Hello, tl;dr below post if you don't wanna read the text wall

I started playing Osu! seriously a few months ago (I played on and off for a year or so before then but never passing any hard difficulty song using mouse only) and recently got to a more decent level of play using keyboard and mouse where I can get an A rank on a few insane songs and A or S most hard songs I come across and am currently working on Achieving A ranks on 5 star rating songs with higher AR and BPM's but I realize that as the songs get more and more mechanically difficult i'm going to be putting more and more stress onto my wrists and arms. Currently I have only ever experienced any pain while playing osu after very extended play sessions and I quit promptly (after say 6 hours or so total of play) after the pain became noticeable enough to interfere with gameplay. From what other posts i've seen discussing this topic said, I believe this pain was in the median nerve due to elbows being lower than my hands while playing, i'm working to rectify this and see if I can prevent it happening in the future.

As such, I would like to know what osu players more seasoned and experienced than myself do to

- aid in warming up every day before playing
- what setup you have as far as arm position and upper body posture
- what experience have you had in the past with wrist pain or anything regarding that and any advice on what you did to fix it (aside from go see a doctor, though their advice on avoidance would be welcome if you care to recount it)
- if you have never experienced anything major regarding pain or physical issues after playing, would you mind sharing how long you've played and what sort of difficulty level you have reached, total play count, tablet vs. mouse, etc.?

I realize a lot of pain people experience could be due to a lot of other environmental or genetic factors than just their osu playstyle or play amount but i'm curious if any of the more skilled higher up people experience any sort of recurring pains like i've noticed a few threads describing after a cursory search.

As a side note, I play with base windows mouse speed with default dpi settings on mouse and 1.6x speed in game, is there anything to suggest less wrist stress is generated long term by playing on higher or lower speeds mouse wise? I would think that lower speeds would generate more stress in the muscle and nerves due to larger movements, but that's just my thoughts.

tl;dr - to players more experienced than myself, do you currently experience any pain after or during osu play and either way, what do you do setup-wise to prevent it?

Do regular stretches, train faster and build muscle, eat and sleep healthy. No pain no gain.

Not playing with a mouse anymore but I don't think I have ever felt something else than wrist pain. Don't grip your mouse too hard, it's pretty much the worst thing you can do regarding pain prevention.
And make pauses.
I also feel like doing finger exercises help (insert pubescent joke here) but that might just me getting more relaxed playing osu.

Saphirshroom wrote:

Don't grip your mouse too hard, it's pretty much the worst thing you can do regarding pain prevention.

Any tips on that? I can easily play most hard songs without gripping hard at all but on some high bpm insane maps or 5 star maps I almost can't help it if i want to get close to the accuracy and speed required to get a decent score.

tip practice merry christmas

No incredible tips, only my own opinion :

If you're playing with a mouse, i suggest you play at 1.0x speed setting without acceleration because if you're playing some other games (especialy FPS or MOBAs that requires mouse accuracy) you want the muscle memory that reduce a lot of stress and pain.

Also you need a confortable mouse (sounds a bit obvious). When i used to play with a mouse it was a Razer Naga that i use for my other games, and it was ok. But when i came around 4 stars maps i started feeling a growing pain in my pinkie because i used it as a break on my mousepad. Hopefully the Naga have a removable part on the right side and i switched to a larger one to get my pinkie onto it.

Anyway i'm now playing with a tablet (after less than 2 month playing actively) and in the begining it was reaaally painful for me until i found a comfortable position.

In my opinion the most important point is that you HAVE to change your settings / gear / positionning as soon as you feel pain because time spent on something that hurts you is wasted time.

I've been having reoccuring wrist pain since a couple of months already. Just take a break, and do stretches once it starts.
a) I stopped using my wrist for the most part to get rid of it since it's only my wrist hurting from fast singletaps
b) Stop tensing up so much - this was the biggest problem for me

I dunno what else to say, getting an injury for this game isn't worth it so if it gets too heavy just take a break for a week/month. Better safe than sorry

I've never had any kind of pain from osu!. I don't do any stretches or anything for warmup, I just go straight into playing.

The key to avoiding pain is not doing anything that will cause it in the first place. Have a comfortable position for both hands, and don't try to push through pain. Take regular breaks (not just a few hours a day, but also breaks that last 2-3 days) and see a doctor if you have any 'permanent pain'.

In other words, most people who get injuries from this game are either trying to copy a playstyle of someone else that they find extremely uncomfortable / straining, or because they play for hours a day, with zero breaks or days off.

Use common sense and you will never be in pain.

tendons and joints, hurting is bad

muscles do recover in a relatively short

i'd advise you to use less wrists and not doing things that make your wrists hurt

I don't have any arm or wrist pains, but after a few hours of gameplay, my fingers swell up, especially my left index/middle finger which I use on the keyboard.

Play less

No pain no gain!

Thats what I say to myself lol but..

You will get some degree of pain that you may have to get used to if you don't play much, I think its due to your arms adjusting to something it hasn't been use to but if it does get severe I think you should take the advice of the people above me and change to get comfy or take a break.

Take breaks from playing.. Go watch a episode of whatever and then get back to playing

Helped me

Bauxe wrote:

I've never had any kind of pain from osu!

this.

