Help with my research on Inverted/Normal Control Scheme

Hello Giantbomb community,

I'm a long time reader, but rarely post, so please accept my apologies from coming to the board for basically the first time in a long time immediately asking for help :P

That said, I would love the help of the community, if any of you have time.

Background: I am a graduate student at a University in Canada who has decided (read. somehow managed to convince my supervisor) to pursue a thesis looking into the effects on performance that forcing people to use a normal or inverted control schemes for first person games/simluations has regardless of preference,.

As you all are probably quite aware, there are countless arguments online as to which is best or which is the correct scheme. While these opinions and arguments are often fun, they will not be the basis for a lot of my thesis (sadly). I've also found very little in the academic literature actually testing it (save an article or two)

What I am currently working on is developing a way to determine a novice's preference for y-axis inversion in a way that doesn't require exposing them to both schemes.

In the same way that a novice snowboarder's forward facing leg can be determined with a push from behind, I'd like to determine a way to best way to figure out if people prefer inverted or normal quickly and accurately (controlling for previous experience, where possible.)

I've become interested in the way that games like Halo have become well known for their in-game checks for preference disguised as calibration of a suit or something (Giantbomb Wiki Concept: Tutorials Disguised as Diagnostics).

What I'd like to know relates specifically to how the games handle those particular sequences.

In Halo, you are asked to walk over to "optical diagnostic station" (lol), and then look at a cross of lights. Then, as far as I can tell from video I've watched, they force you go to inverted, and look at the lights again, then decide if you want inverted or not.

In Halo 2, however, while the same basic thing happens there is a difference I want to explore. In the video I've found of the first level, when you wake up, you are asked to look up and then look down, (then up, then down...) then, it branches. In the video it shows the npc saying its looks ok, and you move on- no option to change to inverted is forced or suggested. BUT from what I have gathered from a level transcript, there is a situation where he says, "Tracking looks sketchy, I'm gonna run you through the full diagnostic," which seems to followed by a forced switch and then option to change back or not, similar to Halo.

My question, that I'm hoping someone can research for me, is what triggers that? Is it a timing thing, if you take to long, they assume you're having difficulty? Is it an error thing, if you look at the wrong target they figure you want inverted? I'd really like to know. And I'd prefer learning what it is on the original version of the game... on an Xbox.

Moreoever, I can't seem to find out if Halo 3 does the same thing? They have a sequence at the start, looking up and down, but in all the videos I've watched, they aren't offered a change, and I can't find a transcript mentioning it.

I've discovered that Halo: ODST straight up asks you if you want to be trained or not, and Halo: Reach hides it by looking at some waypoints while the ship is landing, and then asking if it feels ok. These seem to be less creative, to me, and I'm more insterested in the first ones. Halo 4 really seems to hide it by making you only look up to see the lever to open the stasis pod... again, not sure what happens if you take to long or get it wrong. Halo 5 seems to finally skip going through the charade all together...?

In addition, I am also interested if for the games Halo 3 and onwards, if/how the game takes into account the pre-loaded settings that you can set in the Xbox 360 OS- game preferences like y-axis invert, and in-car/outside car for racing games. Presumably, if you have it set to preferred inverted, it will start you with that scheme... but does that effect the sequence otherwise?

If anyone has any incite into this, or have some examples from other games, I would super appreciate your help/thoughts.

Thanks, in advance, team!

I don't have any specific help for you, but I have my own story. I've been gaming since the early 80s, and for 20+ years, I played everything (well, the limited number of first person perspective games there were) inverted. Then, maybe ten or twelve years ago, it stopped being intuitive and I started playing everything not-inverted. It was a pretty sudden change and I have no idea why it happened.

@sinusoidal: That is a quite strange... was it the same across mouse FPS, and controller FPS?

This question:

Do you want the top of the analog stick to represent the top of your head while the controller is held flat, or the direction of your eyes while the controller is held upright?

That's not in-game, of course, but it's what the reality of the representation of an analog stick actually comes down to.

