It annoys me that so many PC games feel like they're intended for consoles
I often starts playing a game, then quit because it simply doesn't feel like a PC game to me. Sometimes it is because it is a console port, but not always.
I just tried playing VAMBRACE, and got stuck when trying to open a door. There was an "open door" icon right at the door, but clicking it had no effect. Turns out I had to press the action button, which was the E on the keyboard. What's more, all the icons in the game works like this, having assigned a key you have to press. With me having a mouse which is designed especially to click on things on the screen, this makes little sense. It reminded me of the way early homemade DOS games let you use keyboard input, typically in this format:
<P>lay <M>anual <Q>uit
Obviously, VAMBRACE was designed to be played with an Xbox controller. But the end result is a control scheme which grew out of fashion thirty years ago.
I quite hate the Xbox controller. That wobbly thumbstick are just so so uncomfortable, with the forward direction forcing you to move your thumb forward and slightly left in the most awkward of movements. Despite most humans having 10 fingers, the majority of actions are performed by the right thumb which have to move between 4 different buttons. In the Xbox controllers defence, it had to have the wobbly thumbstick as a replacement from WASD + mouse first person shooter movement. But this doesn't change that I'm never going to like this silly gadget.
I can't say exactly what the difference is between PC games and console games. There are of course the controls, keyboard and mouse VS gamepad, but I also feel like there are also some differences in the basic feeling of the game. A lot of consolish games feel a bit like a tech demo with some light interaction throughout, sort of like a rollercoaster ride.
This was something I liked about NOITA. It is designed for PC from the ground up. The aiming requires a mouse cursor, and the wand tinkering would be pretty much impossible without a mouse.
Assuming that the game you mean is Vambrace: Cold Soul (the first search result I got) then I think you just need to change your expectations.
You say that this is a "PC Game" but it isn't. It is a multi-platform game. It is a multi-platform game that has full controller support that happens to run on a PC. If you are looking for games with keyboard and mouse as their primary design, you should be looking for games that are not designed to be multi-platform.
I don't think that's a fair assessment. If I go to a pizza shop that sells standard and vegan pizzas and I order a vegan pizza, then it's reasonable to be upset if I get a pizza with real and fake cheese. If I buy a game on Steam, I've bought a PC game, not multi-platform game. OP can't take their PC license and load it up on a console. They bought a specific license and expect the product to be designed for it. It isn't uncommon for a game to change elements of its UI to match the player's chosen input method either.
Further, the Steam page doesn't give any indication it is multi-platform, it suggests that it is a PC only game when it says "available on Steam and GOG" in the first video with no reference to consoles. From the media I saw, it seems pretty reasonable to expect to be able to interact with the game with a mouse.
I think the most equitable solution is for a store page to list its extent of mouse and keyboard support, much like Steam store pages do for controller support. If your game on a PC storefront is designed for controller first, it should say so on the box.
Changing the UI, yes. Changing the whole control scheme so that you can fully use a mouse on the PC version of a multiplatform game is kinda rare
Sounds like a mistaken order. But that's part of the issue. Look at it legally instead of as a customer:
-you put fake cheese on a non-vegan pizza and you get maybe a frustrated customer. They may not even notice though. Maximum harm is simply frustration.
That's how consoles work. You don't pass the relatively strict Technical Requirements Checklist and your game doesn't get published (ignoring the various AAA exceptions made by people with money). You can meanwhile put anything on steam that isn't malware or illegal and you at worst get review bombed (perhaps rightfully). And in all honestly most people will just play it just fine.
I don't think there's a good general solution because every genre is different. Simpler games game probably get away with no KB&M controls, and other genres like FPS have a very well understood scheme that most engines can) keep in mind when porting. Something like a Puzzle can feel anywhere from non-intrusive to absolutely clunky without the ability to click on elements.
And let's not even talk about mobile... There's a reason few games port from PC/console to mobile.
You're right, not the best metaphor on my part. Thank you for meaningfully engaging and highlighting its pitfalls.
Tangent:
Mistakenly putting the wrong ingredient to what was expected by the customer (real cheese on a vegan pizza) is serious due to allergies (to dairy).
SteamDeck shows this is no longer true. Well, yes, the license remains within a Steam compatible system, but the form factor may be more like a console than a PC.
They've started labelling games with how playable they are on the SteamDeck. Which could be useful as a PC-only vs Console/multi-platform indicator.
