, and there it is easier to reach Shift and Space. But now this WASD seems to be the best and only right choice, and twenty years ago few players used this combination.
At the dawn of shooters, there was no single standard for keyboard control; gamers tried to choose the best option themselves. Game developers set various combinations for movement, including arrows, by default. Shooter System Shock in 1994 offered ASDX. In Descent, AZ was used to move forward and backward, and it was possible to look around the corner with the help of QE. Gamers have tried other combinations, like the ZXCV and ESDF.
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Today’s standard WASD took several years to firmly entertain players around the world. It is not known exactly who first started using this combination, but one person made a very significant contribution to its popularization - Dennis “Thresh” Fong , the greatest player in Quake.
Dennis Fong in 1997 won the first national Quake tournament tournament personal Ferrari 328 John Carmack, the founder of ID Software. And the moment he killed Tom Kimzy (Tom "Entropy" Kimzey), Phong's right hand was on the mouse, and his left was on the WASD combination.
Dennis Fong played Doom with his brother a few years before the championship, using only the keyboard. But in the Doom there was no point in the mouse, because looking up and down was not necessary. You directed the weapon in the direction of the enemy, not focusing on its position on the vertical axis.
Both Dennis Fong and his brother Lyle were great players. But Dennis was losing to his brother, who used the trackball, so one summer Fong decided to learn how to play with the mouse. And became invincible. “As soon as I made this transition, my skills increased exponentially,” says Fong, adding that after that he stopped losing.
This was followed by experiments, for example, WADX. But in the end, Fong found WASD and began to use only this combination. Did he come up with this scheme? Probably no. Other people also tried to use the left side of the keyboard in Doom at the same time. But without the influence of Phong, the combination could not become the standard. There were the same EDSF, or even a strange ZXC. I wonder what key we would have turned on the scope if we went to the ZXC, and to move backwards, clicked on the right mouse button?
“I’m definitely not going to reap the laurels of the creator of the WASD combination. I stumbled upon it by chance. I am sure that at the same time other people began to use it simply because it seemed convenient to them. But I definitely think that I helped popularize it for a particular group of gamers, in particular for players in shooters, ”says Dennis Fong. This key combination was spelled out in his Thresh's Quake Bible as “flipped T”, and this “Quake guide” from one of the first cyber sportsmen had meaning. Phong's opinion was significant before his career as a Quake player — before that, he was the Doom champion.
The history of first-person shooters begins in the 1970s. One of the first games in the genre was Maze War - “War in the Maze”. The game with a first-person view implied movement in the maze, the player could go forward, back and turn to the sides, with each time - 90 degrees. There was no need for precise aiming at a specific point, it was possible to shoot at the enemy simply by directing his gaze in the right direction. In this grandfather shooter could play on Mac, Palm OS, NeXT Computer, Xerox Star.
In 1991, Hovertank 3D, one of the first 3D shooters, was released. Only they played it not for a man, but for a tank that saves hostages and kills monsters in a maze. It was developed by id Software.
Two years later, id Software releases Doom, one of the most significant games among first-person shooters. Do you also play this music in your head? I am sure most of you know this game not by hearsay.
As mentioned above, there was no need for a mouse in Doom. It was enough arrows and keys for shooting and changing weapons. The mouse appeared later. In this case, Quake is not the first game in which they began to use it, before it was Marathon . But she became less influential compared to the legendary Quake.
In 1997, among the options were, for example, A Shift ZX, where A is forward and Z is back. In 1999, System Shock 2 came out, where the movement was carried out by the WADX square, and S could be crouched on.
But people asked questions about how Thresh plays, how its management is set up: “After the demo of the Fong winning game, I was stunned because this guy moves so fast in Quake! It so quickly turns 180 degrees, I don’t think it can be done with a mouse. I think he set up the keyboard for a rocket jump and this turn. ”
John Carmack, one of the creators of Quake, added the Phong name configuration to the second part of the game. But this is hardly what made the layout the most popular in the world of shooters. In Quake 2, WASD was still a separate layout. But in Half-Life, which was released in 1998, for the first time for a shooter, the WASD combination left the bench and became the default control.
