How to lock your mouse inside a game on a dual monitor setup.

[+Warwagon MVC]

How to lock your mouse in a game on a dual monitor setup. v1.11

Today I?m going to show you how to keep your mouse inside a game if you have a multiple monitor setup. Sometimes with a multiple monitor setup when you move your mouse from left to right inside the game the mouse can leave the game and move to a different monitor. If while your mouse is on the other screen you click (thinking you are still in the game) it can alt + tab you out of the game and in some cases crash it. Most people have no issue with this and their mouse behaves just like it should, for others it's a pain the ass.

Recently while playing the new Tomb Raider my mouse refused to stay inside the monitor the game was on. While looking around the internet I found a bunch of suggestions most of which didn?t work, but there was one that did.

The free program is called

Dual Monitor tools

http://dualmonitorto...ourceforge.net/

So what does Dual Monitor Tools do? Before you start a game you will press a key combination (which you will configure below). This will lock the mouse inside the screen; it will not be able to go to any of your other monitors until you press that same key combination again. In doing this it also locks your mouse inside the game.

The program comes as a zip file and requires no installation. To use the application simply unzip it to a directory of your choice.

Step 1) Open the directory you just extracted the zip to

Step 2) Double click ?SwapScreen.exe?

Step 3) Right click Swap Screen next to your clock

Step 4) Left click Options

Step 5) Left click on the ?Cursor? tab

Step 6) Go down under ?Lock Cursor onto screen? and click ?Change?. Now select a key combination of your choice.

Step 5) Click close.

That?s it! You are finished! Hurray!

Edited August 5, 2015 by warwagon

[Dot Matrix]

I've been playing many games on a multimonitor hookup, and the games have always locked the mouse inside automatically...?

[+Warwagon MVC]

I've been playing many games on a multimonitor hookup, and the games have always locked the mouse inside automatically...?

Yep it should lock your mouse automatically, but sometimes people have issues. If they do they can use this.

[HawkMan]

The only games I've seen that don't loop I are games that allows you to run full screen windowed. And the whole purpose of that is to not lock it....

[J_R_G]

Some people need a second monitor on during gaming, but if you don't, I would disable it. Activate the charms menu (upper or lower right corner), then go to devices, second screen and select PC screen only or second screen only if that's what you play on, the screen will go to sleep so you don't need to turn it off. Then after gaming go back and redo it except select extend (or duplicate if you use that). Uses less gpu memory, keeps the gpu cooler, and avoids the mouse moving between screens issue. If not using Windows 8 or 2012, you can do it with right click desktop->screen resolution, or maybe there's some program to automate the process out there.

[Raa]

Rarely I come across this issue, usually older games that didn't understand dual monitors, or just cheap games with cheaper coders :p

[Mystic Mungis]

Can people not just be thankful that he went to the trouble of putting this together? You might not have the issue but others do, I for one haven't encountered any issues with the mouse locking but now if I do or if someone asks me about it I know of a new program that could help out so thanks for bringing it to my attention!

[HawkMan]

Some people need a second monitor on during gaming, but if you don't, I would disable it. Activate the charms menu (upper or lower right corner), then go to devices, second screen and select PC screen only or second screen only if that's what you play on, the screen will go to sleep so you don't need to turn it off. Then after gaming go back and redo it except select extend (or duplicate if you use that). Uses less gpu memory, keeps the gpu cooler, and avoids the mouse moving between screens issue. If not using Windows 8 or 2012, you can do it with right click desktop->screen resolution, or maybe there's some program to automate the process out there.

ctrl+P but having the screen on doesn't really affect FPS or temp to any noticeable degree.

[+Warwagon MVC]

Everyone is correct in saying that you can turn off the screens that you don't want to use while playing the game. In my case I want my screens left on so I can monitor downloads and chats. This is a really great and fast solution to quickly lock and unlock your mouse from a particular screen.

[Max Norris]

Was never a fan of turning off screens either.. can keep an eye on the other displays while gaming and doesn't hurt the framerate any.. typically prefer running games in a borderless "full screen window" when the option is available. Windows in general (especially 7 and 8) has fantastic multimonitor support. Think I've only had one or two oldies that didn't play nicely with multiple displays and lost focus.. annoying when it happened though, and some old games don't take kindly to losing focus either. (Visual issues or even better, splattage.) Used a similar tool called CursorLock to take care of it.

[bestgamerEU]

I registered just to say thanks for this recommendation.

This is necessary not only for running borderless windowed mode with multiple displays, but also for disabling mouse scrolling (which the currently most popular game in the world does not allow) in favor of keyboard scrolling.