Agree. But a game not mentioning any level of controller support, to me at least, implies mouse & keyboard as primary input method.
Steam's playable ratings don't really take into account how comfortable a game feels to play on console, only that it's possible technically. It focuses more on text size and whether you see the right button prompts and if you need keyboard input ever. For some games, controller support is already amazing, but for others the UX with controller just isn't there for fundamental reasons -- you usually need to check out ProtonDB to get a sense for how comfortable the controller support is on Steam deck. I'm a big fan of colony sims and pretty much none of them control well on Steam Deck even though Steam's re-mapping abilities make it possible where it absolutely wouldn't originally. It's just less natural even with adjustments.
I've not played any recently released game but there were few games I remember using XBox buttons for in game activities for PC also. I remember two specifically Onimusha and Resident Evil 5 gameplay. Normal gameplay I didn't notice it much, but RE had timed events where you've to press specific button quickly which is a triangle, square, or circle.
Are you also talking about similar thing? u/Halfdan
It's definitely annoying when they don't both updating tooltips for the actual keybindings and just leave the default console tooltips.
But pressing E to interact pretty standard and in FPS/third person games it makes more sense than requiring a point and click when the mouse operated your camera
The original PC port of Resident Evil 4 was uniquely bad. The game had no mouse support, the assumption being that you had a gamepad. But the game lacked xinput support, so all the button prompts would just be 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. There was no way for the user to actually know what buttons to press during quick-time events.
I'm not interested in wasting my time moving the mouse cursor over a prompt and clicking it every time I use a door in a game. Much better to press a key. Requiring the mouse is a genuine usability issue as well. It could have been an extra way to interact, but it sure isn't my ideal way.
Yeah, same here. I prefer it when a game has a keyboard shortcut. That being said I game more on my console and much prefer controller in general. For one no having to move my hands at all, every button is laid out in an easy to reach way and much more intuitive < - I hate wasd for movement and will avoid that at all costs to the point I don't tend to play games that don't have controller support. Also... I don't get shooting games with mouse and keyboard. Sure, people point out it is easier to be accurate and quick... but honestly to me it seems too easy, like what's the point? It just becomes a click on the thing on the screen quickly game at that point.
I don't think the issue is having a keyboard shortcut for it, it's the combination of:
I can get behind that. Tiny changes can go a long way. Just put a little image of a keyboard key in front of the prompt popping up, and it the E-key. Done. Trivial to undersatand it now. Huge bonus points if you can alternatively click the popup, but eh, that's optional.
I think it depends on the the FPS. I don't play COD or anything like that and my experience has been that it feels more like a shooting gallery.
But games like Overwatch, Helldivers 2, Doom Eternal are so hectic that it's about pulling off the best shot while remaining mobile and positioning yourself strategically. Also if a game has a good sniper playstyle you're often trying to lead a small group of pixels to pull off a headshot from a considerable distance.
One that stands out to me is Mechwarrior Online. At first glance it would be great on a controller, but I couldn't play my preferred loadouts with a controller. I like dual gauss loadouts and coordinating your mechs movement, while shielding your critical components with torso positioning, while charging up gauss for a quick snap shot on a target's exposed left or right torso takes a lot of multitasking. In contrast I play with a friend who for physical reasons prefers being able to use a controller. He excels at small mobile mechs with machine gun/flamethrower (spray and pray) loadouts. It's also effective but when he's tried my loadouts it just doesn't work.
So I'll grant that with a KB+M the aiming is easier. But it means the game can make other demands. Anyone can make a good shot against a stationary target. But being good means pulling off those shots in a firefight and being able to identify the targets of most import.
Edit: one more thought. Bioshock Infinite actually stands out as a game where the shooting was "too easy." I loved the game and the combat was fun, but the gunplay definitely was middling with KB+M because enemies just stood at a distance away taking shots at you.
If it was too easy, auto aim on console based first person shooters wouldn't be ubiquitous.
It feels too easy to me (and I don't usually put on much auto aim to all unless the game really is designed around it <- GTA V being the game that comes to mind). or maybe it just doesn't feel right. Whatever reason pointing and clicking on the computer just makes it feel like a point and click game and it "clicks" more with me to use a controller (I feel more immersed and less like I'm just clicking on a screen). Granted I don't play too many FPS's... I prefer RPG and open world and not MP (but I don't mind shooting mechanics in my RPG. Which is different than rpg mechanics in an FPS <- borderlands is an FPS with heavy RPG elements, modern Fallout is an RPG with FPS elements and sadly lighter on the RPG than it should be).
