Keyboard & mouse

Keyboard & Mouse turns your keyboard and mouse into a virtual controller so you can play controller-only games. This guide explains what it actually does, why it behaves the way it does, and how to set it up correctly.

Overview

Keyboard & Mouse drives a virtual Xbox 360 or DualShock 4 pad from the inputs you already use at the desk. The mapping is direct:

• W+A+S+D becomes the left stick, so it handles movement.
• The mouse becomes the right stick, so it handles aim.
• Any key can act as a face button, a bumper, a trigger, or a bound macro.

The output goes through Emulation, which presents a genuine virtual pad to the game. This is built for controller-only and controller-friendly titles: games that expect a gamepad but that you would rather play with keyboard and mouse. It is not a way to add a mouse to a game that already supports one.

Because it drives a virtual pad, the full play experience needs Emulation, which is a Pro capability. Free users can select Keyboard & Mouse as an input, map every key, measure DPI, and preview the setup; the pad reaches your game once Emulation is running.

How it works

Controller emulation, not injection

OmniControl does not push fake input into the game process. It uses the ViGEmBus kernel driver to register a real virtual device with Windows at the driver level, the same layer a physical pad sits on when you plug it into USB. Your keyboard and mouse feed that virtual pad, and the game reads the pad. Nothing touches the game's memory or executable. To the game, the virtual controller is indistinguishable from a real one, which is why it is detected as controller input rather than a keyboard-and-mouse overlay. The Emulation page covers the virtual device and driver management in full.

Why the game's aim assist applies

OmniControl does not add, provide, or automate aim assist, and it never presents that as one of its features. What happens is simpler: the game sees a real controller, so whatever aim assist the game itself gives to controller players applies to the virtual pad exactly as it would to a physical one. That behaviour belongs to the game, not to OmniControl. If a title has no controller aim assist, none appears.

Keyboard movement is digital, a stick is analog

A thumbstick is analog. It reports a position anywhere from 0 to 100 percent of its travel, so it can describe a slow creep, a half-lean, or a precise diagonal blend. W+A+S+D is digital: each key is either off or on. Holding W is a full-forward stick with nothing in between, so there is no half-press. Fine walk speeds and blended diagonals behave differently from a real thumbstick, and that difference is inherent to keys, not a fault in the mapping.

Mouse motion is a model, not native mouse input

A mouse reports movement as deltas: it tells the system how far it moved this instant, then stops reporting when it stops moving. A stick reports a held position, and the camera keeps turning for as long as the stick is deflected. Translating a stream of deltas into a held position is fundamentally a model. It can be tuned to feel right, but it is not the same path a game uses for native raw-mouse aiming, so expect it to feel very close rather than identical.

Why raw stick-from-mouse feels floaty

Feed mouse motion straight to the aim stick and the camera keeps drifting after your hand stops, because the stick was briefly deflected and the game keeps turning until it recenters. The crosshair sails past the point you aimed at. Fixing this requires knowing the game's real turn rate so the model can convert a mouse distance into the exact stick deflection that produces the matching camera rotation. That measurement is what turn-match calibration provides.

Why controller sensitivity matters

The aim stick can only turn as fast as the game allows a controller to turn at full deflection. That ceiling is the game's turn cap. If the in-game controller sensitivity is low, the cap is low, so a fast flick hits the ceiling and the mouse outruns the camera. Raising the game's controller sensitivity, often to maximum, raises the cap, so more of your mouse motion maps directly before the turn saturates. The honest promise is 1:1 tracking up to your game's turn cap, and a higher cap means fewer flicks reach it.

Getting started

Work through these in order. You measure DPI once per mouse, then run turn-match once per game.

How DPI and turn-match produce cm/360

DPI tells OmniControl how many raw counts your mouse sends per centimeter of desk travel. Turn-match tells it how far the camera turns for a given stick deflection. Together they produce a real cm/360 figure: the centimeters of mouse travel needed for one full in-game turn, which is the standard FPS sensitivity unit. Matching cm/360 to your other games is what makes aim feel consistent across titles.

Drive a controller and Play Mode are different switches

These two get confused, and this page used to confuse them, so it is worth being exact.

Drive a controller is the master switch. On, your keyboard and mouse drive the virtual pad and the game responds to them. Off, they behave normally, so you can alt-tab, type and use the desktop without the pad reacting. Keep it off while you map and calibrate, then turn it on to play. Nothing reaches the pad while OmniControl is the focused window, so it is safe to leave on while you are working in the app.

