Spaceships need joysticks
Posted on July 16, 2007 in Gaming. - No comments
It was my desire to relive those good old days that drove my desire to try and find a space combat simulation that would replace Elite (if there could ever be such a thing!). I had strange urges to re-experience the kind of excitement you only get when you’re battling Thargoids!
This search led me to X3 Reunion which looked fantastic in the screen-shots and the reviews seemed to suggest it was just the kind of thing I was after.
Imagine my excitement when it finally arrived from Amazon. Then imagine how my excitement descended into depression when I realised that my laptop really wasn’t got to be able to cope with running the game – a frame rate of one frame per hour wasn’t going to lead to anything close to “game play!”
So I waited, and waited until good fortune meant that a reasonable 1Ghz P4 machine came into my possession. I splashed out on a new graphics card and to my relief – X3 ran like a dream. However, it soon became apparent that trying to play the game using a combination of mouse and keys just wasn’t going to work for me. It just didn’t feel right and there was no way my feeble co-ordination was going to cope! There was just something “not quite right” with flying a spaceship without a joystick.
Old Joysticks
Now, I’ve not owned a joystick since those old Amiga/Commodore 64 days. I remember owning two in particular – a Quickshot Turbo II (which I used to use when playing Elite and Frontier) and a Zipstick Super Pro that I used for just about everything else. I used to have a Speedking for a while, but my brother bent the “unbreakable” steel shaft when he hit me with it.
Saitek Cyborg Evo
I decided that if I was going to really get into X3 – I had to get myself a joystick. So again I powered up my web browser and loaded up Amazon. I’m not someone who has the patience to compare hundreds of reviews so I prodded around a bit and basically just picked a joystick I liked the look of – the Saitek Cyborg Evo.
It was only a couple of days before the joystick arrived, and for a change I was in when it was delivered. I felt a guilty for depriving the delivery man the pleasure of lobbing my parcel over the back fence and allowing it to get soaked in the rain. Maybe next time.
Well, the Cyborg Evo is excellent and my initial impressions was incredibly favourable. The joystick was adjustable to ensure the best gaming comfort no matter if you’re left or right handed. More importantly, when flying your spaceship, the joystick feels right! All the right buttons under your thumb made combat a pleasure (no more frantic stabbing at the keyboard looking for the right keys!)
The 3D twist of the shaft to control the rudder was a revelation which took a bit of getting used, but then it was also a new experience using a proper analogue joystick but after some practice it seemed natural enough.
Shame it doesn’t suck
Did you notice something about those old joysticks pictured above? That’s right, they both had rubber suckers – something that was missing from the Cyborg Evo. This is my only complaint, the relatively light base and lack of suckers mean that the joystick suffers from a lack of stability sometimes (almost always when you’re in the middle of some frenetic blasting action). It must be said that even this isn’t that much of a problem and was probably exacerbated by my heavy handed joystick action!
Now all I need to do is find the time to invest in getting to grips with X3 and getting used to an analogue joystick!
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