I'm a huge Wavebird fan, and have been quite spoiled by it. So, terrifiying as it is to spend $50 on a 3rd party pad, I just had to find out what the Eclipse was all about. Besides, I ended up $50 up in the casinos on my cruise this weekend, so it's like a free controller.
Anyway, I'm basically going to tell you what you already know. It works, and it is not as good as the controller S.
First of all, forget about using it for Live. The card ports are on a dongle attached to the Xbox. This means your headset will need a wire running back to the Xbox, totally defeating the whole purpose of wireless. The shape and layout are almost identical to the controller S, but the D-pad is not as nice. The edges are sharp, and it becomes irritating after a while. It is still worlds better than the orriginal Xbox D-pad, and it is usable. The main controller buttons feel nice. No complaints there. A solid feel and nothing screaming "cheap". White and black buttons are both on the face (controller S location) and on the top (Dual Shock L1 and R1 location). The problem is, the top positioning is so bad you will never, ever use them. Ever. Ever. You'd seriously need a finger between your index finger and thumb to make any use of them, so pretend they don't exist. Actually.... *picks controller up again* ...you could use the main triggers with your middle fingers and then reach the top black and white buttons with your index fingers, but that feels rediculous. Start and back buttons are in the center of the pad. Back is impossible to reach without looking at the pad, but it's the back button so no biggie.
The analoge sticks are similar to the orriginal Xbox pad, but the indents are not as deep and the springs are not as stiff. Clicking the sticks down is way too hard, and might make Gunvalkarie somewhat of a pain. The rubber coating on the sticks is fine. The material feels similar to both 1st party pads and slipping is not a problem. Analoge triggers are stiffer than the Controller S, but not as stiff as the orriginal pad. The shaping of the triggers is not as nice as either 1st party pad. They also seem to need to be pushed in farther before they start responding.
On to the other stuff... The range and accuracy is fine. I haven't had it miss a press yet, and I can stand and point anywhere I want. You get 100 hours with no rumble, 50 with rumble. I don't like rumble and love battery life, so I can't tell you how the rumble feels yet (haven't tried it). It runs on 2 AA's. You get 2 bands and 4 channels (basically 8 settings) to make sure nothing in the room inturrupts your signal. The first setting I tried worked. One giant oversite is the lack of a power LED. The Wavebird tells you when it's on. The Eclipse doesn't. That could mean unnessecary battery drainage if you are not careful to turn the controller off. The rubber side grips are... just rubber side grips. I've never dropped a non-rubber grip controller in my life, so the gimmick is pretty useless.
As a side note, the pad looks identical to the generic Gamestop Xbox pad. I'm sure Pelican made that pad for Gamestop and used the same mold/parts.
In short: The pad is sturdy, does not feel cheap, works quite well as a wireless, is not as good as the Controller S, and is overpriced. With the Mad Catz wireless pad costing $60 and the Logitec pad costing $70, I see no reason to bother with either of those.
That's too bad. I too have been spoiled by the WaveBird and have eyed up the wireless options for PS2 and Xbox. Unfortunately I've heard not-so-great things about all of them, so I'm sticking with wires for the time being.
After a bit more playing it is definatly useable. I still don't think it handles as good as the controller S. I might even recomend it if it was $10 less. Still... $50 is just too much for a step down in playability and comfort, even if it is just a small step down (as the case is here). Not a bad controller, but only buy it if someone gives you a $20 Gamestop gift certificate or something. MS and Sony really need to get on the ball with the 1st party wireless pads.
Braaaaaaainssssss
Originally Posted by Doc Holliday
Posting Permissions
Bookmarks