Awesome job on the default controls!!!
Today I have finished my first playthrough as Knuckles, with a gamepad, without a single Game Over and the 7 emeralds. Until now, I only played on keyboard or keyboard + mouse, as playing on gamepad was impossible for me, as I lost all precission, which is awful on hard parts like ERZ2. Meanwhile, today I've done the "Megaman platforms" in the first try!! So really good job with the default gamepad controls!!
Like everybody, I had two big problems:
Thoking/gliding to the camera
I didn't like thoking or gliding to where you were looking initially, but I understand why it has been made, and I think it's better this way too. Anyway, this seems like a good suggestion:
Character facing movement direction is neat but thok-ing and gliding not going in the direction the character is facing is disorienting, I would suggest making the character face cam direction during jumps to at least make it clear where a character is going to move after performing their ability.
Has this been tried? Or would the camera change too quick and disorient more?
Shoulders for jumping and spinning
I'm playing with a Xbox One controller, and IMO the shoulder buttons are the worse part of that gamepad (they are too hard to press for an action you perform so much). After changing both jumping and spinning on face buttons, I've played a lot better, but I learnt fastly why the face buttons aren't used: Once you are gliding or thoking fast, you can't press jump and use both analogs correctly.
Some advice to those who want to use a controller but are disappointed with analog's deprecation: Abandon the face buttons, they will make your life harder. Use the two triggers as jump and spindash and the shoulder buttons as whatever preferred Match or Custom buttons you desire - this will be significantly friendlier to your hands when combined with the twin sticks, I promise.
Honestly, I fully recommend this gets incorporated into the tutorial in future patches - it's downright comfortable AND playable!
I haven't tried triggers yet, but I will do it for sure!! They will feel better.
And... Tutorial?
What is really missing is a gamepad tutorial. Does it exist or just didn't work when I tried it? I had to play it with the keyboard instructions. Having one for the gamepad too would be perfect.
Anyway, they are all minor annoyances for me, and I'e really enjoyed my first playthrough. Playing as other characters feels great too :)