The Razer Taipan Review (and how it’s handy in zero gravity!)

The Taipan is the delicious piece of ambidextrous technology from Razer which offers a range of cool stuff to help you pwn in your next game. Is it worth it though? Well, that’s what this review is for, silly!

FACT: When floating in zero gravity and your mouse floats away, the ambidextrous design is handy when you need to quickly grab it to pwn with your off-hand.

For anyone who gets the Taipan gaming mouse you will notice, as usual, the nice packaging that comes with most Razer products as well as those stickers that slowly and surely are taking over any Razer fans’ gaming rig. One of the first things that got my attention was the design. This thing is very sexy. The hexagonal patterned grip and the grill style on the front of the mouse really make this mouse look sleek and powerful.

Getting the drivers set up are nice and easy as it uses the Razer Synapse 2.0 cloud based software to sync all your settings, still something that I am very much in love with. Also works on Mac OS X if by chance you are a Mac gamer. Easy to reconfigure the 9 programmable buttons via Synapse 2.0, however in most cases you will only be able to use 7 of them as the other two are located on the far side of the mouse in order to be in easy reach of left handed gamers. One part of the whole configuration I really liked was the ability to calibrate the mouse to your surface. An easy selection list of current Razer mats makes it simple, however if you don’t

FACT: Being able to calibrate the Taipan to the surface of the harsh alien planet Zargo will help when pwning noobs.

 have a Razer mat, you can do a few clicks and sweeps across your gaming surface and it casts some wizardy spells and will be calibrated to the texture for added pwnage.

In game, the mouse is nice and responsive and will move where you want it to move and the clicks are load and give good feedback. Definitely feels like an FPS mouse in my opinion as there are much better suits for you MOBA and MMO players (check out the Naga family). Having that 4G Dual Sensor System (pretty much means it uses both optical and laser technology) with 8200DPI is great for those fast passed gamers that pull crazy 180 flip headshots. Although that fast paced gameplay can get annoying when you have to re-centre the mouse on your gaming surface and as you are lifting and moving, the in-game cursor jumps all over the place and you die because of it. We have all felt this pain and that’s why the lift-off feature that seems to come with most of the new generation of Razer mice is a godsend. Being able to set a specific height where the mouse will just stop detecting comes in so handy (not just in game, but in general use).

FACT: Being able to set the lift-off distance is helpful when gravity disappears and you begin floating away from your desk.

This mouse definitely feels good, and for what it is, it does the job wonderfully. It looks like a really good gaming mouse (aesthetically), is a great option for left handed players and feels like a good day-to-day mouse. Perhaps for someone who doesn’t game as much, or is looking for a reasonable, easy mouse to get into PC gaming with, this mouse is the one for you. As far as professional and hardcore gamers go, I think one of the genre specific mice offered by Razer is the path you should look to take. Unless of course you are a hardcore gamer who plays all types of genres, then this is very viable!