Valley 2 Official 1.001 "Mouse Aiming For Those Who Stood And Fought" Released news

Valley 2 Official 1.001 "Mouse Aiming For Those Who Stood And Fought"

This one addresses a few minor issues, as well as properly filling out the beta player contributors credits list.

More newsworthy, undoubtedly, is the addition of a new option in the settings menu that enables mouse-aiming. This is something I said I'd never do for this game, but apparently never say never.

I maintain my stance that mouse aiming makes for a watered-down experience, and that the better gameplay model is with a gamepad or the keyboard. However, there is a sizable contingent of players who disagree with me.

Let me back up for a minute: I felt like I was rather bullied into adding mouse controls to the first game, and that was to the detriment of that game. The gamepad controls and keyboard-only controls were really gimped by the presence of those mouse controls, but the mouse controls were what most people (including myself) used.

With the sequel I wanted to have a tighter experience that did away with the mouse controls and was a more traditional platformer in how it controlled. In that, I succeeded. The gamepad and keyboard controls rock in Valley 2.

However, there are some people who simply can't play the game without mouse controls, apparently. I say that with only mild bitterness, heh. In all seriousness, there are people who simply have not learned that method of controlling games. It's the longer-standing method of controlling games, but that's really irrelevant.

I remember how I felt when I was first exposed to dual-stick FPS controls on consoles -- I thought it was the most terrible thing ever. Now I think it's fine, but again that's beside the point. I also remember how hard I found the transition from being a keyboard-only FPS player to a mouse+keyboard FPS player (yes, I'm old), but once I did make that transition I never looked back -- WASD plus mouse is incredibly superior for FPS games.

The point is, there are apparently a sizeable group of people who feel the same way when it comes to sidescrollers. I still disagree, and I encourage those people at least to give the gamepad or keyboard controls a shot. However, I remember how I basically found dual-stick shooters unplayable at first, and if that's how the keyboard/gamepad controls made you feel about Valley 2, then there's now a salve, at least.

Anyhow, long story short, not for the first time I'm forced to eat my words. Never say never and all that. I'm sure it won't be the last time either. For those people who were put off by the lack of mouse controls, hopefully now you'll find the game to be actually something you can play.

Enjoy!

This is a standard update that you can download through the in-game updater itself, if you already have any version of the game. If you have the beta on Steam, it will automatically update for you. When you launch the game, you'll see the notice of the update having been found if you're connected to the Internet at the time. If you don't have the standalone game, you can download that here. If you already own the first game, just use your existing license key to unlock the sequel for free!