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90 points amichail | 1 comments | | HN request time: 0s | source
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thesuitonym ◴[] No.42204499[source]
Reading this brought something to my mind that I had not yet considered. With the rise in popularity of esports, we're getting to a strange place where there is very professional gear for playing games, that is specifically suited to the high intensity, quick reactions of professional athlete. Whether you think that is an appropriate term is not an issue, people are getting paid for this and they play at a much different level that most of us plebes do.

But then you have people who play casually--and let me be clear here, even if you are very good and only play ranked competitive matches, if it's not your job, you're who I'm talking about--who get this same gear. They deck themselves out like the pros for what is, essentially, a hobby. Is that weird? I don't know. People who head out to the local basketball court typically go with only a Spalding they bought at Walmart. Folks who play a little footy on the weekends might buy shin guards, but otherwise just head out to a field.

I don't know where I'm really going with all this, it just seems odd that a person would say one should buy a keyboard that allows for 1mm actuation, when the vast, vast majority of game players wouldn't even be able to tell the difference.

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1. gigaflop ◴[] No.42207826[source]
Peaked in Silver in Valorant, lemme tell you, the hardware isn't much of a gamechanger after a certain price/quality point. I'm just a very tactile guy, and like diving down rabbit holes for stuff that suits me. My input devices are how I interact with the world, so, why not take some care to find one that sparks joy?

Kids these days who are 'graduating' from default laptop keyboard, $40 wireless keyboard/mouse combo, etc to "Hardware I picked out for myself" have plenty of good options, considering how hardware has gotten SO much nicer over the few decades I've been using it.

The 1mm actuation thing is probably for advertising how 'good/sensitive/capable' their switches are. I would personally never use something like that, what with my heavy hands. Little Timmy, on the other hand, is wading through a bunch of actually-decent mass-market options, and may see 1mm actuation as "WOW, NOTHING HAS EVER BEEN THIS GOOD!"