For Console Developers who port to PC: Use the MOUSE!

[raydude]

This point was hit home to me when I was playing the NFSU2 demo for PC. The game interface menu came up and so did an in-game mouse pointer.

I think to myself: Cool! I'll just click on this icon that looks like a flag. Wait, it's not working. Click! Click! Click! Why is it not accepting the icon?

Then I see the left and right side arrows and see that only the center icon is highlighted. Then I click on the left and right arrows and see how the icons scroll by and only the center gets highlighted.

I click on the highlighted icon and get to that menu. Oh, how ghetto!

Console to PC porters: The mouse is there for a reason! It's not a glorified gamepad! Its to give us PC users a more freeform and intuitive way of selecting from a GUI!

[Windows95]

Agreed. Nothing stinks more in a console port then when you cant use the freakin mouse in the main menu. At the same time mouse control can go bad. Take the game True Crime. I thought that much like with GTA, mouse control would be an improvement. Somehow they manage to make mouse control twice as difficult as using a gamepad imho.

So yes, give us a mouse in the menu, but if you're adding it into the game take the time to do it right or skip it.

[obb]

I think that might have been True Crime's fault rather than the mouse implementation issues. That game managaed to suck pretty bad, much like a black hole, and warp perception of everything around it.

I like the recent GTA PC ports with their migration of the mouse without forcing you to play that way

[hitbyambulance]

what's really funnysad are console ports that didn't bother to include an 'Exit Game' in the menu... you have to hit Alt-F4 or something like that to actually quit the game.

[raydude]

Well, I guess if one can get over the consoleness of some ports there are bargains to be had. For example, NFSU2 on the PC is $10 less than the console versions 8)