Play Mode is a separate fix for one specific problem: your game reading your real mouse at the same time as the virtual pad. That is not a bug and not something any application can prevent - Windows lets any process read the mouse directly. Play Mode works around it by holding focus in OmniControl rather than in the game, so the game keeps receiving the controller while your physical mouse stops reaching it. You only need it if the game is reacting to both. Some titles stop simulating while they are not the focused window, in which case Play Mode will not suit them.

Common use cases

• Playing a controller-only port on PC when you would rather use keyboard and mouse. The virtual pad satisfies the game's gamepad requirement while WASD and the mouse drive it.
• Aiming with the mouse in a game built around a controller, where the stick is the only way the game expects you to aim.
• Matching aim across single-player shooters by calibrating each game to the same cm/360, so the same physical mouse movement turns the same amount everywhere.
• Mixing input on the same pad: bind niche actions to spare keys as buttons, triggers, or macros while WASD and the mouse handle movement and aim.
• Keeping a per-game setup that loads on its own. Save mapping, mouse sensitivity, and turn-match into the game's profile so it is ready the next time that game takes focus.

Best practices

• Pick the output pad the game actually prefers. A game that expects PlayStation input feels wrong on an Xbox 360 pad, and the reverse.
• Set the game's controller sensitivity high before you calibrate, not after. Turn-match measures whatever cap is active, so changing sensitivity afterward invalidates the calibration.
• Measure DPI once per mouse. It is stored per mouse in Settings, not per profile, so you do not repeat it for every game.
• Run turn-match per game, and rerun it whenever you change the in-game controller sensitivity or field of view.
• Save each game's setup to its profile so mapping, sensitivity, and turn-match load on their own.

Troubleshooting

Aim drifts or overshoots after you stop the mouse. Turn rate is not calibrated for this game, so the stick is running the floaty raw path. Run turn-match: line up a landmark, press F8, turn one clean 360, press F8 again. If it still drifts, your circle was not exactly one turn; redo it and stop the instant the landmark realigns.

Aim hits a ceiling on fast flicks. You are reaching the game's turn cap. Raise the in-game controller sensitivity, often to maximum, then run turn-match again so the calibration matches the new cap. Above the cap the game cannot turn any faster no matter how far you move the mouse.

The game does not accept the pad. Confirm Emulation is running and Play Mode is on, and check the game reads the output type you selected. If the pad still does not register, the title may block virtual controllers on purpose (see below). Verify the pad works in another game to isolate whether the block is title-specific.

A key stays stuck on. This usually means Play Mode is on while the game is not focused, so a held key keeps feeding the pad. Turn Play Mode off to release input to the desktop, refocus the game, then turn it back on. Confirm the same physical key is not mapped twice.

Movement feels all-or-nothing. That is expected. W+A+S+D is digital, so there is no partial stick lean. If you need analog movement, a physical controller with stick tuning is the better fit.

FAQ

Does this need Pro?

The full play experience does, because it drives a virtual pad through Emulation, which is Pro. Free users can select Keyboard & Mouse as an input, map keys, measure DPI, and preview everything; the pad reaches your game once Emulation is running. See pricing for the one-time upgrade.

Will it feel exactly like native mouse aim?

No. Mouse motion is deltas and a stick is a held position, so the conversion is a model. It can be tuned to feel very close after turn-match and a high in-game sensitivity, but it is not the game's native raw-mouse path.

Does OmniControl add aim assist?

No. OmniControl provides no aim assist and never brands one. If the game gives controller players aim assist, that feature applies to the virtual pad because the game sees a real controller. The behaviour belongs to the game.

Why do so many guides say to max out controller sensitivity?

A low sensitivity means a low turn cap, so fast flicks saturate and the mouse outruns the camera. A higher sensitivity raises the cap, letting more of your motion map 1:1 before it saturates. Recalibrate turn-match after changing it.

Why is my DPI not detected automatically?

Windows exposes no reliable API to read DPI from a mouse, so OmniControl measures it with the drag wizard instead. The result is stored per mouse and feeds your cm/360.

Can I use it in competitive shooters?

No. Titles with kernel-level anti-cheat are out of scope, and we ship no Keyboard & Mouse presets for them. That is a choice about what we publish, not a lock on your machine, so checking a game's rules is your responsibility.