Here’s an interesting bit of kit being shown off at Tokyo Game Show. This is the FragFX 2, designed by SplitFish. It’s a PS3 controller designed for FPS games which provides the benefits of a mouse. Note the nunchuk-like apparatus on the left end, the plastic mousepad (which may or may not be attached to the nunchuk; it’s unclear from the photo) and the four Playstation buttons along the thumb-side of the mouse.
Somewhat surprising to me is that there’s some criticism of the device coming out. Ian Dean of Playstation World Magazine has been quoted saying, “It defeats the point of playing on console, really. If you want to use a mouse and keyboard play COD4 on a PC, the PS3 pad is perfectly set-up to play FPS.” He goes on to suggest that, “it’s a gimmick few PS3 owners really want.”
I can understand the concern from console players that the introduction of this peripheral could unbalance play, as we all know the advantages of using a mouse in an FPS game. That said, I don’t want to play Call of Duty 4 or any other FPS on my PC. That’s why I own consoles. Just because I play my games on consoles does not mean that I would not prefer to play these titles with the control scheme best suited to doing so.
There are a few questions I have about it, though. If the device works as it is being touted, would you consider buying one to step up your game? Could this sort of thing create a bit of an arms race as people attempt to maintain equal footing? Or, alternately, could it hurt the FPS space by limiting the number of players interested in playing with people who might have an advantage simply because of their controller?
[Via TechRadar]
