Astro's officially licensed pro controller

[Kong Wen]

So ScufGaming has released their Vantage pro controller, and Razer has the Raijin Ultimate in Europe, and now Astro is getting into the pro controller game for Sony:

https://blog.us.playstation.com/2018/11 ... arly-2019/

One nice thing about this is that the d-pad and analogue stick ports are all swappable. I believe the Xbox's elite controller does this, but the other PS4 ones don't for some reason. You can change the sticks out on them, but this one brings the d-pad into the equation, allowing you to play with the traditional PS configuration of stick on bottom and d-pad on top, or the staggered configuration used on Xbox controllers and Scuf's PS4 controller. You choose!

They all feature remappable/programmable rear buttons and customizable trigger stops, etc. but they're all designed differently (Scuf uses paddles, this Astro unit uses buttons).

They're all also expensive... it'll be interesting to see which of these controllers ends up getting more play. Either way, it's good that there's some competition in this niche. We've come a long way from the days of the cheap knock-off third-party controllers.

EDIT to add, last I heard, Astro is now owned by Logitech. In my experience, they make some nice stuff. I'll probably give this controller a hands-on. I don't know if I'll spend the $315 on it... but I'd like to play something with it.