Overwatch director speaks out against console mouse/keyboard adapters

Kyle Orland

Game so hard that glowing cracks form in your keyboard and mouse.

Regardless of where you fall in the long-running debate between keyboard/mouse and analog stick controls, you could historically be relatively sure that everyone on a single platform would be playing with the same control scheme. Recently, though, third-party adapters have started allowing console players to use a mouse and keyboard effectively on dedicated consoles, throwing off the competitive balance in a way that Overwatch director Jeff Kaplan doesn't appreciate.

"The Overwatch team objects to the use of mouse and keyboard on console," Kaplan wrote on the Battle.net forums. "We have contacted both first-party console manufacturers and expressed our concern about the use of mouse and keyboard and input conversion devices.

"We have lobbied and will continue to lobby for first-party console manufacturers to either disallow mouse and keyboard and input conversion devices or openly and easily support mouse and keyboard for all players," he continued. "I encourage you to reach out to the hardware manufacturers and express your concerns (but please do so in a productive and respectful way)."

Kaplan is talking about products like the XIM4, a $125 hub that lets certain USB keyboards and mice work natively with some Xbox One and PS4 games (as well as PS3 and Xbox 360 titles). IoGear's $100 Keymander does much the same thing, claiming to be "compatible with all console games."

These devices essentially emulate a standard controller through a combination of hardware and software settings, disguising the keyboard and mouse inputs in a way that makes them hard for a developer to detect. This is a problem in competitive online games like Overwatch, where the quickness and precision of mouse aiming can give a decisive advantage over players using a slower and clunkier analog stick. "Quick reflex-focused playstyles that are virtually impossible to do on a controller were at my command," one Gizmodo reviewer said of the XIM4. "And even though I was terrible at those playstyles, I was still better than the other guy. Which is all that matters."

It's not hard to find Overwatch players complaining about what some see as "blatant cheating" on the console versions of the game by using a keyboard and mouse. Kaplan's message board statement shows that the developer is sympathetic to that position.

Allowing different control options isn't such a big concern for all shooter developers, though. Late last month, the Gears of War 4 developers at The Coalition opened up cross-platform play between PC-based mouse-and-keyboard players play directly against console-based analog stick users. That decision came after a trial run in December in which "Windows 10 and Xbox players had closely matched results when comparing Average KD, Score, and Kills per match based on skill ratings," according to the developers.

As Kaplan writes, opening a mouse and keyboard control option to all console players, and not just those who invest in costly third-party solutions, could help balance things out a bit. Microsoft said back in June that official support for mouse-and-keyboard controls was "months away" from coming to the Xbox One, but no additional details have been made available since.

The PS4 technically supports USB and Bluetooth mice and keyboards in games, but developers have to explicitly code native support for the alternative controls into their titles. So far, only a handful of MMOs ported from the PC do so. The PS4 also hosts the TAC Pro, an officially licensed mouse and keyboard device peripheral maker Hori that is "designed to work seamlessly with the PS4 system and all games and "designed specifically for FPS games," according to its product page.