GetAxisRaw with analog stick VS keyboard for diagonal input combination

[Stranger-Games]

Hi,

I noticed that when I use UnityEngine.Input.GetAxisRaw for horizontal and vertical axes I get different output depending on analog stick or keyboard, when pressing diagonal input buttons like up-right, down-right and so on

When I use the keyboard I get horizontal of 1 and vertical of 1
When I use analog I get horizontal of 0.5 and vertical of 0.5
When I press up for keyboard I get 1 and also get 1 for up in the analog
So now I have two different speeds when I press a diagonal button for the character. How can I solve that?

Any help is greatly apprecaited!

[guavaman]

The value your joystick returns at a corner direction is dependent on the joystick hardware. Most analog joysticks will return 0.7, -0.7 in the up-right diagonal direction. However, this is only the case if the joystick is physically constrained to a circular area. Some old gamepads have square movement areas for the sticks and will return 1.0, -1.0 in the up-right diagonal direction. The keyboard will return 1.0, 1.0 for up-right.

Just process the input vector and constrain it to a circular area like this:

Vector2 moveDirection = new Vector2(Input.GetAxis("Horizontal"), Input.GetAxis("Vertical"));
if(moveDirection.sqrMagnitude > 1.0f) moveDirection.Normalize();

If the magnitude of the vector ever exceeds 1.0, which it would at 1.0, -1.0 or any of the corner directions, it will be normalized. The end result is a circular radius. If keyboard diagonal is pressed, it will return 0.7, 0.7 just like most analog joysticks (with the Y axis flipped of course).

If your joystick is returning 0.5, -0.5 at up-right, that will give you a smaller magnitude and a slower speed than a joystick that returns the proper 0.7, -0.7 vector for a corner. The only way you could handle that is to calibrate the joystick which isn’t directly possible in Unity’s input system. You would need to make a wrapper which would involve a lot of steps. Calibrating the joystick would also involve user interaction and creating a GUI for that.

Out of curiosity, what joystick are you using?

[Stranger-Games]

@guavaman

The value your joystick returns at a corner direction is dependent on the joystick hardware. Most analog joysticks will return 0.7, -0.7 in the up-right diagonal direction. However, this is only the case if the joystick is physically constrained to a circular area. Some old gamepads have square movement areas for the sticks and will return 1.0, -1.0 in the up-right diagonal direction. The keyboard will return 1.0, 1.0 for up-right.

Just process the input vector and constrain it to a circular area like this:

Vector2 moveDirection = new Vector2(Input.GetAxis("Horizontal"), Input.GetAxis("Vertical"));
if(moveDirection.sqrMagnitude > 1.0f) moveDirection.Normalize();

If the magnitude of the vector ever exceeds 1.0, which it would at 1.0, -1.0 or any of the corner directions, it will be normalized. The end result is a circular radius. If keyboard diagonal is pressed, it will return 0.7, 0.7 just like most analog joysticks (with the Y axis flipped of course).

If your joystick is returning 0.5, -0.5 at up-right, that will give you a smaller magnitude and a slower speed than a joystick that returns the proper 0.7, -0.7 vector for a corner. The only way you could handle that is to calibrate the joystick which isn’t directly possible in Unity’s input system. You would need to make a wrapper which would involve a lot of steps. Calibrating the joystick would also involve user interaction and creating a GUI for that.

Out of curiosity, what joystick are you using?

Thank you very much for your detailed response.

I am using xbox 360. Actually it seems to return about 0.7, 0.7, but I am not sure what was the number exactly. I just wanted to say that it is not 1,1.
I actually solved the problem by multiplying the value by 2 then clamping between -1,1 when using the analog stick.
Of course I lost half of sensitivity when pressing righ, left, up, down, but I noticed that other games have full speed half way, so I think most games use this cheap solution.
For the calibration, I think rewired might be able to do that trick, but may be it is an overkill solution.
https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/21676

[guavaman]

@Hoksha the Bald

Thank you very much for your detailed response.

I am using xbox 360. Actually it seems to return about 0.7, 0.7, but I am not sure what was the number exactly. I just wanted to say that it is not 1,1.
I actually solved the problem by multiplying the value by 2 then clamping between -1,1 when using the analog stick.
Of course I lost half of sensitivity when pressing righ, left, up, down, but I noticed that other games have full speed half way, so I think most games use this cheap solution.

The solution I posted isn’t particularly expensive and lets you have the full range of movement on the joystick.

@Hoksha the Bald

For the calibration, I think rewired might be able to do that trick, but may be it is an overkill solution.
https://www.assetstore.unity3d.com/en/#!/content/21676

Well, since this is an Xbox 360 controller and it returns 0.7 at the corner, there’s no need for calibration. As for Rewired, looks very nice! … Oh, I guess I should mention that I’m the author. (See my signature?)