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The Armaggeddon G-17 is a peculiar gaming mouse. It is so oddly shaped and balanced that some people either love it entirely or would want no association with it. Retailing at RM 269 it is one of the more top tier wired gaming mouse. The G-17 comes in the market strong with its one off ergonomics and hefty specs sheet.



LOOKS AND ERGONOMICS

Look wise, Armaggeddon loaned me a black/grey coloured mice that did not fit in very well with my all black set up. Then again, it was not supposed to. This mouse likes to stand out and be seen. With its profile select light on the left, lighting up differently for each selected profile to the subtle breathing of the logo backlight located at the bottom of the palm rest, showing gamers it can be flashy and classy.

The ergonomics is peculiar to say the least. Some people will love it, some will hate it. It is large by any standard, but the sculpt means you do not feel the bulk. I like mammoth mice; they feel more steady and stable. Most FPS gamers prefer their mouse small and nimble; I on the other hand do not share the same sentiment as my fellow comrades. So take that with a grain of salt. The right side of the mouse has this odd sculpt to it that functions to support your fourth and pinky finger. When I switch back to my other mouse, I can feel the difference that little bit makes. Keeping my pinky away from the gaming surface allows blazing fast reaction and less friction from the side of my palm. However having it there just does not feel “right”. Words cannot really describe it. If you have access to a display unit, give it a try. You will be sold either with the first touch or never. To me, I see the purpose but the implementation from Armaggeddon could have been improved. The mouse just feels a touch weird.



BUILD

The external body of the mouse is made mostly out of plastic coated with some form of soft touch compound similar to the ones on the MKA–7 keyboard. However the coating seems to be thicker and has more give to it. The cushy feeling makes the mouse feels a little bit more bulky. On the other hand, this mouse does not feel like it belongs in its price tier. The plastic feels very cheap. I just cannot get myself to think that it is a top tier mouse every time the light plastic makes contact with my palm. The only thing telling me that it is worth its penny is its broad spec sheet which we will get back to later.



If you look at the mouse from the position you would use it, the front right side has two programmable keys while the left side has two more programmable keys and a rocker switch. The usual left and right click and also a vertical scrolling only center wheel with a 3rd button press. Behind the scroll wheel is where the DPI/CPI selector and the Profile selector button is located.

Underneath the mouse, you have a polling rate selector switch, where you have the option to set it to 1000 Hz, 500 Hz and also the native 125 Hz. If you have an old motherboard that does not like 1000 Hz mice, set the polling rate to 125 Hz during boot up and once Windows has finished loading, go ahead and set it back to a thousand Hertz. All the newer motherboards (LGA 775 and above) supports high polling rate mouse natively and you should not worry about it.

PERFORMANCE

As with most other wired mice, the G-17 is light. Armaggeddon has included weights or ballasts to help counteract this, if you find the lightness to be a problem that is. Armaggeddon included ten 4 grams weights, totaling to 40 grams. I found the sweet spot to be three ballasts weighing in at 12 grams. The weights are placed on the underside of the mouse near its bottom. Unlatch the yellow cover and place the weights to your liking. The weights placement means this mouse will not be evenly balanced, with the front side being light and the back slightly heavier. You can feel this when you quickly move the mouse sideways, the back part lags a little. The extent of this problem is directly related to how much ballasts you dump into the mouse. At the maximum of 40 grams, I found the lagging behind to be annoying and disturbing. At 12 grams the lagging behind is still present, just more controlled. However as soon as you get burned in and familiar with the mouse, it just feels like a characteristic of the mouse. Every mouse has a personality, and this one is no different.



As the additional programmable buttons goes, they are terrible. The two on the left of the mouse are mushy and sticky. Once you press the button, there is this millisecond of delay before it pops back out. I find it detrimental to my performance. I had bound one of it to a skill shortcut in Dota 2 and the other to a voice chat hotkey. When I spammed the skill shortcut, the delay was apparent. I had to resort back to the keyboard. The voice chat hotkey was annoying me that I also had to resort to continuous broadcasting, further annoying my teammates. Below that, there is a sort of slide button that you can slide back and forth. I have no idea why this sort of switch was implemented. I found no practical use of it other than a volume rocker but I had better volume control from my keyboard.