I hate WASD as well (asymmetric, harder to reset position to home) so I always rebind those controls to the numpad. Usually enough neighboring keys to rebind other functions to be nearby the numpad as well. The only issue is that it makes me have to shift the keyboard over (or get a USB 10-key pad).
I don't see how your example is particularly "not PC". Are vim keybindings "not PC" as well? Mice didn't use to exist. It's just a choice - keybindings are easier to use, but require memorization. GUIs are good for things that you don't do frequently. For opening a door, I think a key is perfectly valid - that's something you do a lot. It's easier to press a key than move your mouse and click on something.
It's also weird to draw a dichotomy between "controller" and "pc" imo. A controller is just a valid an input method on PC. I play almost all the games I still play on PC with a controller.
Vim isn't a game, though, it's software made for productivity. It's also known to be unintuitive. In addition, unless I'm looking at the wrong game, Vambrace: Cold Soul is a turn-based RPG, not something you'd particularly benefit from the fastness of a keyboard-only control scheme in.
There's definitely a set of design principles that a game made for PC supposed to support keyboard/mouse controls should follow and this is not it
Why wouldn’t you benefit? When I edit text files, I am not editing the dark souls of txts either.
There’s no reason to entangle mouse first design and games designed for PC. The keyboard is just as much a first party input method on PCs.
Cave Story and other indie platformers were definitionally designed for PC, since they only came out on PC originally - yet you could not interact with their UI with a mouse. That’s just a design choice.
Roguelikes are turn-based RPGs by some measure and are traditionally built with somewhat Vi-like control schemes with distinct actions typically being bound to distinct keys on the keyboard. The original Rogue even had movement in the cardinal directions bound to H/J/K/L, something which has survived into much later and current entries in the genre, long after it was simply a limitation of the medium.
There is a game design problem when introducing the mouse to roguelikes. I think NetHack most of all established surprising interactivity as a staple of the genre in the sense that pretty much any action could apply to any object in some way. So when you click a dog, what do you do? Do you pet it? Eat it? Shove it? Kick it? Lick it? Sit on it? Displace it? Attack it with your sword? Zap it with a wand? Pray to it? Walk towards it? Pick it up? A context menu is not an ergonomic way to represent several tens of different actions that may or may not apply, and where discovering the effects of certain actions on certain objects is half the fun.
LucasFilm adventure games addressed this problem in a mouse-centric way by dedicating 1/4 of the screen to displaying a list of verbs that can be applied to objects in the world. Of course, this means that the set of possible verbs has to be relatively small, and you have to have a generalized catch-all interaction verb like "use" that represent a variety of actions of the game designer's choice. Sierra adventure games addressed the problem by using a text prompt where you could describe your interactions with nearby objects. That means that you'll be guessing verbs and nouns.
I've been playing Caves of Qud which retains a traditional roguelike means of controlling player actions but does a good job of adding a mouse interface on top of it. It has a context sensitive idea of the action you most likely want to perform, which can be done by clicking things, but still allows you apply any other verb using the keyboard. If you click a bad guy, you likely want to bump-fight it. If you click a good guy, you likely want to talk to them. If you click something while selecting a target, you probably want to select that which you clicked on as a target...and so on. This still works more like an added convenience on top of an interface that still essentially works like it did for NetHack, which is what players of the genre expect. You could still speak to the enemy or set the friendly villager on fire if that's what you prefer, but those actions aren't representable by the mouse interface.
Now, Vambrace certainly doesn't seem like it's a roguelike. It does however call itself a "roguelite" in the Steam description, so maybe it owes some of its design choices to Rogue and the likes.
The thing that bugs me is that all of the control schemes you mentioned sound like bad design when put into the context of modern games. Games have had context-sensitive action buttons for decades at this point, and it is a more-or-less universal feature these days. Most of those actions you described don’t make any sense unless you have a very specific context for them; I can’t even imagine why you would ever want to lick a dog. Even for games with complex interactions where you can’t just have a “press E to interact”, you can provide contextual menus that only provide relevant actions.
If I’m playing a game nothing is going to take me out of the mindset faster than needing to consult a manual over which of 100+ buttons you use to lick something.
