That Xbox Elite controller you paid $180 for has a rival. It comes from Joshua R. A. Horstmann, who was recently highlighted by Cherry for utilizing its MX Blue switches as triggers on an Xbox One controller. Cherry highlighted the project on Twitter.
Horstmann, who goes by nepomuk_ra on Instagram (the account is currently set to private), replaced the controller's triggers for faster feedback in shooting games. He also has switched out the control sticks, opting for a lengthier right stick for more control in aiming.
Horstmann told Tom's Hardware that he finds gaming with a controller far more comfortable than sitting at a mouse and keyboard. He started gaming on consoles before moving to PC to play Fortnite. But when Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Call of Duty: Warzone came out, he felt he wasn't competitive.
"I saw how often I died only because of pure input delay differences," he said. The Xbox One controller triggers only fired when he pressed them all the way down, so he tried remapping firing to bumpers, which he also found uncomfortable, so he took to a video on YouTube explaining how the triggers on the controller work.
"I took out the trigger of my controller and designed something that fit int he same mounts," Horstmann said. A friend of his father's printed the mounts for the Cherry MX Blue switch. You can even take the Cherry switches out and hotswap with the original trigger, though that does involve some soldering.
The other beauty of the design is that you can change the keycaps to choose what's most comfortable for you. Hopefully Horstmann works on caps that look and feel more like traditional controller triggers.
Many of us on the Tom's Hardware staff love Cherry Blues for typing, but we do wonder if linear switches like Cherry Reds may have been better for this project. But like many things, that comes down to personal preferences.
If you use a mouse and keyboard, sure, you can have a whole mechanical keyboard. But sometimes controllers are great for sitting back on the couch, and this definitely makes it a bit more of a PC experience.