How can I make Terraria easier to play with controllers?

Since I can't really into WASD due to some issues with my left hand, and I have some issues gaming with a keyboard and mouse even without that, I was hoping to find something that suited it more for a controller like with the way they did the Xbox port.

It wouldn't be for competitive/online play, so I'm not worried about that very much, I just can't actually survive very well in most cases right now. I have to be twice as powerful as recommended usually just to function in an area without dying every few minutes.

Even if I can just set up the "directional cursor" type thing that they have on the Xbox port say for a toggle for when I'm exploring (and go back to regular for building) and a way to cycle through the hotbar items without hitting the number key I'd be set since I can set up the rest via XPadder.

Edit: To clarify for any user that has not played Terraria on console,

  • Front bumper buttons generally move you back and fourth through your immediate inventory.
  • Left trigger acts as the grappling hook
  • Right trigger acts as the "use" button
  • Inventory items can be quick-mapped to the D-pad.
  • The cursor has two modes:
    • A grid-based mode, where you use the analog to move a mouse cursor around your character, within the range of manipulation.
    • A direction mode, where you push the analog stick in a direction. For example, if you push in any direction and mine through dirt, the player will generally proceed to mine a passage of 3-units-width in the given direction.
  • Pressing the right analog stick down swaps back and forth between the two modes.

Solution 1:

As of version 1.3.1, the PC version of Terraria has official controller support. It has presets for PS4 and Xbox One controllers, as well as custom support.

Screenshot of controller config screen

Solution 2:

I had this same question a few weeks ago when update 1.3 came out, and I picked Terraria up again.

I highly recommend checking out the XInput Game Support Mod. It can be a little quirky to hook up, and as of now (few weeks after 1.3 Terraria released) it has a few bugs that they're trying to patch quickly. However, it helped my hand cramps a lot, as using an xbox360 controller is a lot less physically straining for me.

The forums can explain the setup better than I can.

Link is here on the Terraria forums: http://forums.terraria.org/index.php?threads/xinput-gamepad-support-mod.1260/