Controls & shortcuts

Every player key is an InputMap action, so it shows up — and can be rebound — in Settings → Controls. The keybind menu (ui/menu_config/menu_config.gd) builds its list automatically from InputMap.get_actions() and saves the player's choices to user://inputs.map. There is no hard-coded key in gameplay code: inputs are read with event.is_action_pressed("…") / Input.is_action_pressed("…").

Main shortcuts (default keys)

Several keys are contextual — the same key does one thing on foot and another in a vehicle.

Default	Action	On foot	Driving a vehicle
F	action	Pick up / drop a prop, open / close a door, enter a seat, use a console	—
Z / S	move_forward / move_back · vehicle_accelerate / vehicle_decelerate	Walk forward / back	Accelerate / slow down and reverse — the vehicle's own actions: on the walk's keys by default, rebindable alone (a pad player can put them on the triggers and keep walking on the stick)
Y	exit	—	Leave the vehicle
U · pad D-pad ↑	toggle_flashlight	Torch on/off	Torch on/off
L · pad D-pad ↓	vehicle_lights	—	Head lights on/off (D-pad ↓ is prone on foot)
Space	jump / brake	Jump	Brake — hold at low speed = hand brake
R	vehicle_reset	—	Flip the vehicle upright
2	zapette	Toggle the admin cleanup tool ("Zapette")	(same)
I	vehicle_ignition	—	Start / stop the engine
T	emote_wheel / vehicle_speed_limiter	Hold to open the emote wheel, release on a slice to play it	Speed limiter on/off
Alt + wheel	vehicle_limiter_up / _down	—	Speed limit ±5 km/h (shown on the dashboard)
F7	screenshot	Photo: the world alone, no interface nor debug visuals	(same)
F8	screenshot_debug	Bug-report shot: the screen as it is, plus the debug panels	(same)
F2	star_map	Open / close the star map, in the DataPad's NAVIGATION tab. Escape then closes the DataPad (opened from the DataPad itself, Escape goes back to its home)	(same)
+ / −	star_map_zoom_in / _out	Zoom the star map, held (numpad or the top row; triggers on the pad)	(same)

Star map

Every gesture of the star map is an action too, listed under Settings → Controls → General → Star map, so any of them can move to another button, a key or the pad:

Default (mouse / pad)	Action	What it does
Left click / A	star_map_select	Select what is under the pointer (the centre of the screen on the pad); twice = go there
Right click / X	star_map_reset	Reset the view: the whole system
Middle click (hold)	star_map_orbit	Turn the view as the mouse moves (about the station, over one)
Right stick	star_map_orbit_left/right/up/down	Turn the view
Wheel up / down	star_map_zoom_step_in / _out	Zoom one notch

The help line at the foot of the map is built from these bindings, for the device in your hands: a rebound gesture shows its new key, an unbound one is left out. Mouse buttons are named in the game's language (Clic gauche, Molette haut…), on the Controls page too.

The arrows steer progressively while driving: a tap turns the wheels a little, and they keep their angle when released (they straighten up on their own only while rolling).

Screenshots

F7 and F8 save a PNG and copy it to the clipboard. Files go to <game folder>/screenshots (F8 in screenshots/debug, the F6 recordings in screenshots/records) — the game folder being the executable's in a build, the project's in the editor. When that folder is not writable they fall back to Documents/DyingStar/screenshots. Settings › Graphics › Gallery opens it.

For developers: the photo hides everything drawn on the window's canvas by itself, but it cannot tell a debug visual drawn in the 3D world from scenery — such a node must join the group Globals.GROUP_DEBUG_OVERLAY (as the celestial markers and the cargo envelope do).

Movement (move_forward/back/left/right), sprint, crouch, prone, mining (toggle_tool, aim, perforate), chat (toggle_chat, write_in_chat) and pause are actions too — see the full list (and rebind them) in Settings → Controls.

Seated, the panels come first

Sitting in a vehicle no longer locks you out of the rest of the game: the star map, the emote wheel and the debug panels all still open, and the dashboard instruments stay usable at the wheel. While a panel holds the keyboard, driving input is neutralised and the mouse cursor is released, so opening the map cannot make you honk or drive off — and closing it hands control straight back.

Carrying, cargo & lights

A crate in a vehicle bed is grabbed with F (the carry prompt shows [F] Carry). While carrying, look up / down to raise or lower the held object — to set it on the ground or stack it on a shelf — and it drops on its own if you drag it out of reach (e.g. left stuck behind a wall). On the in-cab HUD the active shortcuts are listed live (e.g. [L] lights, [Space] brake).

One key, one use: F

action moved from E to F (E is now the EVA roll), and the separate interact action that also sat on F is gone: one press used to do two things — carrying a crate while using a console put the crate down as well. A console under the crosshair now takes the action press first, and only it.

In space (EVA)

Weightless — around a station, or beyond a planet's air — the same movement keys push you with your suit's thrusters, and there is no drag: you keep your speed until you push against it. They are grouped in the EVA tab of Settings → Controls. How the drift works: Orbital stations.

