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Microsoft Announces Customizable Xbox Elite Wireless Controller
MojoKid writes: Today, Microsoft announced that later this year, it will be releasing what could be the "ultimate" Xbox and Windows game controller. Called Xbox Elite Wireless, this gamepad has a dramatically overhauled D-pad and four paddles underneath. Other features that make this gamepad special: there are trigger locks, the ability to customize thumbstick sensitivity, along with the level of travel for the top triggers. In addition, it also sports swappable components, like the paddles, etc. Pricing has been announced at $149 and given just how advanced this gamepad is over the original, it's understandable but still pretty steep.
As a casual gamer, I have maybe two or three hours per week to play games. I don't want to spend all of that time trying to figure out a goddamn 30-button controller! At least with a PC keyboard I can use it for many other things than playing games, including typing this very comment. But with modern console controllers all they can do is control games, and nothing else. Playing games using one of these controllers is just a time investment that I can't afford to make!
It cannot be the ultimate PC game controller, because it does not have bluetooth support. Modern bluetooth has a low-latency mode which is totally suitable for game controllers, but Microsoft not only didn't use it, this is the second proprietary protocol they've used. The whole system is just a big "fuck you" to the players, as usual. When you consider all the other fuck-yous that they backpedaled on, they're really the biggest assholes in gaming.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The controller is probably the one thing more than anything else that prevents me from having an interest in the XBOne, just like the 360 & XBox before them. The PS controllers have always seemed more comfortable to me due to their symmetry.
Taking guns away from the 99% gives the 1% 100% of the power.
It still bothers me spending more than $30 for any controller other than a fighting stick. This one is ridiculous.
Wow, unless they use leaf switches, those sound like really crappy buttons. You should really think about switching to Cherry-brand microswitches.
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
I understand this controller isn't meant for casual players, but I think this is an example of choosing complexity over usability. If I'm trying to get more gamers to play Xbox One, I would invest in technologies that will allow normal players to enjoy a game as much as pro players rather than invest in technologies that widens the gap between pro players and normal players. There are far more normal gamers than "pro" gamers.
Take Splatoon for instance. It took a genre that is reserved for hardcore brogamers and made it accessible and fun for everyone - including brogamers. They didn't do it by making the game complex nor did they do it by making a dumbed down game. Nintendo achieved its goals by encapsulating the complexities of a shooter in a way that is intuitive for everyone. As engineers, that's what we should all be striving for.
https://scufgaming.com/
Who logs in to gdm? Not I, said the duck.
I was looking at this and Hololens and was kind of excited. I'm not a fan of Microsoft, but hey, they're putting out some cool stuff.
Then I found out for your $150, they're not giving you a play and charge battery.
Bollocks. What the fuck Microsoft? At least it's controllable over USB now.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.
Which will eventually hard-crash against the floor in a fit of rage.
"The controller is seen as a huge improvement. In FPS playtesting, test subiects using this controller had their butts handed to them by a mouser in 2.8 seconds, compared to 1.3 seconds with the old controller."
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
It has a round censored spot in all photos. Is there a dick or a nipple there or something?
Please bring back the Microsoft Sidewinder, as that was the best game controller ever made.
Microsoft advertises windows support for their xbone controllers. They sell a cable for the explicit purpose of using with your Windows PC.
And when it breaks after just a couple days, you're screwed.
They refuse to honor the warranty if you don't also own an xbone.
"Note You must register your Xbox One console to replace a wireless controller thatâ(TM)s under warranty."
Seems like a flagrant violation of Magnuson-Moss to me.
As far as the natural/neutral positioning of your hands is concerned... The Wii Pro Stick is by far the most comfortable controller to hold, it also has the least amount of "thumb-travel" to switch from the Control Sticks to the D-Pad or Buttons.
Even with fairly large (long) hands, the bulkier/larger bodied controllers aren't any more comfortable.
At least the XBox Elite solves one problem that nearly all game-pads have -- half of your fingers are underneath the controller body, and are not needed to hold/support the controller --- a well designed controller will comfortably est on the bottom and sides of your palms, which leaves your fingers nothing to do at all.
What the XBox Elite doesn't solve is a console control-scheme problem --- the complete inability to use a button/key press as a modifier key... along with console games that assign disparate actions to the same button in a different context, instead of considering the flexibility of a modifier key.
If you assign Ctrl, and Shift to the two thumb buttons, then you get 4 states for each of the 3 standard mouse buttons --- without reaching for a keyboard yet.
Instead of a 5 button mouse, you have 9 additional states that you can use above and beyond the normal three L/M/R clicks.
How about recognizing that if a product isn't perfect, that criticism is valid? That handwave doesn't work.
Twitter supports and protects racists - by smearing their critics with the "Hate Speech" label.
Bollocks. What the fuck Microsoft? At least it's controllable over USB now.
Yes. That's a dramatic change over the last controller that they made.
Or the one before that.
Or the one before that.
Of course the regular Xb1 controller also does USB. But not including the play and charge battery block is just a jerk move. Especially for a controller that costs 150 bones.
Wireless play and charge kit for the 360 didn't support Usb control btw. You needed a dingus that plugged in via USB for *any* wireless controller. The Xbox's controller didn't have a standard USB dingus at the end. That thing is a third party hack.
Non impediti ratione cogitationus.