If I were the game master and you were the player in a table top RPG session I could certainly come up with a believable effect to licking a dog, and maybe even a reasonable cause for doing so. You as a player wouldn't say "I use the dog" after which I as a game master decide what that means. You wouldn't ask "what can I do with the dog?" as though there's an exhaustive list I can reasonable recite before it's time to go home. You describe what you do, and as a game master I come up with a response to it; I am only limited by my vocabulary. I think games with the interface and complexity of NetHack are a step closer to that experience. An interface which limited me to one action or to a small set of actions of the game's choosing seems to me like a different thing altogether. I see it as a success in achieving exactly what it achieves, not a failure to achieve something else.
NetHack also has a way to enter commands without memorizing keys. You can enter extended command mode with
#, after which you can start typing the name of a command and auto complete suggestions start appearing. If I were to design a roguelike of that scope myself, with mouse use in mind, I would probably add a context-sensitive "default action" to a left click and open a fuzzy-filtered, scrollable window for any command upon a right click. That way, quick play is less dependent on rote memorization without sacrificing flexibility.For what it's worth, you can't actually lick things in NetHack as far as I know.
On a tangential note, I recommend checking out the game Fit For a King, which is kind of a pastiche on the user interface in early Ultima games. In reality, it's a puzzle game where each letter in the English alphabet is bound to some mostly inane and oddly specific action. It's a decent example of a game that really leans into this freedom of verb-noun combinations in a way that is essential to the experience the game conveys.
But video games are not tabletop RPGs. We have only just now gotten to the point where AI is advanced enough to react to the players’ interactions, and even then we do not really have the ability to have it deliver a designed experience that can get you back on track for the planned scenario. And even in these cases nobody is trying to do a keypress based interface, instead opting for text input, which doesn’t need any form of training to understand other than what you should have learned to grow up.
It's not relevant to my point that they are not. My point is that there is an aspect of freedom of interaction in tabletop RPGs which I enjoy that you can get somewhat closer to in video games by decoupling verbs and nouns and offering not just a lot of nouns, but a lot of verbs. Video games don't have to be tabletop RPGs to implement that or for that to be more than "bad design". I consider it one of the defining and positive aspects of the genre.
Just as, say, a first person shooter doesn't have to be real life to have make use of a realistic design in some basic, limited sense.
The rest of your reply seems to be about AI text input games. I am not arguing for or against AI text input games as an alternative to the long-but-fixed-list-of-generally-applicable verbs kind of design.
I've used Vim for years, than used Emacs with Vim keybinds. I appreciated a keyboard driven interface. However, outside certain environments, the majority of the regular non-techie people would absolutely consider Vim as "not PC". Unless they're talking about PCs from the 1970s.
Plus you could always argue that if the keyboard shortcuts were kept as-is, there's no downside to also adding an optional mouse interface. Of course, there's also no point as no VIM user would use a mouse and it incurs maintenance cost, but from a usability perspective it'd still be strictly superior.
No they're not. VIM is sadness in character form that mocks text editors and all they are great for.
Okay enough VIM rants. 😩
But really, the issue seems more in how the game hints at being mouse-interactive, but being exclusively keyboard-interactive. VIM never hides that, in fact it full-on forbids and removes all mouse interaction, so you'd never get the idea that you can click anything. It's very open in what it wants you to do, even if the keyboard interaction that follows is the most arcane and batshit crazy thing anyone on mushrooms has ever come up with.
If I have a mouse, I expect it to work, within reason.
Menus are a perfect example of where the mouse should just work imo. It's guaranteed to exist as an input method, and it's probably better than using arrow keys for navigation, for example.
I have this same gripe with the touchscreen on the Switch. For some reason, practically no games support accessing menus via the touchscreen and the vast majority of games pretend that it doesn’t exist. Even first party Nintendo games do this. And every time I am playing in portable mode I wonder why I am being forced to press half a dozen or more buttons to perform an action when the button I want to press is literally inches away from where my fingers are.
The thing that kills me is that this feature almost always worked on all Vita games, even with the screen being something like half the size. Maybe Sony had higher quality standards than Nintendo does?
Maybe it is just me... But pressing 'E' to interact has been standard on PC games for 25+ years. (The earliest game I remember was Half-Life doing it but I'm sure it wasn't the first).
Could there have also been support to manually click open a door? Sure, but that seems cumbersome for something you do often.
Doesn't seem like a console vs PC game issue IMO.
