@zakkster/lite-gamepad

🎮 What is lite-gamepad?

@zakkster/lite-gamepad unifies WASD, arrow keys, and gamepad analog sticks into a single normalized Float32Array(2) movement vector.

It gives you:

• 🎮 Unified keyboard + gamepad in one API
• 🕹️ Radial deadzone with smooth scaling (no snap)
• ↗️ Diagonal normalization (no speed boost on diagonals)
• 🧹 AbortController cleanup — no leaked listeners
• 🔢 Uint8Array key state (zero allocation per poll)
• 🪶 < 1 KB minified

Call poll() once per frame — get a normalized direction vector.

Part of the @zakkster/lite-* ecosystem — micro-libraries built for deterministic, cache-friendly game development.

🚀 Install

npm i @zakkster/lite-gamepad

🕹️ Quick Start

import { InputVectorizer } from '@zakkster/lite-gamepad';

const input = new InputVectorizer();

function gameLoop() {
    const [dx, dy] = input.poll();
    player.x += dx * speed * dt;
    player.y += dy * speed * dt;
    requestAnimationFrame(gameLoop);
}

// Check action buttons
if (input.isActionPressed(32, 0)) shoot(); // Space or Gamepad A

// Cleanup
input.destroy();

🧠 Why This Exists

Keyboard gives you [-1, 0, 1] per axis. Gamepad gives you [-1.0 ... 1.0] with deadzone drift. lite-gamepad normalizes both into the same Float32Array(2) — clamped magnitude, smooth deadzone, zero allocation.

📊 Comparison

| Library | Size | Keyboard | Gamepad | Deadzone | Normalized | Install | |---------|------|----------|---------|----------|------------|---------| | gamepad.js | ~3 KB | No | Yes | Basic | No | npm i gamepad.js | | keymaster | ~4 KB | Yes | No | N/A | No | npm i keymaster | | lite-gamepad | < 1 KB | Yes | Yes | Radial smooth | Yes | npm i @zakkster/lite-gamepad |

⚙️ API

new InputVectorizer()

poll() — Returns Float32Array(2) normalized movement vector. Call once per frame.

isActionPressed(keyCode, gamepadButtonIndex?) — Check action key/button state

destroy() — Cleans up all event listeners via AbortController

🧪 Benchmark

N/A — input polling is I/O bound, not CPU bound.
Key advantage: zero allocation per poll() call (Float32Array reuse).

📦 TypeScript

Full TypeScript declarations included in InputVectorizer.d.ts.

📚 LLM-Friendly Documentation

See llms.txt for AI-optimized metadata and usage examples.

License

MIT