Simultaneously turning and firing is not always possible.

[Sparclen]

There seems to be a problem when trying to combine the arrow keys with the main fire button (control and space).
In the following situations the ship will not respond to keyboard input:

Hold up arrow, hold left arrow, then press fire.
The ship will just keep turning to the left without firing.

Hold fire, hold up arrow, then hold left arrow.
The ship will just keep firing the weapon without turning left.

My first guess would have been that the game was simply not designed to be able to accept all that input at the same time, but there are no problems at all when you use the right arrow instead of the left.

I have reproduced this on v1.01 and v1.05, both vanilla.
I have reproduced this with all three starting ships.
I have reproduced this on 2 different machines, one running under Windows 7, one running under Windows XP.

This is a major annoyance to me during dogfights, and it breaks the game for me.
I would like to hear from you guys if you're coping with the same problem.

Thanks in Advance!

EDIT:
I have done some further testing and these are the strange results:

The stated errors are only as described while using the arrow keys to move. When using the numpad to move the ship, no problems occur.
However, when I use the J, K and L keys to move, the problems is inverted. This time the combinations won't work when turning right instead of left.

[Curudan]

This works perfectly fine for me. The ship turns left, thrusts forward, and fires its weapon.

This is almost certainly a problem with your keyboard. Because of the way they are wired, not all possible 3-key combinations are detected in many keyboards.

[Sparclen]

This works perfectly fine for me. The ship turns left, thrusts forward, and fires its weapon.

This is almost certainly a problem with your keyboard. Because of the way they are wired, not all possible 3-key combinations are detected in many keyboards.

I have edited my original message. I highly doubt it is an issue with my keyboard, since I have used two totally different keyboards on two totally different machines. One of them is a laptop and another a stock keyboard that came with a desktop.

Did you use the arrow keys to move, or the numpad or did you use your own keybindings?
As stated in my edit, you must use the arrow keys to reproduce the exact problem.

[Amariithynar]

replicated issue with three other keyboards on two computers. It is almost assuredly the inability of the keyboard to be able to register enough keystroke commands at the sametime when using Space. This is particularily galling with USB keyboards (More than likely what you're using).

Recommended remedy: have an Options menu off the initial game startup that lets you rebind all the keys (with a default button just in case, maybe a save settings button that copies your key selection to a new file that you can copy and paste to transfer settings?) so that the base key setup isn't the only one available. Would be nice to go back to using my FPS WASD to move. >_>

[sdw195]

i have had this happen to me on my desktop. (usb keyboard) yet it works fine on my notebook, so i would say its a keyboard issue. but i will let George have the final word on this

[Curudan]

I have edited my original message. I highly doubt it is an issue with my keyboard, since I have used two totally different keyboards on two totally different machines. One of them is a laptop and another a stock keyboard that came with a desktop.

Did you use the arrow keys to move, or the numpad or did you use your own keybindings?
As stated in my edit, you must use the arrow keys to reproduce the exact problem.

The exact keys I pressed: Up arrow key, Left arrow key, Spacebar. My spaceship begins to spin in a loopy circle, firing shots rapidly. I could make you a video if you want.

But, I've got an old battleship of a keyboard that's lasted through more than a decade of whatever I threw at it. I'm afraid that if this isn't working for you, it is the fault of both of your keyboards.

Recommended remedy: have an Options menu off the initial game startup that lets you rebind all the keys (with a default button just in case, maybe a save settings button that copies your key selection to a new file that you can copy and paste to transfer settings?) so that the base key setup isn't the only one available. Would be nice to go back to using my FPS WASD to move. >_>

In one of the beta versions, 1.02?, George added the ability to define custom keybindings. You have to manually edit 'setting.xml', but this should do exactly what you want it to.

I have done some further testing and these are the strange results:

The stated errors are only as described while using the arrow keys to move. When using the numpad to move the ship, no problems occur.
However, when I use the J, K and L keys to move, the problems is inverted. This time the combinations won't work when turning right instead of left.

This is only further proof that your keyboard is at fault, most keyboards have combinations that simply won't work, these just happen to be yours.

[Bobby]

Try changing the fire button to shift. On my keyboard with the same issue shift works fine in concert with the arrows.

[Sparclen]

Right now I am using a workaround by using the numpad to move, so it's 'fixed' for me. I guess other people having problems could just switch the keybindings to something that works for them.

Dissapointing that a lot of keyboards seem to have problems with this, how hard can proper wiring be.

[blizgerg]

Dissapointing that a lot of keyboards seem to have problems with this, how hard can proper wiring be.

It's not that it's hard to do, it's that it is expensive to do, and if the manufacturer can shave off $0.01 on the cost of wiring then they will make $10,000 extra profit if they will sell 1,000,000 units. Leaving out a few wires that only 0.0001% of customers will even notice and gain 10k in profit or not? The decision of what the company will do seems clear to me.

[digdug]

I fire with Z and use launcher with X
that fixed the problems I had while pressing Up+Left+spacebar or up+left+CRTL
However I'm on a laptop, and laptop keyboards are known to have silly wirings to make them as cheap as possible.

[Amariithynar]

There is also, as I said, a limitation for using a USB keyboard. USB slots can only take so many signals at a time. while you may think three button presses = three signals, it is more complicated than that.

[sdw195]

same issue here

[PKodon]

Hm. I've not run into this problem myself, however, in searching the internet for "gaming keyboards", I did notice several had in their descriptions that they were designed to enable the user to use more keys at the same time than normal keyboards (and these were USB keyboards, some wireless).

I'm not sure how they do this, being that I don't know a lot about USB signals (I do understand the multiplexed wiring issues and economics of manufacture/sales mentioned above), perhaps it's a combination of the keyboard's wiring, processor (yes, a keyboard has it's own little processor in it) and the driver they use (I had a gaming keyboard once, which had extra keys that required installing a driver and management software in order to access/program them).

At any rate, if you desire to use the key combinations that are giving problems, perhaps a gaming keyboard might be the solution.

PK