Ori and the Will of the Wisps – Better Keyboard Controls Setup

So you don’t have a controller, nor a mouse with 6 buttons on it, but you still want to play Ori WotW? This guide lays out how to set up your controls for playing with a keyboard only.

Why keyboard only?

If you don’t have a special controller or fancy mouse with extra buttons, this game can be hard to play. There are so many different actions, and you only have so many fingers! With only a regular mouse, your keyboard hand would have to control all but 2 of the actions! Movement, dash, burrow, glide, grab, grapple, bash… Not to mention that you’d like to be moving *while* doing those other actions, so your WASD fingers shouldn’t be multi-tasking.

Preferred controls for keyboard only

Let’s be honest; the defaults for keyboard-only controls are not the best. So how should you rearrange things? Let’s get right to it.

Left Hand:

• WASD – directional movement and aiming
• Space – jump
• Left Shift – dash and burrow
• F – interact
• Z – option 1
• X – option 2
• C – option 3
• Tab – map/shards/inventory

Right Hand:

• J – ability 1
• K – ability 2
• L – ability 3
• ; (semicolon) – grab and glide
• ‘ (apostrophe) – re-bind abilities
• U – grapple
• I (as in Indigo) – bash
• M – map
• , (comma) – shards
• . (period) – inventory

Alternatives:

• bash could be on the same key as grapple
• dash or burrow could be moved to Left Control
• F could be replaced by Q or E
• U could be replaced by H
• ZXC could be replaced by 123
• If you’re comfortable with Left Control while using WASD and would like to be able to re-bind abilities while gliding, re-bind abilities could be on Left Control

Why these?

The primary reason for these choices is so that you’ll never need to do two things at the same time with the same finger.

• The only actions that cause your WASD fingers leave those keys (e.g. for interact) are actions that happen when you’ll be standing still.
• You can still use all 3 abilities while gliding.
• You’ll never need to use an ability *while* you bash or grapple, so quickly using an ability’s finger for bash or grapple is not a problem.
• Using apostrophe to re-bind abilities leaves your direction WASD fingers still free, as well as all 3 fingers that are on the abilities’ keys.

Aiming is Unresponsive?

If you’re trying to use WASD for aiming (e.g. for bash) but the aiming arrow isn’t moving, the game is likely trying to use your mouse location to aim. This is usually caused by an accidental movement of the mouse.

To fix it, you need to pause the game, go to controls, and switch to the “Keyboard Only” option, not “Keyboard with Mouse”. To prevent this in the future, you could disconnect your mouse entirely (or on a laptop, disable the trackpad) while you play.