Default	Action	What it does
W A S D (Z Q S D on AZERTY)	move_*	Thrust forward / left / back / right
Space / Ctrl	strafe_up / strafe_down	Thrust up / down, along your own up
Q / E (A / E on AZERTY)	roll_left / roll_right	Roll, with momentum; a released roll slows down on its own
X	eva_stabilize	Brake: the thrusters fire against your motion until you are still relative to your frame (the station, beside one)

Developer & debug tools

Handy while working on the game. Like every key, these are InputMap actions — rebind them in Settings → Controls.

Default	Action	What it does
Alt + ²	toggle_debug	Show/hide the debug panels — server/client stats, and (for the body you're on) your altitude, its local time, and your longitude/latitude.
(Settings → Debug)	Star map debug	A Star map section in the debug panel while the map is open: bodies, followed body, zoom, simulated time, relief tiles. The panel goes over the map, and the map's info panel steps aside.
$	god_mode	God mode (dev free-flight, not the real EVA) — detach and fly the body where you look, with no gravity and no collision, to inspect planets, moons and the day/night terminator from afar. Its speed shows at the top of the screen, and your own body is hidden while you fly (the others still see it).
Mouse wheel	walk_speed_up / _down	In god mode: double / halve the flight speed, from 1 m/s to 100 000 km/s (2 km/s to start). On foot it sets the walk speed as usual. The server clamps the speed again.
Middle mouse	god_mode_land	In god mode: land on the ground right under you, on the body whose gravity holds you (or the one you belong to), and leave god mode.
Middle mouse (hold)	carry_free_rotate	While carrying a prop, hold and move the mouse to freely rotate the held object (mouse wheel = step the yaw by 15°).
+ / −	debug_time_forward / _back	Shift the simulated time by an hour, on this client only; hold to sweep the sky (a tool for judging an atmosphere at another hour). While it is shifted a red banner says so: everything worked out from the time on both sides — an orbital station's place — no longer matches the server, and leaving a station lands you where the server has it. Shares its keys with the star-map zoom, which only reads them while the map is open.
Alt + L	debug_toggle_moon_lights	Cut the moon lights and print each factor (phase, elevation, extinction, energy) — the way to tell "the night is too dark" from "the moon is below the horizon".
Alt + I	debug_isolate_light	Cycle the light isolation modes: no aerial perspective, no sky reflection, no sky ambient. Each step removes exactly one contributor, so whatever still lights the scene names its own source.
F6	game_record	Start / stop the gameplay recording (saved in screenshots/records).

See Lighting, day/night & the sky for what those readouts mean.

Chat

The message log is visible by default; F12 (toggle_chat) hides/shows the whole panel. The input bar (channel selector + text field) stays hidden until you write.

To write, press Enter (write_in_chat): the input bar appears; press Enter again to send the message and close it. Escape (or a mouse click) closes the input without sending — Escape here cancels typing rather than opening the pause menu.

While typing, Tab cycles between the channels you can post to (today only the global channel — group/alliance/region come later). Tab and Escape here are fixed text-field keys, like in any chat box, so — unlike toggle_chat and write_in_chat — they are not listed in Settings → Controls and cannot be rebound.

Adding a shortcut (for developers)

Always add a new key as an InputMap action — never a raw keycode. A raw event.keycode == KEY_X is invisible to the settings menu and can't be rebound.

1. Add the action in Project Settings → Input Map (or project.godot [input]), with a default key. Name it readably, and file it with its %%ACT_* label (see Families and labels): an unfiled action is shown by its bare name, _ → spaces.
2. Read it with event.is_action_pressed("my_action") (events) or Input.is_action_pressed("my_action") (polling).

It then appears in Settings → Controls and is rebindable + persisted, with zero menu code.

Families and labels

The controls page groups its actions into tabs — General, On foot, In a vehicle, EVA (weightless), Debug — from MenuConfig.ACTION_GROUPS, which maps family → action → translation key. That is one table, not a list of families beside a table of labels: two of those drift, and you end up with an action in a family with no label, or the reverse.

A new action you do not file lands in an Other tab rather than disappearing from the page, and shows the opened-out form of its name. Filing it is one line.

Give it a label whenever the action name does not say what the key does. jump also starts a vault and a climb — it was reported as "the vault key is not configurable" when it had been configurable all along, under a name that never mentioned vaulting. action and interact were worse: two different keys whose names said the same thing, until interact was folded into action (F).

The search box searches all families, not the open tab — you type in it precisely because you do not know where the key lives. See Localization for the label keys themselves.

Prompts show the key that is bound

Never write a key into a prompt. "[F] Drop" lies to anyone who rebound action.

# InputLabel names the key as printed on the player's own layout ("²" on AZERTY)
player.interact_label.text = _prompt(&"action", tr("%%HUD_DROP"))

The same helper names keys in the controls list, so there is one answer per key for the whole game.

A modifier does not separate two actions on its own

is_action_pressed() ignores modifiers: an action bound to L matches a plain L and Alt+L. So binding Alt+L next to an existing L gives you two actions that both fire on the same press — the head lights toggle while you meant to cut the moon lights.

Two actions currently sit on L (the head lights, and the moon lights on Alt+L) and two on I for exactly this reason. When you add a modified variant of a key that is already taken, guard both sides symmetrically: the plain action must reject the press when the modifier is held, and the modified one must require it. Checking only the new action leaves the old one firing.

Exception: dev/bench tools

Bench and debug-only keys (e.g. the test bench's T/N, F4, F10) may stay raw keycodes — they are developer tools, not part of the player's control settings.