ZDoom

I must be doing something wrong, because nothing I do gets me past the title screen. Usually, you press the "any" key to get the menu. But now, nothing? It worked a couple days ago.

Things I've tried:
- Different wad files and addons
- Different wad files with no addons
- Separate 32bit installation of gzdoom (was using 64bit initially)

It's like my keyboard is only good for Alt+F4. But why?

My first thought, maybe your settings file got damaged somehow and reset key bindings to blank?

Try to rename the gzdoom-YOURUSERNAMEHERE.ini file to something else (it may show up as just gzdoom-YOURUSERNAMEHERE if you have file extensions hidden).
On next gzdoom start it should have all settings reset to default, including keybinds.

If that was the problem, you can try to upload the bad file here so we can take a look.
If it was not the problem, you can delete the newly-created settings file and rename the old back to get your settings back, and we can continue troubleshooting...

I don't see any .ini files in the gzdoom folder at all. Nor do I remember ever seeing one when it worked. It should be right there with the .exe right?

Typically should be next to the exe, yes, unless you put the GZDoom folder in Program Files folder.
Then Windows "make stupid old programs from 1998 work" feature will kick in, and redirect the writes to a folder under
C:\Users\YOURUSERNAMEHERE\AppData\Local\VirtualStore\Program Files\GZDoom
or similar.
You can press Win+R and enter %LOCALAPPDATA% with percent signs into the Run window to go to the right location, then descend into VirtualStore folders.

Aaaah, I did not know Windows did that. I am relocating out of Program Files. And yes, that did the trick! Thanks!

Hmm, although now that I'm playing with it again, it seems going fullscreen is what causes the problem. As soon as I do that, I lose control. Alt+F4 and delete .ini file again

Curiouser and curiouser...

We will need you to run the game with a parameter like this:
gzdoom.exe +logfile "C:\path\to\gzdoom\gzdoom.log"

Not sure if you're familiar with command line (sounds like you are), but your other option is to make a shortcut to the game exe, edit properties, and add the parameter to the "target" field line.
Or add it in some kind of "extra parameters" field in your launcher program if you use one and it has that.

This should make all the startup and console log be copied to the specified file.

Then please:
1. delete/rename the corrupted .ini file
2. start the game, so it opens with defaults and working keyboard
3. enter fullscreen so it breaks for you
4. alt+f4
5. make a copy of the freshly corrupted .ini file and of the log file
6. start the game again and alt+f4
7. make a copy of logfile from this second run (with corrupted ini)
8. attach the .ini and the two logs to a post here so people smarter than me can look at it. (Of course I'll try to help too, but I know what I don't know.)

Thanks!

Here ya go.

Also, I don't know if gzdoom did it or something else, but I lost a whole lot of control over explorer.exe after playing with this yesterday, long after gzdoom was closed. I had to ctrl+alt+del in order to shut my system down.

... yeah, this definitely needs someone more experienced.
Your keybindings are perfectly well preserved in the ini file, so I would think that it's the fullscreen switch that somehow kills things for you.

You're running the newest stable driver for your GPU, and I'm sure if it'd be general bad-Win10-patch kind of malfunction we'd hear of similar situations from lots of others.
Try to edit the ini, find fullscreen=true and change it back to false. Then look for win_borderless=false and win_maximzied=false nearby and set them to true.

This should make GZDoom run in "looks like fullscreen mode, but isn't" - and might be some kind of workaround for you, if it'd make it work.
Good luck.

Borderless is a good workaround, thanks for that. But yeah, this is a proper bug, I fear.

It is for sure a bug with /something/ - might be something as exotic as some odd software on your laptop or maybe a forgotten gamepad left plugged in and somehow taking priority.
But it's for sure out of my league, at least.
Glad borderless works - I hope it's an acceptable way of playing for you, at least temporarily.
All the best!