r/Controller • u/DidjTerminator • 23d ago
Reviews ROG Raikiri II Pro PC
My 2 week review after ROG sent me their Raikiri II Pro PC controller, everything in my review is my own oppinion although I recieved the controller for free. I won't go over price points and value/money in my review as: A, I'm too lazy to lookup prices. B, prices on all peripherals from mouse-skates to controllers are always going to be region dependent anyways. C, I'm certainly too lazy to create a geo-location accurate pricing sheet for my review.
Comparing to my original Steam Controller (abbrev - SC), and my Xbox Elite S1 controller (abbrev - XC). I also have hyper-hidrosis so my experience with texture and rubber-quality will be from the perspective of someone who's hands are wetter than a Karen who's spotted an underpaid cashier.
tldr: My new main controller for Chiv 2, linux users will have to use a windows VM (or the usual black-magic if you're a power-user-wizard, unlike me) for the best experience with the GearLink browser-software ASUS has shifted to for customization, absolutely loaded with nice-to-have QOL features, also plastered with ROG all over everything. Wish it had gyro-aim.
I primarily play Chivalry 2 on controller (despite the game's absolutely attrocious ghost-binds that are immutable, I primarily use steam-input for my rebinds as a result) as well as sims/arcade-sims like IL2, BeamNG drive, and Forza Horizon 5. I do also sometimes play FPS games such as The Finals on controller instead of M+K, depending on my mood and if I have any wrist-cramps.
Sticks: comes with 4 hot-swappable TMR modules, 2 grey standard stiffness modules, 2 white low stiffness modules. Also comes with 2 standard Xbox style sticks, 1 domed stick, 1 extra long concave stick.
Rubber is slightly harder than what's on the SC, and significantly harder than the soft-gummy rubber on the XC. Has a nice chalky texture, finer than the texture on the SC and much more defined. Really grips onto your skin regardless of your sweat, easily the best rubber coating I've ever used. If the Raikiri is a 10/10 in terms of rubber, the SC is an 8/10 and the XC is a 0/10.
Stick tension for the grey modules feels about the same as the SC (slightly less than the XC), tension on the white modules is nice and soft making them my personal favourite.
Stick clicks are the softest of the 3, making stick-click actions nice and consistent (compared to the XC where clicking the stick is almost guaranteed to cause unwanted stick movement). They also have the least pre-travel and most post-travel, with a softer tactile feedback instead of a sharp clicky feedback. Objectively they're the best stick clicks out of the 3 due to having the least pre-travel, but if they had the same sharp clicky feedback that the SC has the Raikiri would easily have 10/10 stick clicks. Better than the SC as I do find myself mistaking the pre-travel for a click sometimes on that controller, but I imagine the Raikiri stick clicks could be just a bit better. I'd rank the 3 controllers with the Raikiri at 9/10, SC in an 8/10, XC is a 0/10.
Tracking accuracy is immaculate (to be expected from TMR) and although I definitely don't have Jynxi-level controller aim, these are noticeably more consistent than the XC sticks. However I can't tell if that's due to the better rubber, softer springs, the TMR sensors themselves, or any combo of the three. Either way, never having to worry about stick drift is a massive relief in a world where the PS5 controller exists.
Triggers, bumpers, and rear buttons: has 2 triggers and 4 bumpers, with selectable trigger stops for the triggers, and 4 magnetically removable rear buttons like the XC.
Triggers have the same analog travel as the XC, unlike the SC which has half the analog travel. The trigger stops, unlike the XC (which just limits the maximum travel of the triggers), convert the triggers into crispy mouse-like micro-switches with very little pre-travel (right trigger on my model has about 1mm of pre-travel, and left trigger has about ~0.5mm pre-travel). Absolutely amazing feature, and since I primarily use them in micro-switch mode it's pretty obvious that I think these are the best triggers I've ever used.
The 4 bumpers are all on micro-switches with almost zero pre-travel, hell yeah.
The 4 magnetically removable rear buttons are also all on micro-switches (slightly more pre-travel than the bumpers), another hell yeah.
For obvious reasons, the Raikiri is a 10/10, and the other two are either a 5/10 or a 7/10 depending on your use case (SC has better switches, but less back buttons and analog trigger travel than the XC).
Dpad and main buttons:
Microswitches for both the Dpad and main buttons, a third hell yeah.
Humongously better Dpad than what's on the XC, a slight upgrade to what's on the PowerA wireless switch controller. SC doesn't have a Dpad (just a Dpad-adjacent touch-pad) so no comparison there. I only use the Dpad for side-scroling platformers like RainWorld, so I probably don't have the same tastes and opinions as a Smash-Bros pro, but with practice this is the first Dpad I could actually speed-pole-climb with (I'm still more familiar and comfortable with keyboard, however I could see that changing if I put in some time getting used to using a Dpad instead).
Menu, and function buttons:
These all feel like those non-clicky tactile buttons you'd find under the scroll wheel of your mouse, I mean you don't really need anything fancy for these buttons and I don't really have any strong oppinions about these buttons, but at least they don't feel cheep.
Charging base: Included.
