Is the Pandora's ABXY layout confusing?

[WizardStan]

This keeps getting thrown around as a flaw in the Pandora's design, that having an A key on the keyboard and an A button on the game controls is distinctly confusing, and a reason why it needs to be changed for the Pyra.

I'm asking this question to try and sort out who this actually effects. To that end, "confusing" specifically means hitting the A key on the keyboard when you should have hit the A button, or vice versa. If you hit the Q key when it told you to hit the B button you have bigger problems then this poll aims to solve.

I separated out "only" emulators into it's own answer because if you're making mistakes there it may not matter what labels are on the buttons. Or maybe it would, it would require more investigation, but the point is that it is different to be confused in an emulator than it is to be confused in a native game.

When I say "messed up", I don't mean handing the Pandora to your mother without explanation and just asking for her to hit the A button, that's not a fair use case and there's no knowledge to be gained in that; I mean someone with intentions to use the Pandora picking it up and knowingly going through the motions of doing whatever it is that they're setting out to do and hitting the wrong key/button on a fairly consistent basis.

edit: and just to clarify, "messed up" is not meant to be taken in any sort of personally negative light, it's just the phrase my brain latched onto to mean "made an arbitrary but not necessarily fatal mistake that I wouldn't have made if things had been different". If you want to suggest something friendlier that still gets the same message across please do.

edit: changed "frequently" to "periodically" to more accurately represent that, while it is still causing problems it doesn't necessarily happen all the time.

 

[sebt3]

Because "Press the A button" just sound like "press the A key"...

 

[_wb_]

I'm missing a poll option:

- Yes, it is causing me to avoid assigning functions to the A,B,X,Y keyboard keys in the software I write for the Pandora

 

[sebt3]

I'm missing a poll option:

- Yes, it is causing me to avoid assigning functions to the A,B,X,Y keyboard keys in the software I write for the Pandora

Why for ? In the end this pool could save you the trouble : if most dont get confused, then why bother ?

 

[_wb_]

I'm missing a poll option:


- Yes, it is causing me to avoid assigning functions to the A,B,X,Y keyboard keys in the software I write for the Pandora

Why for ? In the end this pool could save you the trouble : if most dont get confused, then why bother ?

I don't think this poll really helps for that. If people don't get confused, it could be because devs are taking care to use guihints and to avoid assigning functions to the A,B,X,Y keyboard keys.

Also, the answers to this poll are phrased in a rather biased way that makes people who want to answer "Yes" look like they're stupid and constantly make a mess of things.

I think it is potentially confusing. That does not mean I get messed up all the time. Just like it is confusing that  I | ¦ l  can look similar depending on the font. Context can usually disambiguate such problems, but not always. It's a not a huge problem in daily life, but I still would not recommend people to make a website with the url www.IllWII.com and advertize that url using printed leaflets. I wouldn't let people solve CAPTCHAs where the text they have to enter is "iIl|¦!iI:l" either.

We avoid the confusion by not doing things where context cannot disambiguate. By doing that, most people don't get confused. But it is still a constraint that has to be taken into account.

 

[WizardStan]

Yes, it is causing me to avoid assigning functions to the A,B,X,Y keyboard keys in the software I write for the Pandora

No, that has nothing to do with the question.The question is if the USER is getting confused. If you are avoiding things because you have gotten confused in the past, choose option 2 or 3. If you are avoiding things because you see the potential for confusion but have never gotten confused yourself choose option 5.

What sebt3 said, this is to find out if people really are getting confused and if not then you're going through this effort for nothing.

I think it is potentially confusing. That does not mean I get messed up all the time.

Pick answer 5. That is exactly what it says: you see the potential for confusion but don't get messed up by it yourself.

 

[Hồng Thất Công]

I have no confusion whatsoever until this poll.  Now I'm confused

Edit:  Joking aside, I always go to the gaming buttons first, if they don't work, I go to the keyboard.  There are only two choices people!  It's either the ABXY on the gaming pad or ABXY on the keyboard.  Try them both out see if what works for each game.  This is no rocket science.  I really don't care what Pyra gaming buttons will be labeled, but I think it would be fun to have other different sets of characters than English letters so I chose Greek in the other Action Button poll.  But really I don't give a damn what they will be

 

[Natsu]

I don't have the Pandora, but I don't get confuse between my gamepad and keyboard.

 

[_jr_]

But you don't have to remember to hit the A action button when your word processing app's help file tells you to do Ctrl-Home. And your gamepad is probably not using the same letters as everybody else in a different layout.

 

[Tenka]

It's my own fault for being the way that I am, but the Pandora's ABXY layout even today confuses me, and I even today forget which button is where.  I suppose that when I'm trying to remember the layout my first thought is not "What was it again?" but is instead "What should it be?"  This is probably ridiculous, but that is how I experience it.  "A and B should be right next to each other, right?"  "Okay X means horizontal axes, Y means vertical.  Wait, no?"

I had to open my Pandora a moment ago to assure myself I remembered the order of the buttons, and I was wrong.

 

[WizardStan]

That's a different type of confusion. I'm specifically trying to address the "there are two buttons labeled 'A'" confusion.

 

[Hồng Thất Công]

Confusion in a confusion?  Now I'm double confused

 

[hipnotoad]

Only confusion for me was the positioning of the cross crossed gaming buttons I.e. x and y vertical, a and b horizontal. Not once 2as I ever confused by which button to press between the gamepad/keyboard.

 

[Kiga]

Confusion isn't a big deal because people can adapt, just as they can adapt to Greek letters, and most people once adapt will never say that it confuse them.

But we trying to chose a labelling which needs less adaptation (starting from 0) and is more logic.

And you anti-no-Latin-letters people act as confusion is the only argument there is with trying to change the labelling while for me the fundamental argument is that this labelling is a sensless flaw design.

 

[WizardStan]

Confusion isn't a big deal because people can adapt

Yes they can, I specifically added a response for that.

act as confusion is the only argument there is with trying to change the labelling

Stop. I am addressing ONE argument that has been passed around. We've already got four other threads devolving into the same arguments over and over. This poll is taking one argument and seeing where it leads. If you want we can then tackle each of your issues one at a time in turn, but for now if you want to argue about them take them back to the other threads.

 

[Kiga]

I talked about this argument, saying that latin supporters always derides no-latin proposals, saying that there isn't any confusion, while it's not the main argument to me, since people can adapt easily for a minor problem like labelling.

 

[WizardStan]

I talked about this argument

Good, then you should see that we're on the same side in this. Stop trying to sabotage something that you agree with.

 

[Kiga]

Are you trolling? So if someone talk on this topic without being agree with you, that's a sabotage? In this case I think this topic should be closed and I should think about truly trying to sabotage it. :lol:

 

[milkshake]

Omg Kiga do you ever stop?

 

[Kiga]

I am assailed by a bunch of Troll, well I will try to not feed them.

 


What I had to say:



Confusion isn't a big deal because people can adapt, just as they can adapt to Greek letters, and most people once adapt will never say that it confuse them.

But we trying to chose a labelling which needs less adaptation (starting from 0) and is more logic.

And you anti-no-Latin-letters people act as confusion is the only argument there is with trying to change the labelling while for me the fundamental argument is that this labelling is a sensless flaw design.