I was trying to remember the mouse-driven games I've played, and I can only think of top down isometric games like Diablo or Neverwinter Nights. And in the case of NWN, they provided the option, everything I was doing with the mouse could have been done with the keyboard. Most RTSs can be played primarily with the mouse, but if you want to be competitive, you learn the keyboard shortcuts. Sure, shooters make good use of both, but I wouldn't call them mouse-driven in the context of the situation presented here.
This game is definitely on the line where more mouse support would be welcome, though. Given the perspective, having a more functional mouse makes a lot of sense.
I've never understood the derision of controllers for PC gaming. That's a last-decade hot take from people actively choosing to ignore reality and trying a create a feeling of superiority. I can't stand PCMR gate-keeping. I have fond memories of my Sidewinder controllers and joysticks before DirectInput was a thing. I choose the input method that feels best for a given game.
Are sim-gamers not playing PC-first games? The generalizations made here are pointing in this direction. What about the Steam Deck?
As for the difference between PC games and console games? The platform you play on, and that's it. Why does there have to be such a strong line in the sand? Simply the fact that there was in the past?
At the end of the day, I want to have fun playing a game. The 'how' and 'where' are details, and small ones at that.
Honestly, I'd argue that using a controller on PC is a quintessentially PC Gamer thing to do. PCs and PC gaming has always been about flexibility, especially by comparison to console gaming. I'm not bound trying to play something like Cultic or Dusk with a controller, like I would be if those games existed on console; I can use u KB/M for superior control and then switch over to Elden Ring and pick up my controller for the superior method there and then again switch to my HOTAS for a flight sim.
The PC is about options and if a game is designed for a specific control style, no problem, I can either choose one of the many games that aren't, or hook up that preferred method and go to town. No use in trying to fit a square peg in a round hole.
I have Xbox One and PS5 controllers at my desk. Some games I use one, some the other. Even these two almost identical controllers have different strengths and weaknesses, and on PC I can freely use either.
I'm admittedly an old-head but I think the KB+M vs Controller really comes down to FPS games. I like a controller for JRPG, Action/Adventure, platformers. But my dumb hands will never feel comfortable coordinating look and aim with joysticks.
A mouse is objectively better than a joystick for aiming, there's a reason the pro scenes for most shooters are almost exclusively on PC.
A studio putting out a shooter without good mouse and keyboard controls is basically asking not to be taken seriously by half their potential playerbase.
Objectively maybe for competitive fps games but for the rest, not so much. Analog for the movement and mouse for the aiming would be amazing if more games supported that.
Same.
If I need to aim, or accurately click on things quickly, I prefer KB+M.
If I need to react quickly with imprecise movements like in reaction, rhythm or action games, a controller fares better.
Agree 100%. "Dumbed down controls for controllers" has always read to me as "I resent that controls aren't needlessly complex to the point where only people who have nothing else to do can get proficient at them, and also I don't give a single shit about accessibility."
I also wonder how such folks would react if they were suddenly yanked back in time to the late 80s and forced to use single-button "joypads" connected via gameports on their audio cards. Would they bemoan "dumbing down" then, or would their heads explode when they realize that controllers for PC games weren't invented in 2001?
Yup. While I'm primarily a PC gamer, I always have consoles. And there are games, such as JRPGs, that I'll buy on Steam and then hook up a controller. Mostly out of habit, but also because some games have terrible KB&M functions. Luckily, I have a Steam Controller, but I also have my various Dual Shock/Sense controllers.
Controller, mouse, keyboard, perhaps even hand gestures in VR...they're all just tools. For FPS games, I'm terrible with using the tool that is a controller, so I use the tools of a keyboard and mouse. Other games, I only use a mouse or a keyboard. I just use whatever suits me.
Noita plays great on a controller. You aim with one analog stick and move with the other. Wand tinkering uses the d-pad and buttons.
Your problem is with half-assed conversions from one to the other. Those universally suck; if you want to support both well you need to come up with two separate control schemes.
Yeah, having an "interact" button mapped to a key is pretty standard for a game if it's not point-and-click. But it sure pisses me off when you can rebind every key under the sun except that one button!
I am an annoying elitist gatekeeper and I say that Xbox, the first one, made gaming significantly worse by starting the unification of the PC and console market. Mainstream PC games became dumber because they had to cater to a more casual and younger console audience, and also more restricted due to, at the time, very weak console hardware (specifically a tiny amount of RAM which forced limited gameplay areas, small levels, levels cut into pieces etc.).
