Gamepad object = broken and can't be used at all?

Hello,

I've been having immense problems with the gamepad object ever since I started using it.

Here are the issues I've discovered:

• Different browsers will detect gamepad devices completely differently, and in extremely buggy ways. Sometimes Chrome will detect every single USB device that is plugged in, while Firefox will detect the gamepads as intended.
• Different browsers have different device names for the same devices.
• Sometimes browsers won't detect anything at all, and sometimes they will load a bunch of empty "gamepads" which have no gamepadID at all.
• The Gamepad object has no reliable way of targeting gamepads by unique identifiers.
• Gamepads of the same model will have the exact same gamepadID, which makes it harder to target gamepads uniquely - especially if gamepads are removed and then plugged back in again (which changes the device order).

Has anyone else had trouble doing anything useful with the gamepad object?

I haven't had any problems with gamepads on my 4 player game except when a wireless gamepad turns off or is out of battery. Then you can't reconnect it in any way and have to restart the game for it to be found again. I've searched and asked on the forum but no solution

It is quite a gamebreaker because if you're idle and don't use the controllers for some time they usually turns off to save battery and then you have to restart everything. And this is a real hazzle when it's a multiplayer game without a save function.

All those problems seem to relate to using multiple gamepads. My game only uses one and I've never had problems.

You might want to talk to Aurel, I know he's working on a 4-player version of Penelope.

sqiddster Yeah, I guess. But wired controllers works just fine. Worst case scenario I'll put a varning in the game and tell them not to put their controller down If their controller dies they get game over. So then it's a game mechanic

Yes, sadly dealing with 4 gamepads is always tricky (on any engine).

I have no problem here on Penelope, but:

1 - users are forced to press a button before being able to play the game (to make sure gamepads are correctly detected)

2 - game rounds are super short, then back to the 4 players select screen > users are forced to press a button again to play > super short rounds, etc...

3 - the game can be played with 4 players on the same keyboard, in case of gamepads problems.

This way, I made sure to not deal with gamepad IDs that much. I avoided all the "player 3 will keep his particular color for many rounds" stuff etc...

Call it lazyness, but 4 gamepads are always a pain in th. do deal with, I picked the easy way on this matter : )

Aurel Thank you for the info. Sounds like we have the exact same setup except you can't play on the keyboard if something goes wrong in my game. Only one player kan use the keyboard. It would be so nice if you just could reconnect a gamepad if it disconnect.