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USB Trouble
While they are easy to install, configure, and calibrate, USB HOTAS devices are facing a serious problem in relation to the flight simulation software they are designed to work with. Most sims only recognize one controller, and all of the axis' of movement must come from that controller, or the game will not recognize the commands. We bet that all of you are now beginning to see the problem. How will a game such as Falcon 4.0, that only recognizes one controller, work with a setup such as a USB FighterStick/Pro Pedals/Pro Throttle if each of these devices is plugged into a separate USB port and recognized as a separate device? The answer: As it currently stands, Falcon 4.0 won't work with this set-up, as it will only recognize one of the devices.
The Saitek USB X36 works great in games such as Falcon 4.0 because both controllers are plugged into the USB port on one connection, and the Windows game controller panel will see just the single device. However, if you want to use your rudder pedals instead of the rudder toggle on the X35 throttle, you are out of luck as any pedals must be plugged into another port separately, and again, most games will not recognize this second device..
There are a few flight sims that currently recognize multiple controllers through DirectX. The Flight Simulator line, MiG Alley, and Aces High all allow the user to select specific devices seen in the Windows game controller panel and assign them to specific axis' of movement. We decided to configure Aces High using the X36 USB combo and USB CH Pro Pedals as a test. Even though the stick/throttle combination and pedals are plugged into separate ports, and are recognized as separate devices in the control panel, Aces High's in-game joystick configuration menu will see both of these devices, allowing the user to configure them accordingly. We have every button and axis on this setup mapped to a function in Aces High, including the toe brakes on the Pro Pedals, and we have to say that this functionality is a HOTAS programmers dream come true. Our question is, why the hell doesn't every game have this capability, especially when nearly every new HOTAS device coming out is going to be a separate USB device? Well, fortunately there is a light at the end of this tunnel.
There are two possible solutions to this problem, the first more radical than the second. A couple of companies, one of which is CH Products, are currently working on "combo" drivers that will add multi-device compatibility to the Windows game controller panel. In other words, this new driver will pull the wool over Windows and the registry's eyes and fool them into thinking that all the inputs coming from the separate USB devices are coming from a single device. If this driver works as planned, multiple USB flight control set-ups will be useable with games that only recognize a single controller.
The second solution is for simulation developers to code their games so that they write to DirectX correctly. As we've been told by several of the HOTAS manufacturers, the amount of time it takes to code a game so that it takes advantage of DirectX and allows Windows to recognize multiple controllers is negligible. If the "combo" driver doesn't happen, or only works with certain equipment, this is going to be a requirement or else full functionality of the new USB devices on the way will be jeopardized with future simulation titles. If simulations such as Aces High and Flight Simulator 2000 have this capability, we don't think that asking future sims to have it is out of line. We want to be clear here: the possibility of future problems isn't the game or hardware developers' fault. We just hope that one of the two groups finds a solution. The best thing that could happen would be for combo drivers to be released that allowed a sort of backwards compatibility between new USB sticks and older titles, as well as future titles being coded so that they correctly write to DirectX.
The Chinese have a proverb: May you live in interesting times. This certainly applies to the current and future state of HOTAS controllers, and time will tell if our future simulations will support the new lines of USB sticks.
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