Turtle Seashore VelocityOne flightstick assessment – a compact, feature-packed flight sim controller, for much less

One-minute assessment

Flight sim peripherals are costly. Thrustmaster’s Warthog HOTAS is the gold commonplace at north of $400 and Logitech’s cheaper X56 remains to be greater than $200. Turtle Seashore needs to undercut them each with this HOTAS-flightstick hybrid and, like a veteran Tom Cruise making an attempt some little bit of cinematic aerial derring-do, it pulls it off in fashion. 

There are 27 programmable buttons nestled across the joystick, laid out sensibly in an ambidextrous design that makes it straightforward to dial in helpful mappings whichever hand you use it with. The texture of these buttons isn’t uniformly ‘premium’, with some noticeably wobblier or flimsier than others, however one thing needed to give if Turtle Seashore was going to ship all this for $120. 

It’s not a conventional HOTAS, and purists may not get on with utilizing the throttles and flightstick all on the gadget. For newbie digital pilots and space-conscious aviators who don’t wish to jam up all their USB slots with flight peripherals although, the VelocityOne completely sticks the touchdown and is a prime PC controller or Xbox controller for flight fanatics

Worth and availability

• $122.99 / £119.99 / AU$250
• Considerably cheaper than Thrustmaster and Logitech HOTAS
• Obtainable within the US and UK

The Turtle Seashore VelocityOne flightstick represents nice worth for cash and that every one begins with the design basis Turtle Seashore put in place to mix HOTAS inputs with an everyday flightstick. Someone within the headset-strewn corridors of Turtle Seashore HQ can pat themselves on the again for that one. 

Slapping all of the mixed inputs of each peripherals onto one unit clearly makes it simpler to hit a cheaper price level than the large gamers in flight sim controllers.

There aren’t outright reduce corners on the subject of construct high quality, however you may really feel the place some cost-saving switches and button caps have been drafted in to maintain issues reasonably priced. That does imply that these after a no-compromise, actually premium management expertise will discover extra to love in Thrustmaster’s extremely weighty and well-constructed Warthog HOTAS. For everybody else, it’s a steal at this worth level. 

Turtle Seashore VelocityOne flightstick: Specs

Turtle Seashore VelocityOne flightstick: Design & options

There’s a hanging however smart design to this unit, which works like a hybrid of a HOTAS and a flightstick. It’s laid out symmetrically, with banks of enter buttons in two neat rows on both facet of the stick. 

However there are inputs hidden throughout this factor. You simply preserve discovering them. The textured metallic ring across the base of the flightstick? That’s a dial. You twist it to register an enter. On the stick itself? Not solely two hat switches, a set off, buttons, and a scroller, but additionally an OLED show. Actually, it’s like a 2000s rapper and a actuality present manufacturing crew bought their arms on this factor. It’s simply lacking the aquarium. 

At both facet are the throttles, which offer you a satisfying little click on at 0% and 100% to present you some haptic suggestions that you simply’re at both excessive. There’s even a trackpad, which defaults to a spotlight cursor in Microsoft Flight Simulator so you may go searching and choose completely different cockpit controls that you simply don’t have mapped to an enter – unlikely, given the plethora accessible right here.

The joystick itself feels superbly clean throughout its axes, and it’s designed with loads of stiffness. That’s nice in some, however not all, situations. While you’re making huge inputs – suppose dogfighting in an area fight sim – it’s nice to have that resistance to maintain your actions exact. However when you’re making an attempt to get a industrial jet stuffed with holidaygoers down onto the runway with out evacuating their extortionately-priced egg and cress sandwiches everywhere in the gangway, you don’t wish to really feel an excessive amount of centering spring across the zero level because it tends to ‘snap’ you again to that heart place.

This isn’t essentially a flaw of the joystick, however a nuance that takes a little bit of getting used to. You’ll be able to counteract it with an elevated deadzone. 

The OLED show might be programmed to point out you a choice of helpful readouts, and though I tended to overlook to take a look at it whereas I used to be in-game, I used to be captivated by it after I first plugged the unit in and noticed it mild up. 

Talking of lights, there’s backlighting beneath every of the 2 banks of buttons on the bottom, a hoop on the base of the joystick, and a few delicate backlighting across the thumb buttons on the highest of the joystick. These are break up down the center right into a turquoise and orange color scheme which provides the VelocityOne a definite look. A glance that I’m onboard with, when you’ll excuse the unbelievable aviation pun. 

Turtle Seashore VelocityOne flightstick: Efficiency

The make-or-break second for a management gadget with this many inputs is what occurs while you load up your recreation and head over to the controls menu, praying to each recognized deity that there’s a management scheme already established for it. 

Fortunately to all these deities, Microsoft Flight Simulator on each PC and Xbox is aware of the VelocityOne nicely and has a smart format for it that maps many of the controls you’d need, the place you’d need them. 

I did just a little little bit of tweaking to the defaults, which is to be anticipated given the breadth of planes inside that title. Everybody has barely completely different wants relying on whether or not they specialise in haring about in prop planes or doing super-serious Airbus routes as realistically as potential. What issues is that there’s a good place to begin for everybody.

That is such a time saver. Nevertheless, that’s (almost) the place the management profiles finish. XPlane 11 and 12 acknowledge it proper off the bat and provide a ready-made profile, however in any other case, it’s as much as you to map your individual inputs in video games like Elite: Harmful and Conflict Thunder. 

Not an enormous deal, however it will be good to see some extra profiles added sooner or later. 

PC and Xbox compatibility is dealt with fairly seamlessly, too. That flashy OLED show lets you realize while you’re in compatibility mode for both platform, and I had exactly zero turbulence when plugging it into both gadget. It was acknowledged and useful with none problem.

Do you have to purchase the Turtle Seashore VelocityOne flightstick?

Purchase it if…

Don’t purchase it if…

How I examined the Turtle Seashore VelocityOne flightstick

• Examined for a number of months
• Examined with Microsoft Flight Simulator, Ace Fight 7, Elite: Harmful
• In contrast with Thrustmaster and Logitech HOTAS

Fortunately the air miles concerned in testing this one have been digital, in any other case I’d have a hell of a carbon footprint to offset. Microsoft’s critical Flight Sim drank up the testing hours, together with extra fantastical experiences the place combating and loop-de-loops are a bit extra commonplace.