Guild Wars 2, the highly anticipated follow up to the original MMO Guild Wars, has been given the peripheral treatment by SteelSeries. Similar to the Diablo 3 Mouse, the Guild Wars 2 Mouse is based on the Xai family of mice, but has an awesome red, white and black colour scheme to match the game and mouse mat.
The Package
The mouse comes in a sturdy cardboard box, again decorated to match the style of the game with a red, white and black colour theme as well as the typical flap that provides a plastic window view that SteelSeries tend to have with their mice, so you can see your shiny new toy! The mouse is also encased in a plastic shell inside the box. The mouse mat is packaged similarly, with a Guild Wars 2 themed cardboard box that is cut away half way across and replaced with a plastic cover instead.
As per usual, SteelSeries have also included a quick start guide, a logo sticker and a SteelSeries product guide in the box.
The Mouse
The Guild Wars 2 mouse shares the same features as the Sensei Raw – such as the scale of CPI from 90 to 5,670 and up to 12,000 frames per second.
The Appearance
The appearance is obviously to appeal to the fans of the series with the artwork on all the pieces being co-designed by some of the artists at ArenaNet – making all the artwork authentic (and a nice touch for the fans!). The cord is bright red, which as well as meshing well with the game’s colour scheme, is also consistent with the other peripherals in the family. The four programmable side buttons, scroll wheel and CPI switch are also the same colour. There is also a nice touch in the form of the illuminated scroll wheel and the Guild Wars 2 logo near the end of the mouse.
The shell of the mouse is covered with a pure white background and the iconic dragon logo on the palm and has a really nice smooth, velvety feel.
There are four additional buttons either side of the traditional left and right clicks, two on either side. In terms of manoeuvrability and accessibility, the left buttons sit right where your thumb is usually placed and are easy to reach, the two buttons on the right of the mouse will take some getting used to as they are positioned in a slightly awkward place – they could do with protruding out slightly more so it would be easier to find and press them.
Software
The Guild Wars 2 Mouse also comes with SteelSeries engine, which allows you to control all of your SteelSeries peripherals from the same menu. The Guild Wars 2 Mouse’s engine hasn’t been re-skinned to fit with the game, instead, the usual charcoal black colours are back, with a very subtle Guild Wars 2 logo in the corner when the device is selected.
There are four areas of configuration, the buttons – you can reprogram each button to a corresponding key. Settings for CPI, polling rate and illumination. Properties – which allows you to create a profile which allows you to switch macros and bound actions. Lastly, Statistics – this recalls the schematics from the buttons tab, which basically allows users to record which buttons are pressed more often by being given a numeric and colour-intensity representation.
Performance
The mouse performs fantastically! The light weight feel and pleasant fit matched with the mouse mat made playing games effortless. It glides incredibly smoothly, no stickiness at all, and reacted quickly to any movements and clicks I made. Eventually, even the two buttons near my little finger were easy to use. Tested on an FPS, the additional side buttons were hardly used, however the left and right click buttons were responsive and I had no issues what so ever, testing on an MMO, the additional buttons became useful and were comfortable and easy enough to use (with some practice!).
Specs
The mouse works with both PC’s and Mac’s and thanks to some pretty cool specs is pretty much a winner for any game:
- Frames per second: 12000
- Inches per second: 150
- Mega pixels per second: 10.8
- Counts per inch: 90 – 5670
- Maximum acceleration: 30 G
- Sensor data path: True 16 bit
- Lift distance: ~2 mm
- Maximum polling: 1000 Hz
You can download the drivers for this awesome mouse from http://steelseries.com/us/products/games/guild-wars-2/guild-wars-2-gaming-mouse, you can also download the manual just in-case you lost it.
The Mat
The mat is “medium sized” which comes to 320mm x 270mm. The mat allows the mouse to scroll across incredibly smoothly due to its tightly compact cloth surface and the bottom is made to prevent slipping as it is made from rubber. It is easily rolled up (great for traveling & LAN parties) and is really quite durable, maybe water resistant to a small extent – typically Qck surfaces are heavier than your regular mouse mat, although I haven’t had any problems with this one and haven’t had the need to re-adjust it.
The mouse glides perfect across the surface of the mouse mat with no resistance at all and feels perfect, even when using a high end mouse like the SteelSeries Mouse or a standard old style roller-ball Mouse they all work great.
There are two mats available, the one I reviewed was the Dragon logo that you will likely recognise from the game cover (and mouse!) although you can also buy the ranger character from the Norn-race that fans will recognise as Eir.
For Technical Specifications about the mouse mat please goto http://steelseries.com/us/products/games/guild-wars-2/steelseries-qck-guild-wars-2-logo-edition
Overall
Both the Guild Wars 2 Mouse and Mat are fantastically styled pieces of hardware that I’m sure both fans and newcomers will take great pleasure in using – with the authentic Guild Wars 2 artwork sweetening the deal! Yes, they are mainly cosmetic upgrades, but they are a great addition to your rig and SteelSeries have done a brilliant job in matching the quality of the hardware to the look of the pieces. Must haves!
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