In 1998, the shooter Starsiege Tribes, where WASD again becomes default. Quake 3 in 1999 finally added WASD to its default settings. Then other shooters went, but Half-Life, Starsiege Tribes and Quake 3 made the main contribution to the popularity of the layout. In 2004, World of Warcraft came out with the same default settings, and if WASD were not yet the main one for everyone, the combination after WoW would have become part of the everyday life of millions of gamers.
The same option for the movement was used in Castle Wolfenstein in 1981, but it was a 2D game with a left view. Today, the combination is used not only in shooters - it is a way to control the camera in strategies.
If you play shooters and use this configuration, you should understand its advantages. When you hold your fingers on the WAD, ready at any moment to move the middle one by S to move backwards, your little finger easily reaches Shift and your thumb up to a space. And while you can easily change the weapon on the keys 1-4, if during the game it is necessary.
The WASD combination is located on the left side of the keyboard, and is used when the mouse is in the right hand. But if you are left-handed, the control shift from the usual arrows on the right to the left side of the keyboard loses its meaning. Therefore, it is likely that you use the arrows and the surrounding keys to control the character in the game.
Fallout 4 uses WASD by default. But there are people who switch the layout to ESDF. Players in this case are faced with a problem : the E key is designed to collect loot. And they are all that they see, they collect - because they go to this key, and it is impossible to change this setting in the game. Reddit users in the thread on the link above note that 10% of all gamers play on ESDF.
Interestingly, Gabe Newell, the founder and CEO of Valve, does not use WASD. Its logic is that games should not divert your hands from their position during normal typing. Therefore, it also uses the right-shifted inverted T-ESDF. Another Half-Life developer, game designer Dario Casali (Dario Casali) prefers ASXC.
There are other options. Someone prefers RDFG. There are fans of TFGH. Even 5RTY and EDAF seem to some more comfortable. And in whose camp are you?
Today, WASD seems like an inevitable and indispensable key combination for games. As soon as the mouse control appeared in the 3D shooters, it became difficult, at least right-handed, to keep fingers on the arrows. The keys on the left side of the keyboard are more convenient, and there it is easier to reach Shift and Space. But now this WASD seems to be the best and only right choice, and twenty years ago few players used this combination.
At the dawn of shooters, there was no single standard for keyboard control; gamers tried to choose the best option themselves. Game developers set various combinations for movement, including arrows, by default. Shooter System Shock in 1994 offered ASDX. In Descent, AZ was used to move forward and backward, and it was possible to look around the corner with the help of QE. Gamers have tried other combinations, like the ZXCV and ESDF.
')
Today’s standard WASD took several years to firmly entertain players around the world. It is not known exactly who first started using this combination, but one person made a very significant contribution to its popularization - Dennis “Thresh” Fong , the greatest player in Quake.
Founding father
Dennis Fong in 1997 won the first national Quake tournament tournament personal Ferrari 328 John Carmack, the founder of ID Software. And the moment he killed Tom Kimzy (Tom "Entropy" Kimzey), Phong's right hand was on the mouse, and his left was on the WASD combination.
Dennis Fong played Doom with his brother a few years before the championship, using only the keyboard. But in the Doom there was no point in the mouse, because looking up and down was not necessary. You directed the weapon in the direction of the enemy, not focusing on its position on the vertical axis.
Both Dennis Fong and his brother Lyle were great players. But Dennis was losing to his brother, who used the trackball, so one summer Fong decided to learn how to play with the mouse. And became invincible. “As soon as I made this transition, my skills increased exponentially,” says Fong, adding that after that he stopped losing.
This was followed by experiments, for example, WADX. But in the end, Fong found WASD and began to use only this combination. Did he come up with this scheme? Probably no. Other people also tried to use the left side of the keyboard in Doom at the same time. But without the influence of Phong, the combination could not become the standard. There were the same EDSF, or even a strange ZXC. I wonder what key we would have turned on the scope if we went to the ZXC, and to move backwards, clicked on the right mouse button?