@mustard said:

Yep. Both mouse and analog stick. I first noticed that I suddenly preferred not-inverted on stick though. It was Halo 1, I think. I'd spent a bunch of time playing Quake 1, 2 and 3 inverted with a mouse, but if I go back to those games now, I play not-inverted.

Growing up in the 90's you never had option in many cases it was inverted or don't play so inverted stuck. Odd thing was being a lefty use to play with the sticks swapped not every game gave you the option so I learned both eventually sticking to normal but I could never unlearn inverted.

I think inversion preference is learned. Depending on what you played first, you will get used to. That said, you can also relearn into the other method, for example I'm normal camera all the way usually, but I play some old games like Ratchet and Clank inverted because that's how I did it back then and my muscles/brain still make that connection. So a heavy gamer like me got used to both depending on which one felt more natural at the time, but I think most people get used to the camera of a favorite game and then stick to it as long as they can.

@mustard: I can't remember the specifics but Colin Moriarty over at Kinda Funny has an interesting take on inverted controls if I remember correctly. I believe it is the difference between you being the character or you controlling a camera monitoring the character.

I'm unsure of the exact video but a Google search returned this one:

@spaceinsomniac:Yes, this is the common way people describe it, however, the analogy breaks down slightly when you consider that while the right-left control follows the same principle for the eye movement, it does not for the neck... if it were the same for the neck, as the controller is held flat push right and left, the movement should cause a "roll" of the camera.

To be clear, I'd like to create a simple physical test for y-axis preference. Which is why the Halo stuff is interesting to me.

@tobbrobb: There seems to be a lot of people that believe y-axis controller preference is learned, but i'm not entirely convinced this is true yet. Things change dramatically when you are playing a third person game vs. first person. There are additional levels of abstraction taking place, and the camera is no longer being represented as part of the character, like it is in an FPS game. This is why many third person games offer an X-axis inversion option.

@ohagan: Yup, lots of the common arguments being made there. Good stuff. I laughed pretty hard at the "Inversion Conversion Therapy camp"... saw it coming but still couldn't help but laugh really hard.

I should probably note that I have no intention of determining which one is better or worse, I have taken a stance that this is very similar to snowboard riding or surfing with right or left foot forward... people have a preference, simple as that. They may even be able to use the other setting to some very high degree of success, which is great. I want to know if there IS a performance difference, and if that difference is more pronounced in those who are naturally "normal" vs naturally "inverted" when you force them to switch. But before I can do that, I'd like to know if I can determine people's natural inclination towards one or the other, even if they think they prefer one or the other. I think it's important because I have come across other FPS controlled devices in fields like medicine and construction that force a control style. Which could be remarkably detrimental if a choice was not given.

Either way.

Can anyone get me in touch with any of the developers of Halo 1 or 2... specifically the first level tutorial section! :P
Or, can someone test out the sequence for me? Trying to figure out what triggers the suggestions to change?

I always played games in inverted UNTIL... not all games supported that way of playing so i had to conform.

Here's something I wrote several years ago about inverted controls.

@mustard: Well I see how you read that as specifically inverted being learned, but I meant that you develop either preference based on the first game you spend significant time in. Like you base the rest of your muscle memory on the one type you learn first whether its inverted or normal. I also think the perspective shift between third and first person is enough of a disconnect for the brain to develop two separate preferences.

@sgtsphynx:Thats really interesting, Sphynx. I like the idea of "banking," to bridge the gap of abstraction.

@tobbrobb: Indeed, multiple preferences for two different scenarios makes sense. I also wasn't trying to imply that inverted was learned rather than normal. I think we, in fact, disagree. I am trying to say/argue/determine that people have a natural preference (inverted or non, not unlike handedness or dominant snowboarding foot), which they may be able to overcome (to whatever extent). This is opposed to tabula rasa idea that we are all blank slates before we see or touch a controller/mouse and an FPS game, and whatever version we are exposed to the most early on is the one we end up preferring. A snowboarder who has been riding "normal stance" their entire life, when exposed to a properly executed "push test" (ie. not expected) will still put out their preferred leg which may or may not be the same leg they thought it was.

But this is exactly why I am intersted in trying to develop a physical test to determine it for fps camera controls ;)