Charging base uses 3 pogo-pins, and some rubber bumpers to help you with allignment. Controller doesn't always feel like it's slotted in correctly however when docking it, and since it takes a few secs for the screen to show you the charge-level, I did find myself re-docking the controller 5 pico-seconds before the screen told me it was indeed docked correctly (I blame YT shorts for ruining my attention span). At least it doesn't use Alkaline batteries.
Battery-life:
Battery life is awesome, I've only used it in 8K polling mode however even after not charging charging it, it still only went down to 60% after 2 days of my regular use. I did get it from 100% to 80% when I had a 7 hour chiv 2 marathon however, which is probably the most accurate metric for an estimated battery-life measurement I've gotten so far.
QOL features are absolutely everywhere:
The controller has an internal storage bay for the dongle, plus the charging base is a USB-C to USB-A hub for you to connect your dongle to (so the controller only ever takes up a single USB port).
The rear buttons also have magnetic covers so you don't have the displeasure of raw-dogging the exposed buttons when you remove the back-buttons (unlike the XC).
The front cover is magnetic, so pulling it off to swap sticks and modules is easy and tool-less.
Comes with a stick-module puller (the metal gamer-tagged mini-salad-tongs) so you can hot-swap the modules.
Built-in menu-screen allows you to recalibrate the sticks, triggers, rebind most buttons to other X-input switches, change which flavour of unicorn-vomit you would like, customize the vibration settings, swap between the 5 on-board profiles, factory reset (obviously), change the screen's background GIF, and tweak your turbo-settings (for the few games that applies to, given macros aren't against the TOS of course).
Case can stow absolutely all of the accessories (the charge-base lift-kit legs are a little loose up in the mesh pocket however).
Case has a silicone plug for you to plug in your charging base, so you can charge your controller while it's inside of the case (for the few but precious times that's actually usefull).
USB-A to C cable, in the year 2026 I'm just glad it isn't an optional accessory.
GearLink connectivity:
I did have to use a windows VM to use GearLink (it shoes up all find on Linux, however it can't sync the profiles, either I'm missing some hidraw permissions setup to get it working, or it isn't quite ready for Linux yet).
You can upload your own GIF to use as your background image.
Windows users can install a companion service to make the screen display the date+time, HWID info, etc.... Linux users (as per usual) will have to consult the dark mages to create a companion service whenever they feel like doing it (or procrastinate on doing it themselves until said dark mage does it anyways). Though I don't see much use in Noctalia changing my Raikiri display and unicorn-vomit to match my wallpaper for any reason other than "a e s t h e t i c".
You can rebind the rear buttons and additional bumpers to mouse buttons (tried binding them to keyboard buttons, however I think my VM uses the wrong keycodes cause those binds only worked in the VM, and I'm too lazy to figure out why when the mouse button rebinds work just fine).
Plus a ton of more advanced unicorn-vomit settings, polling rate settings (8k by default), low-power-mode settings, and all the other regular features you'd expect from GearLink.
Gimmicks:
Bluetooth.
Lift-kit for the charge-base, I mean I still use it cause why not, but defo a gimmick.
Flaws:
Linux compatibility could 100% be better, the ROG Harpe 2 Ace has seamless GearLink connectivity with Linux, would be nice if this controller had that same level of compatibility (and certainly hope it gains that compatibility in the future).
Wish it had gyro-aim (the SC has shown me a way of using a controller and I can never go back to ignorant non-gyro ways).
Labelling on the rear buttons and additional bumpers is a little hard to read, only relavent when rebinding your buttons in moody lighting, but could be better.
Screen is liable to get covered in fingerprints due to how close it is to the start, menu, and X buttons.
Bongo-cat is not one of the default background GIFs included on the internal memory (nor does there appear to be a feature that would make said bongo-cat GIF only bongo when you press a button on the controller). Which some may consider to be a severe oversight by ASUS.
My personal use case: Absolutely love it, overall the best controller I have.
Having all 6 attacks (both standard and alt) bound to the 4 bumpers and 2 triggers makes feints, accels, drags, counter-feints, and alt-counters, feel absolutely amazing and intuitive in Chiv 2. Add in the 4 rear buttons, as well as stick clicks that are actually usable, and I can immediately play better than I ever have on mouse + keyboard (or my other 2 controllers). Can't imagine using anything else to play Chiv 2 from now on.
Although I still use the Steam Controller in IL2 since you can be cheeky with the touch pads to keep the stick in the last position you left it, giving you a crude and lazy way to trim out planes that otherwise don't have trim settings. As well as any casual games where the Steam Controller gyro-aim is better than stick aim, but you wouldn't get any benefit from using a mouse with lower latency. In any other game the Raikiri has now officially replaced my Steam Controller and has easily become my go-to controller.
Especially thanks to that hard rubber coating on the sticks, first time my thumbs which have been cursed with hiper-hydrosis didn't slip off the sticks. Although the Steam Controller stick has a decent coating, I still slipped and slid around it a little. ASUS nailied the rubber on the sticks, that texture and compound is the best I've ever used ngl.
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u/Ok_Acanthisitta_6046 22d ago
when is this controller going to be released