“I’m definitely not going to reap the laurels of the creator of the WASD combination. I stumbled upon it by chance. I am sure that at the same time other people began to use it simply because it seemed convenient to them. But I definitely think that I helped popularize it for a particular group of gamers, in particular for players in shooters, ”says Dennis Fong. This key combination was spelled out in his Thresh's Quake Bible as “flipped T”, and this “Quake guide” from one of the first cyber sportsmen had meaning. Phong's opinion was significant before his career as a Quake player — before that, he was the Doom champion.
The first WASD default shooters
The history of first-person shooters begins in the 1970s. One of the first games in the genre was Maze War - “War in the Maze”. The game with a first-person view implied movement in the maze, the player could go forward, back and turn to the sides, with each time - 90 degrees. There was no need for precise aiming at a specific point, it was possible to shoot at the enemy simply by directing his gaze in the right direction. In this grandfather shooter could play on Mac, Palm OS, NeXT Computer, Xerox Star.
In 1991, Hovertank 3D, one of the first 3D shooters, was released. Only they played it not for a man, but for a tank that saves hostages and kills monsters in a maze. It was developed by id Software.
Two years later, id Software releases Doom, one of the most significant games among first-person shooters. Do you also play this music in your head? I am sure most of you know this game not by hearsay.
As mentioned above, there was no need for a mouse in Doom. It was enough arrows and keys for shooting and changing weapons. The mouse appeared later. In this case, Quake is not the first game in which they began to use it, before it was Marathon . But she became less influential compared to the legendary Quake.
In 1997, among the options were, for example, A Shift ZX, where A is forward and Z is back. In 1999, System Shock 2 came out, where the movement was carried out by the WADX square, and S could be crouched on.
But people asked questions about how Thresh plays, how its management is set up: “After the demo of the Fong winning game, I was stunned because this guy moves so fast in Quake! It so quickly turns 180 degrees, I don’t think it can be done with a mouse. I think he set up the keyboard for a rocket jump and this turn. ”
John Carmack, one of the creators of Quake, added the Phong name configuration to the second part of the game. But this is hardly what made the layout the most popular in the world of shooters. In Quake 2, WASD was still a separate layout. But in Half-Life, which was released in 1998, for the first time for a shooter, the WASD combination left the bench and became the default control.
In 1998, the shooter Starsiege Tribes, where WASD again becomes default. Quake 3 in 1999 finally added WASD to its default settings. Then other shooters went, but Half-Life, Starsiege Tribes and Quake 3 made the main contribution to the popularity of the layout. In 2004, World of Warcraft came out with the same default settings, and if WASD were not yet the main one for everyone, the combination after WoW would have become part of the everyday life of millions of gamers.
The same option for the movement was used in Castle Wolfenstein in 1981, but it was a 2D game with a left view. Today, the combination is used not only in shooters - it is a way to control the camera in strategies.
If you play shooters and use this configuration, you should understand its advantages. When you hold your fingers on the WAD, ready at any moment to move the middle one by S to move backwards, your little finger easily reaches Shift and your thumb up to a space. And while you can easily change the weapon on the keys 1-4, if during the game it is necessary.
What if not WASD?
The WASD combination is located on the left side of the keyboard, and is used when the mouse is in the right hand. But if you are left-handed, the control shift from the usual arrows on the right to the left side of the keyboard loses its meaning. Therefore, it is likely that you use the arrows and the surrounding keys to control the character in the game.
Fallout 4 uses WASD by default. But there are people who switch the layout to ESDF. Players in this case are faced with a problem : the E key is designed to collect loot. And they are all that they see, they collect - because they go to this key, and it is impossible to change this setting in the game. Reddit users in the thread on the link above note that 10% of all gamers play on ESDF.
Interestingly, Gabe Newell, the founder and CEO of Valve, does not use WASD. Its logic is that games should not divert your hands from their position during normal typing. Therefore, it also uses the right-shifted inverted T-ESDF. Another Half-Life developer, game designer Dario Casali (Dario Casali) prefers ASXC.
There are other options. Someone prefers RDFG. There are fans of TFGH. Even 5RTY and EDAF seem to some more comfortable. And in whose camp are you?
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/369499/
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