By Harry Good heavens, I thought, someone has sent me a sculpture of two massive scarab beatles doing the wild thing. But no, it's the latest game controller in Microsoft's Sidewinder range. At first glance the Strategic Commander seemed like a very odd piece of kit. I wondered what the hell I was supposed to do with it. I thought that's what my mouse was for.
Installation is a breeze.
I used the supplied USB adapter and the software took car of the rest. The device essentially looks like a large black mouse sitting on top of a slightly larger one. The top part can move backwards, forwards, left, right and twist too. This top section contains 11 buttons and the bottom section one button and a three-way switch. The top switches are divided into sections.