Direct joystick access, often abbreviated to DJA, is the default input setting for Project Heartbeat and changes how a controller's sticks are read by the game. When direct joystick access is on, the game will use the raw values of the stick positions and configurable settings to determine when a slider or heart note input should be activated. When direct joystick access is off, the game will map stick inputs to a direction and use the bound controls to map those directions to inputs. In practice, the decision you are making between the two is whether you want to configure the precision of inputs (DJA on), or the action of an input (DJA off).

This setting applies only when direct joystick access is enabled. If you are playing with DJA off, this setting will have no effect.

Direct joystick slider deadzone outer is a deadzone for stick inputs. Despite the name, it also applies for heart notes. When you press a direction, after crossing the threshold, all inputs will be ignored until the stick returns back below the threshold. Rotating the stick around the edge will not trigger additional inputs. This prevents the double inputs that are common when direct joystick access is disabled. The activation radius is shown in the image as the blue shaded region and the white is the deadzone. Optimizing this value is difficult. On one hand, you want the radius to be as small as possible to minimize the latency between when you begin moving the stick and when the input triggers. However, if you need to alternate directions, or rapidly press the same direction, the radius needs to be large enough that you cross through it to deactivate and reactivate the inputs. It's easier than it sounds to accidentally miss a small outer deadzone by passing just over top the radius for alternating sliders. Avoid setting this value to 1.0 or 0.0. A slider deadzone outer of 1.0 will require the sticks to be fully pressed in a direction to activate, but many controllers are not calibrated in such a way where you will always hit 1.0 when pressing a direction, which can lead to dropped inputs. Setting it to 0.0 will prevent inputs from deactivating unless the stick is perfectly centered, which is practically impossible on most controllers, leading to missed notes.

This setting applies only when direct joystick access is enabled. If you are playing with DJA off, this setting will have no effect.

Direct joystick angle deadzone controls the precision required to activate sliders. Despite the name including deadzone, the value is the range of how close the angle must be to a perfect left or right inputs to activate a slider, which means it's more of an "activation zone". To give an example, if you have angle deadzone set to 60, it will create a span of a 60 degrees where sliding the stick in that direction will count for activating a slider. In the image, this is the orange shaded region. There isn't any reason to have this setting below its maximum, since there's no downside to having it be as forgiving as possible.

Toggles controller rumble.

Analog deadzone is the deadzone setting for any analog inputs for controllers. This setting is ignored for sticks when direct joystick access is enabled, but it still applies to all other analog inputs, such as triggers (for controllers with analog triggers). When direct joystick access is disabled, this is the setting to modify if you're experiencing double inputs due to snapback or ghost inputs due to stick drift. Aim to keep the deadzone as low as possible to minimize the latency between when you start pressing an analog input and when the input triggers. Avoid setting this value to 1.0. An analog deadzone of 1.0 will require analog inputs to be fully pressed to activate, but many controllers are not calibrated in such a way where you will always hit 1.0 on a full press, which can lead to dropped inputs. Despite being similar to direct joystick slider deadzone outer, when DJA is off and this controls the stick deadzones, the control stick does not need to return to the deadzone before triggering more inputs. Rotating the stick around the edge will trigger new inputs as you cycle around.

The example image shows DJA on with an angle deadzone of 120 and a slider deadzone outer of 0.7. DJA on prevents the customization of the stick inputs—they are permanently set to use heart or slide. Crossing into the blue region (border set by slider deadzone outer) will trigger an input. New inputs cannot be triggered until the stick leaves the blue region. The orange dotted line shows the angle deadzone. Inside the left and right regions, sliders can be triggered when entering the blue region. When I used DJA, I used angle deadzone of 120 and a slider deadzone outer of 0.85.



This example image shows DJA off with an analog deadzone of 0.5. DJA off allows the customization of stick inputs in the controls tab. Entering the blue region (border set by analog deadzone) will trigger any inputs bound to the stick direction. Crossing the solid green lines will trigger additional inputs, which can cause misinputs or double inputs if you're not careful. Personally, I use DJA off with an analog deadzone of 0.5, but with Stick Up & Stick Down unbound to prevent misinputs. I don't recommend this for most users. DJA on with well-configured settings will be better for most users.