The latter had an upside later, the next generation of consoles had significantly stronger hardware and lasted for a long time, so it started the era of not needing to upgrade your gaming PC that often. But the dumbing down and worse controls definitely happened and decided to stay.
Boy this takes me back. Reminds me of the late 2000's, when this was even more commonplace and we didn't have the refuge of indie games.
That said, you may want to see if you can find a controller you like; I do know Dual Shock works with PC, though I've never used one. But a controller is an essential component of PC gaming these days and realistically, always has been in some form or another. Back in the 90's, many of us (well, not me) liked to play Doom with a joystick, back before WASD was even a twinkle in Thresh's eye.
Yeah, controllers can be awkward and I'm lucky I have large hands, as I can comfortably use all the face buttons on an Xbox pad with one hand, but again, they're essential. Use the right control method for the game at hand and you'll be much happier as a whole.
Home-Ins-End-Del for life yo. They align better than wasd.
I got railgunned in the face by Thresh once. Remains the highlight of my Quake 2 gaming.
However, they put your hands further away from other buttons. When I play games like Quake, I have each weapon on its own key bind. The most important weapons (like rail and rocket) go on the mouse, but the rest need to be clustered around my movement keys. I should be able to change to any weapon instantly without ever removing my index finger from the forward or backpedal keys. I use Q,E,F,C, and X as weapon bind keys.
I'd love to see something like a 30% keyboard design that is just the left side of a normal keyboard with an ortholinear layout. That would give us the best of both worlds.
I’d also recommend the Xbox Elite controller with underside paddles, which can be mapped to anything like ABXY, and has exchangeable thumbsticks.
I'm the opposite. There are a lot of games I can't stand because they use the mouse in annoying ways. I find it particularly annoying when it's used for 360 degree aiming in a 2D game; it somehow makes aiming feel more imprecise than digital 8-way directions. Papers, Please to me is a game that, mechanically, is almost entirely built around fighting the mouse.
To me, the less "PC-Like" a game is, the better. I can't stand games where the whole keyboard is full of hotkeys because it makes me feel like I'm running vi and I'm fighting my imperfect memory for when I need to remember a key that is rarely used.
I don't have a problem with complex games; I just can't stand when the complexity comes from an interface that seperates you from the actual game you're playing.
You may be interested in Cataclysm' Dark Days Ahead if you're into survival horror crafting sandbox games built explicitly for PC. Open source and with more keyboard commands than you can shake a stick at.
I'd just caution that the main branch is explicitly a simulation and getting more so. Also the darkness level seems to go to similar absurdity such as WH40k. Minimal priority is given to game-specific considerations such as keeping the gameplay enjoyable.
That said the sandbox is impressive. It is the single most complex game world I have personally seen. Personally I would also recommend Bright Nights fork for less features but more gameplay centric approach.
It also has a functional Android version, though no idea how good it is as a phone game, as I only played it on PC.
From your link:
This really got me! I am going to have to check it out (not on Lego brick though).
I used to be more opinionated about this when I was in my teens and early twenties, with a strong preference for KB+mouse, but these days I find it nice when a game is reasonably playable with a controller. In front of a PC, it’s nice to be able to sit in a more kicked back, relaxed position with a controller sometimes (as opposed to the more upright/leaned in position called for with KB+mouse), and of course if it’s controller-friendly that means I an play it in bed on my Steam Deck or on my couch in the living room, no desk needed.
Autohot key script:
#Persistent
SetTimer, PressE, 10
return
PressE:
If (GetKeyState("LButton", "P"))
{
Send, {e}
}
return
It won't really do what you want but it will open the door with a mouse click.
How much of the game is actually controlled by mouse? If it's the major control mechanism, it should be doable by mouse, no excuse (or at least you should be able to set it that way in options).
But I remember playing ie. Half-Life more than 20 years ago and opening doors with "e", nothing wrong with that.
If the game is, or seems to you, like it's build for controller, get one! There are many games which are simply much better with controller. You don't even have to buy Xbox controller, it's not he only one in the world. I use PS3 controllers just fine (wired or wireless), 8bitDo makes some good controllers, Logitech had some good ones back in the day... It is good to have a controller at hand, believe me.
Do you enjoy games that make more sense with a keyboard and mouse? Like RTS games for example?