Btw I know many gamers who are using underdeveloped open source overlay software that functions ONLY when fullscreen mode is disabled.

@replies saying OP's contribution is useless....you really must be sooo bored with your lives to be finding time and reasons for such "critique". I'm glad I'm not you haha

[+Warwagon MVC]

I registered just to say thanks for this recommendation.

This is necessary not only for running borderless windowed mode with multiple displays, but also for disabling mouse scrolling (which the currently most popular game in the world does not allow) in favor of keyboard scrolling.

Btw I know many gamers who are using underdeveloped open source overlay software that functions ONLY when fullscreen mode is disabled.

@replies saying OP's contribution is useless....you really must be sooo bored with your lives to be finding time and reasons for such "critique". I'm glad I'm not you haha

Weclome to Neowin! :D

[groan]

I also wanted to reply so Im a new registrant.

Thanks for this suggestion. It does holp a lot in this case.

 

I still have a problem, though that I am struggling with.

Windows 8 has that "charms Bar" on the right and the App bar on the left. When in windowed mode it will activate these corners when my mouse travels over them. This is a pain because if I click and i'm over there it activates whatever item I am hovering over.

 

I'm looking for an ability to disable these menus on one monitor and leave it active on the other. Now it will activate no matter what monitor corner I hover over.

 

Thoughts?

 

I'm going to try Classic Shell.

http://www.askvg.com/classic-shell-get-classic-start-menu-and-explorer-toolbar-buttons-cut-copy-paste-etc-back-in-windows-vista-and-7/

 

It has the ability to disable the Charms bar. I'll report back. In War Thunder (game) I am constantly getting that charms bar showing up so hopefully this will help.

[groan]

Tested and I can say that after several hours of playing War Thunder I never once went out of window to my other screen using the tool you suggested and I never once saw the Charms. Finally I can play/work in peace!

Thank you!

[DrJohnSmitherson]

This is a great tool. I sometimes have issues. I know gta4 and world in conflict have issues for me!

THANKS :D

[briangw]

I noticed this happening when the Windows 8 Preview came out last year and even after putting the full version on with my dual monitor setup. Mouse just leaves my game of Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion when I scroll around the edge. Thanks for this warwagon!

[Dukath]

I signed up for an account on the forums here, just to say thank you for this suggestion.

 

I've run multiple displays for years, and every once in a while I come across a game that (for whatever reason) I see this problem with.

 

This suggestion worked perfectly, and is certainly worth taking the time to register for a forum account to say Thanks!

[Crossie]

This tool is awesome, I recently reinstaled GTA 4 and had those issues.

Registered to forum just to say thanks.

 

So yeah thanks man! :D

[fsm123]

Just wanted to thank the OP.

 

I don't use this for games, but for my desktop.  I was having such a hard time finding the sweet spot to activate charms, etc. on my center monitor in my 3 monitor setup.  This tool allows me to make the cursor "sticky", making it much easier. 

 

This is the kind of thing that should be built into Windows 8.

 

Thanks again!

[boocowgrrl]

Thank very much, kind sir. Now I can play Skyrim on one monitor while watching & chatting on Twitch on another. Much appreciated :-)

[Andrew Evenstar]

I also registered just to say thank you! this was preventing me from playing FO3 the way I liked. Thanks so much!

 

 

I registered just to say thanks for this recommendation.

This is necessary not only for running borderless windowed mode with multiple displays, but also for disabling mouse scrolling (which the currently most popular game in the world does not allow) in favor of keyboard scrolling.

Btw I know many gamers who are using underdeveloped open source overlay software that functions ONLY when fullscreen mode is disabled.

@replies saying OP's contribution is useless....you really must be sooo bored with your lives to be finding time and reasons for such "critique". I'm glad I'm not you haha

[Jase]

Checking this out now! thanks for the tutorial!

 

Do you think it's possible to also mirror the mouse?

[jenovaswitness37]

I went through a lot of ###### to give you props. But you deserve it good sir. Exactly what I was looking for. Good lookin out!

[Kala the Fox]

I just signed up, just to say thank you. I looked at snakebite's mouse lock, and I didn't like it. This is simplicity at it's best. it does what you want,. and leaves itself open to do more should you choose. Thank you!

 

 

Cheers.

[HawkMan]

Just for the heck of it I decided to try this with Glactic Starfighter for SWTOR... yeah, as soon as SWTOR is activated as the active program any mouse locking is disabled so it only annoyingly locks the mouse outisde the game if I click somethign when it goes to the other screen...