In this guide, we will take a look at the HOTAS Deadzone Fix for STAR WARS™: Squadrons. This is a quick guide to remapping the joystick axis. It will help you to get around EA’s forced ~20% dead zones on HOTAS Pitch and Roll.
Follow the steps carefully and fix the joystick in a few minutes. Kindly note that this guide contains downloading third-party software to run HOTAS. User discretion is advised and used at your own risk.
STAR WARS™: Squadrons – HOTAS Deadzone Fix
- Plugin your HOTAS.
- Download VJoy here: http://www.xedocproject.com/headsoft_vjoy_1_2.exe.
- Install VJoy.
- Download Joystick Curves here: http://www.xedocproject.com/joystickcurves/setup.exe.
- Install Joystick Curves.
- Open Squadrons, set to run in a window, and make the window about half the width of your screen.
- Close Squadrons
- Open Joystick curves.
- Select your physical joystick device in the physical dropdown.
- Choose the physical axis of the pitch.
- Select virtual joystick 1 in the virtual dropdown.
- Select the virtual axis of rotary 2.
- Click Add a new tab and repeat steps 9-12, selecting a physical axis of roll and a virtual axis of rotary 1.
- Right-click in the big green grid, and under virtual pitch, select rotary 2, and under virtual roll, select rotary 1.
- Move your joystick around, and you should see the crosshairs move around correctly.
- Open the game.
- In controls, click remap and flight.
- Switch to Joystick Curves and click the pitch tab.
- Click the “virtual axis test loop” checkbox, now you’ll see the bright green, “virtual” crosshair move from top to bottom and loop.
- We are going to start with pitch down because it is harder and will wipe the correct setting for pitch up if you fail the first time.
- You need to watch the virtual crosshair move down, and when it’s at about 80% of the way to the bottom, select pitch down in squadrons and do not touch your stick.
- Wait a second, and the virtual test loop will cause it to map to the virtual joystick.
- This ~80% timing somehow tricks the system and maps the x or y “-rotate+” you need, and If it says x or y “-rotate-” that’s ok, just do it again till you get a plus.
- Now to get the inverse for a pitch up, just select pitch up when the crosshair is approaching the center of the green grid and wait for a second or two. You’ve succeeded when it maps to x or y “-rotate-“. If it says x or y “-rotate+” it will have overwritten pitch down, and you need to do step 21 again first.
- Turn off the virtual axis test loop and click the roll-tab.
Repeat steps 19-21 for roll right and roll left. If you do it right, you should see roll right map to x or y “-rotate+” and roll left map to x or y “-rotate-. “
- Turn off the virtual axis test loop.
Your mappings should now look like this:
NOTE: You’ll need to run joystick curves every time you run the game.
If you follow the above instructions step by step, HOTAS will now be working for you, and you can enjoy Squadrons properly. That will be all for this walkthrough. Thanks for reading, and we will see you in the next one!
Last Updated on April 27, 2024
A computer science graduate by qualification, Zoid loves to keep himself updated with the latest gaming content related to PC, Android, and other platforms as well. Likes to keep his diet and health in check from time to time!