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The two on the right of the mouse were slightly better. The furthest one was difficult to reach, while the other is fine enough to be used. I programmed this to be a modifier to the scroll wheel. It modifies the scroll wheel from vertical scrolling to horizontal scrolling as the mouse lacks native side-to-side scrolling.

The profile selector button is well placed so that you do not accidently press it, but still requires you to lift your palm off the mouse to press it, unless you are a finger gymnast. The DPI or CPI selector button is also similarly placed as the profile selector, but can be pressed without lifting your whole palm. I did however found out the hard way in a Battlefield game that pressing the DPI/CPI selector results in the Blue Screen of Death (BSOD). Even after reinstalling the drivers, pressing the DPI/CPI selector button repeatedly will inevitably end me up with a BSOD. Given that Battlefield 4 is a new game with a lot of problem, it may be due to the game rather than Armaggeddon’s fault.

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Playing MMORPGs like Dota 2 does not highlight too much of the G-17 capabilities. The mouse is comfortable for the long gaming rounds that Dota is famous for. However, like the above, the additional keys are quite literally useless. FPS gamers will give a thumbs up for the G-17. The mouse feels precise, the 1000 Hz polling rate does not hurt even if you cannot really notice it and the mouse glides thanks to its Teflon pads. The only complaint is the uneven weight distribution brings a notable drag on parts of the mouse. DPI/CPI selector is unusable for me in Battlefield 4 due to the BSOD, hence no high speed spraying and super precise sniping. I opted for a compromise between the two which is reasonable enough but I will have to contact Armaggeddon regarding the driver error.

SOFTWARES

The GA-17 comes with the usual suite of drivers and configuration software in a mini disc. The configuration software has a consistent theme across all Armaggeddon’s gaming peripherals. The first page that you are greeted with, called Home Base, shows the mouse and highlights some of its feature.

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The Main Frame tab allows configuration of X and Y axis sensitivity separately or controlling the Master Sensitivity. Besides that, you can adjust the Windows Pointer Speed, Scrolling Speed and also the Double-Click Speed.
The third tab dubbed Button Setting allows button programming and macro configuration of the mouse with up to 5 different profiles. All the additional buttons on the G-17 barring the Profile Selector and CPI/DPI selector button is programmable. In total, the G-17 with its configuration software allows up to a total of 30 different buttons selection, 6 for each profile. I personally have trouble remembering what I assign to each of the six button but if you are a proficient enough to require 30 different buttons configuration on your mouse, have a blast with this feature. Here you can also quickly set CPI setting ranging from the lowest of 800 CPI all the way to 8200 CPI.
The next tab controls the Lighting Options of the mouse. Here you can turn the mouse lights on or off, set the intensity from High to Low and also the speed of the mouse’s pulsation. The pulsation effect when set to fast is particularly neat looking and brings an extra flair to the mouse.

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As with the Stealth Raptor MKA-7 mechanical keyboard from Armaggeddon, the G-17 softwares lack multi-peripherals integration and but somehow Support/Updates tab is present. However instead of automatically checking for drivers update, users are greeted with Armaggeddon’s own website and will still have to navigate to their respective product page in order to download the latest update.

CONCLUSION

The Alien Craft IV G-17 is a niche. The shape and ergonomics is so weird that I have not encounter any other similar mouse in the market. Some people will like it and some will not. It is really up to the user to give the mouse a try.

At the current selling price of RM 269, the G-17 is not as justifiable as it does not bring in too much extra feature into that price bracket but if you are feeling comfortable with the shape it is probably worth the lightness in your wallet.

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Here is my final say on the Armaggeddon Alien Craft IV G-17:

Things it excels at:

• The ergonomic, peculiar but unique
• Nice look
• A lot of customization in terms of button customization

Things it can improve at:

• Button switches needs to be more tactile
• Plastic build needs to feel more premium
• Weight distribution should be balanced