One of the reasons I changed to tablet was due to the wrist pain I got from playing mouse.. I had the bad habit of holding the mouse too hard, I also have an Abyssus which isn't the most confortable one to hold either lol

Since I got the tablet I never got wrist pain again, and I still play mouse from time to time. I'm not saying for you to get a tablet though, at least try to change the way you play and test to see if it hurts less/more. If nothing helps, only then I'd consider getting a tablet.

ey b0ss

Thanks to all for the responses, your opinions are appreciated!

Milhofo wrote:

One of the reasons I changed to tablet was due to the wrist pain I got from playing mouse.. I had the bad habit of holding the mouse too hard, I also have an Abyssus which isn't the most confortable one to hold either lol

Since I got the tablet I never got wrist pain again, and I still play mouse from time to time. I'm not saying for you to get a tablet though, at least try to change the way you play and test to see if it hurts less/more. If nothing helps, only then I'd consider getting a tablet.

I've often considered getting a tablet considering how much I like osu , I have the same issue of holding too hard and I feel like that's contributing heavily to what causes my pain as well. I'll definitely consider picking up a tablet in the next few months, thanks for the idea!

Bauxe wrote:

I've never had any kind of pain from osu!. I don't do any stretches or anything for warmup, I just go straight into playing.

The key to avoiding pain is not doing anything that will cause it in the first place.

One day I will fc image material rip dream. Better stick to 180bpm and avoid jump maps.

In that case RIP my osu dreams. I have pretty bad RSI in my left hand which would most likely need endoscopic surgery to repair.

The process of building muscles involves a partial breaking down of old muscle followed by a regrowth of new muscle. If the pain stemming from one of the muscles involved in playing osu! you probably have reason to be concerned. Otherwise, I wouldn't worry about it too much early on. With that said, I don't believe there is a muscle group in the wrist so that's probably from squeezing a nerve which is bad.

First of all, since I come from playing counter-strike with pretty low sensitivity, I am used to move my arm / wrist a lot, and because of that, I never had problems with pain in these parts...

After 2 months or something I bought a tablet tho and i feel pretty comfy with it.

But there's 1 thing which I can't avoid, except putting a patch/plaster over it...
After 2-3 hours I experience that the joints on my pinky turn red and start aching a lot. This pretty much goes that far, that I get almost like a little blister in that regions... (not like a normal blister with water in it, but it gets bigger when playing longer.. )

Did anyone experience something like that? And if yes, what do you do to avoid that?

mbL1337 wrote:

First of all, since I come from playing counter-strike with pretty low sensitivity, I am used to move my arm / wrist a lot, and because of that, I never had problems with pain in these parts...

After 2 months or something I bought a tablet tho and i feel pretty comfy with it.

But there's 1 thing which I can't avoid, except putting a patch/plaster over it...
After 2-3 hours I experience that the joints on my pinky turn red and start aching a lot. This pretty much goes that far, that I get almost like a little blister in that regions... (not like a normal blister with water in it, but it gets bigger when playing longer.. )

Did anyone experience something like that? And if yes, what do you do to avoid that?

I would recommend doing a cold press on the blister. It's probably just swelling. They call it a pen finger.

As for me, I don't get pain in the hands, but more so on the arm because I have very little space to rest my arm. My arms get sore and tense up, during the next day, I'll have extreme joint pains. What I do now, is I would massage my arm, and personally (you guys don't have to do this) I use some traditional Chinese medicine called Tie Da oil. You rub it on the joints, and it'll sting, but it's a bone-setter.

mbL1337 wrote:

But there's 1 thing which I can't avoid, except putting a patch/plaster over it...
After 2-3 hours I experience that the joints on my pinky turn red and start aching a lot. This pretty much goes that far, that I get almost like a little blister in that regions... (not like a normal blister with water in it, but it gets bigger when playing longer.. )

Did anyone experience something like that? And if yes, what do you do to avoid that?

Chances are you are putting too much pressure on your pinky.

Bauxe wrote:

Chances are you are putting too much pressure on your pinky.

Mh, yeah probably...
I think I also use too much pressure when writing/drawing i guess, but that's hard to adjust if you always did it that way

Kaetwo wrote:

I would recommend doing a cold press on the blister. It's probably just swelling. They call it a pen finger.

As for me, I don't get pain in the hands, but more so on the arm because I have very little space to rest my arm. My arms get sore and tense up, during the next day, I'll have extreme joint pains. What I do now, is I would massage my arm, and personally (you guys don't have to do this) I use some traditional Chinese medicine called Tie Da oil. You rub it on the joints, and it'll sting, but it's a bone-setter.

Thanks for the recommendation, it normally goes away after 2-3 days again... Maybe I just need to build some more skin on that spots..

im tryng to get better and ima 13 cunt i´ve been playn cs since like 7 years so wrist papain aint a problem butt since i started playng osu my arm(not the wrist or hand) is hurting af then i get confy and it gets better but still

Nah I don't really feel any pain except numbness and sometimes strain when I singletap 200 bpm after 10 secs

I have only a little pain in my arm when I play stressful maps