Talk:WASD keys

Reachable keys

With one hand on the mouse, and one hand on the cursors, I can probably reach punctuation, some of the numpad and and the ins -- pgdown keys, but it's pretty difficult. What's this about being able to reach half the keys? 90.242.37.219 (talk) 12:48, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

Left-handed players

what about left handed players, dont they get a mention?!--GregLoutsenko 19:51, 6 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I'm left-handed and use the keyboard like a right handed person would. --Arm 12:49, 4 October 2005 (UTC)

I've developed an interesting way of playing games with the numpad and the arrows. I use the numpad keys 8456 to move, right arrow to jump, and down arrow to crouch. The thumb is perfect to hit the arrows in that position. And usually the "*" key will reload the weapon, and "/" is the use button. --Vittau 03:17, 14 December 2006 (UTC)

Actually they perfectly fit left handers - try for yourself and see: operating WASD with the right hand might proove somewhat difficult.;) The arrow keys were created for the masses, WASD is for the left-handed elite. I^NT_ER^NA_ZI 20:23, 8 January 2007 (UTC)

Actually right-handed people are supposed to use WASD with the left hand. While left-handed people would need to use WASD with the right hand, and this is quite hard... Left-handed people out there, try out the configuration I said above.--Vittau 06:19, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Strafing

The common difference between WASD and the Arrow keys, is that A and D normally strafe instead of turn. Is this really so? I took it out of the article, but it can be put back in. Many of the games that I've played use Arrow keys for strafing also. --pie4all88 02:05, 29 Sep 2004 (UTC)

It's true for the default settings of most modern FPS games, so should probably be added back in. Orange Goblin 17:54, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Please name some, because I personally always use the left and right keys for strafing. I would guess that most people today would use he mouse for turning, not a key. 66.75.49.213 23:34, 16 October 2005 (UTC)

The entirity of the Half-Life and Counter Strike series of games has (from memory) used the left and right arrow keys to turn, but all other movement was controled by the wasd keys by default. I also recal having played other games that used the same layout, however cannot remember their names at this time. Grab some demos of FPS games and you should be able to test this yourself

Game perspective

Should the perspective of games using WSAD really be mentioned? It's popular in several top-down view games as well, usually for moving the camera while moving the character(s) by clicking your LMB. --Ashmodai 23:21, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

Origin

(Earlier discussion, which has been disproved, has been moved to the archive.) Ham Pastrami 03:04, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

Snipes Used WASD for directional firing, and was writen in 1982. Polpo 16:55, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Terra Nova: Strike Force Centauri (1996) used WASD for movement. The early Blizzard games The Lost Vikings (1992) and Blackthorne (1994) used ESDF for action buttons -- interestingly, neither is an FPS. This claim needs and deserves research; not just people pulling for their favorite or first FPS. With no disrespect to Snipes mentioned above, you'll probably find that WASD predates FPS even if you limit candidates to notable titles. Ham Pastrami 06:02, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

System Shock in 1994 used ASDX. Ham Pastrami 14:34, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

The Wizardry article claims that the game was the first to use WASD, and since it goes as far back as 1981 this could very well be true. However, it doesn't specify exactly which title in the series was the first to do it, so we need some verification. Ham Pastrami (talk) 18:08, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

It was the first one ever released - Wizardry 1:Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord on the Apple 2 - you can try it out with an Apple 2 emulator by downloading the dsk images here - http://www.apple2.org.za/mirrors/ftp.apple.asimov.net/images/games/rpg/wizardry_I/ —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nevster (talk • contribs) 05:00, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Also, couple that with the fact that John Carmack was an Apple 2 programmer and D&D player - he's sure to have played Wizardry when he was growing up. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nevster (talk • contribs) 05:10, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

WSAD and WASD

The page should be under 'WSAD' not 'WASD' which is how most gamers refer to it L1nX 15;18, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

Most? I highly doubt it. You can't even say "wsad" because it sounds awkward.  Grue  16:25, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

I'm saying "WSAD" because in Polish it is simpler and shorter to say than "WASD". Also in Polish Wiki this article is under WSAD title. I think it is a matter of language, not "most gamers" opinion. Hołek ҉ 17:10, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

If anything, WSAD should forward to WASD. I use "WSAD" myself but most people I know use "WASD". (Personally, I play using EDSF.) --- Trevie 17:39, 8 December 2005 (UTC)

Are you sure you're not thinking of WSAD - the IBM Java development tool? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nevster (talk • contribs) 05:08, 9 May 2008 (UTC)

Well, I have heard of these 4 keys as "ASWD" keys ... in czech language (and maybe some others) it is easier pronouncable than WASD or WSAD. Personally I use YGHJ, as I have roughly equal number of usable keys available on both sides of hand. --Bilboq 20:52, 3 August 2006 (UTC)

If this was pl.wikipedia, then WSAD would be correct. If this was cz.wikipedia, ASWD would be correct. However this is en.wikipedia, and common usage in english speaking countries is WASD; the interlanguage links point at the right places, but this is correct as it stands. --Firien § 14:10, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

In the US, I have heard people use ASWD derogatorily -- it is pronounced "ass wad". Ham Pastrami 10:34, 7 November 2007 (UTC) Plus , I like the sound of wasd more than wsad. the most gamers that guy was talking about are usually the extremely immature and small crowd of people who talk in leet speak. the same people spell "the" as teh, and other purposeful typos and speak in bad grammar like "all your base are belong to us" instead of " All of your bases now belong to us" or some other grammatically proper phras —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.201.151.133 (talk) 22:04, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

User box

Here is a silly template I made. Feel free to add it to your own user page, or copy the source and edit it to make a box reflecting your own control preference. Ham Pastrami (talk) 10:16, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Template: User ESDF —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ham Pastrami (talk • contribs) 10:18, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

E 
SDFThis user prefers ESDF over WASD.

Article scope

I think the article's scope is poorly defined. Is any combination of 4 keys considered to be WASD-like? What are we actually trying to address with this article? Perhaps we should consider renaming this to Movement keys. Ham Pastrami (talk) 06:06, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Mouse as forwards

We have neglected to address the small minority of game players who use the right mouse button to move forwards. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.236.202.220 (talk) 22:31, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

Sources

• http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,1817462,00.asp
• http://davidryanhunt.com/2008/03/13/controls-wasd-deserves-to-die/ (blog of a game designer[1])
• http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2007/09/saitek-the-late.html

Possible sources for the article. Ham Pastrami (talk) 03:02, 9 August 2008 (UTC)