I’ve used a lot of gaming controllers through the years. From the unique PlayStation to the newest Xbox, I’ve probably used each mainstream console’s controller not less than as soon as. What has been true, till lately, was that the official controller was going to be the best. They’d beat out the third-party choices in ergonomics, responsiveness, connectivity, and battery life more often than not.
Nonetheless, this has slowly shifted through the years: First-party controllers have began to have extra points, whereas the manufacturing high quality of third-party controllers has improved to be roughly on par with the likes of Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo.
Taking this into consideration, the PB Tails Metal Crush Defender gaming controller is a very fascinating idea. It is a singular, high-quality controller that works throughout a number of units and avoids the issues that plague first-party controllers as we speak. However whereas the idea is nice, it wants a bit extra polish to be a real competitor.
The Stick-Drift Drawback
The most important difficulty most individuals wrestle with on their controllers (together with me) is stick drift. Seemingly ubiquitous throughout Xbox, PlayStation, and Nintendo controllers, this difficulty comes from analog joysticks slowly changing into much less correct over time, to the purpose the place they finally begin to continually detect slight directional inputs even when sitting untouched.
{Photograph}: Henri Robbins
There are fairly just a few theories as to what causes this, with the most well-liked attributing the drift to smaller (and thus extra fragile) joysticks, cheaper parts, and minimize corners, or tighter manufacturing tolerances to cut back the “lifeless zone” on the heart of the controller.
Regardless, the problem grew to become giant sufficient for Nintendo to face a class-action suit over it. The issue seemingly isn’t prevalent (or extra realistically, worthwhile) sufficient for any first-party producers to begin utilizing joysticks that don’t drift. As an alternative, most avid gamers settle for they’ll have to purchase a brand new controller when theirs begins to float, search for DIY repairs, or flip towards the aftermarket for controllers that don’t have this difficulty.
The Corridor Impact Answer
A reasonably frequent answer is to suit your Swap’s Pleasure-Con controllers with Hall Effect joysticks that may remove stick drift. However putting in one thing like that is pretty technical and sophisticated for the typical particular person, and it voids the guarantee, so it’s not an ideal answer.
Enter PB Tails. The corporate’s controllers use Corridor Impact switches (you may learn extra about the technology in this explainer), which it claims are proof against creating drift over time. Its latest mannequin, the Metallic Crush Defender, takes it a step additional. This controller makes use of Tunneling Magneto-Resistance (TMR) joysticks, that are theoretically extra responsive, correct, and sturdy than typical Corridor Impact joysticks. Including to this, the controller has multidevice assist. It is appropriate with Android, iOS, Home windows, MacOS, Raspberry Pi, and the Swap natively and wirelessly. The one lacking platforms are Xbox and PlayStation.
