The Blood of Dawnwalker: How to Fix Stuttering Controller Movement

Movement in The Blood of Dawnwalker can feel broken on PC when you play with a gamepad. Instead of walking or sprinting smoothly, Coen stutters, snaps between speeds, and drops out of a sprint for no reason. The cause is not your frame rate. It is how the left stick’s circular deadzone is being read, and you can correct it in a couple of minutes without touching the game’s own settings.

Quick answer: Open the Steam overlay with Shift + Tab, edit the game’s controller layout, and under the Left Joystick behavior set Deadzone Source to Custom and Deadzone Shape to Square, then lower the left deadzone limit to about 90.

Fix janky controller movement in Steam’s controller layout

This is the fix that works for most controllers, because it changes how Steam hands your stick input to the game rather than relying on the game’s limited controller menu. You need the game running so the overlay opens on the correct layout.

Launch The Blood of Dawnwalker with your controller already connected, then press Shift + Tab to bring up the Steam overlay. Open the controller settings for the game from there. The panel should show your gamepad listed as the active device.

Controller settings panel for The Blood of Dawnwalker with XINPUT CONTROLLER #1 selected — The controller settings panel for the game, with XINPUT CONTROLLER #1 selected as the active device.

Select Edit Layout. You will see tabs for Buttons, DPad, Triggers and Joysticks along the side of the editor.

Layout editor open on the Buttons tab showing controller button assignments — The layout editor opens on the Buttons tab; the joystick options live in a separate tab.

Open the Joysticks tab and find Left Joystick. Click the gear icon next to its Behavior entry to reach the detailed stick options.

Joystick sensitivity options showing output, deadzone, outer ring and haptics settings — The stick options include sensitivity, output, outer ring and haptics alongside the deadzone controls.

Change Deadzone Source from its default to Custom. This unlocks the shape and limit controls that are otherwise handled for you.

Switch Deadzone Shape from Circle to Square. This single change is what stops the stuttering, because the game stops receiving the clipped circular stick values that cause movement to break up.

Deadzones tab with joystick deadzone sliders and a Start Test button — The deadzone controls, including the sliders you adjust and a test option for checking stick output.

Drag the left deadzone limit slider down to roughly 90, then back out of the editor so the layout saves. Return to the game and move in a few directions to confirm the change took effect.

Setting	Value
Deadzone Source	Custom
Deadzone Shape	Square
Left deadzone limit	About 90

Fix it in controller companion software instead (GameSir, 8BitDo, Flydigi)

If your pad ships with its own desktop app, you can apply the same idea at the hardware level and skip the Steam layout entirely. The wording differs between brands, but the goal is identical: stop the stick output from being mapped to a circle.

Open the companion app for your controller, such as GameSir Nexus for a G7 Pro 8K, and connect the pad so the app detects it.

Go to the sticks section of the settings and set Stick Trajectory to Raw. That converts the trajectory from a circle to a square, which is the same correction the Steam fix applies.

Set the Inner deadzone value to 5.0 and save the profile to the controller. Relaunch the game if it was already running when you changed the profile.

Note: pick one method or the other. Stacking a hardware profile on top of a custom Steam layout makes it harder to tell which layer is responsible if movement still feels wrong.

How to confirm the fix worked

Load into the world and hold the left stick fully in one direction, then rotate it in a slow circle. Coen should hold a steady walking or running pace without the speed snapping up and down. Press the left stick in to sprint and keep it held while turning; the sprint should stay engaged instead of dropping in and out.

Coen running toward a quest objective with the tracker showing Meet with Anca at the old inn — Running toward a tracked objective is a quick way to test sustained sprinting after the change. Image: Rebel Wolves

Camera control is handled by the right stick and is unaffected by this change, so if only movement was stuttering before, that is the only thing you should notice a difference in.

If movement still stutters after the deadzone change

The most common reason the fix appears not to work is that a second input layer is still processing your stick. The controller settings menu also exposes options to disable Steam Input and reorder controllers, and either can change which layer the game listens to.

Make sure only one remapping layer is active. Running a custom Steam layout and a third-party profile at the same time can produce duplicate or conflicting stick input.
Disconnect and reconnect the controller, then restart the game with it already plugged in or paired.
If the game shows keyboard prompts while the pad is connected, it is reading another input device. Resolve that before judging the deadzone change.
If you have remapped bindings inside the game, restore the default layout and test movement again before rebuilding your custom setup.

Once the square deadzone is in place, the game’s own controller options stay untouched, so your sensitivity, vibration and button mapping choices carry over exactly as you left them. The layout is saved per game in Steam, which means the fix stays applied the next time you launch and does not affect how your controller behaves anywhere else.