If you’re in the market for a new controller for your Xbox or PC but don’t want to hand over the €59.99 for an official one on the Microsoft website, then look no further than PDP.
In fact, with the Afterglow Wave controllers, you get extra paddles on the bottom of the controller so it’s even better value. It feels very similar in size, shape, and weight to a standard controller (without batteries), so there won’t be any breaking in or getting used to it. If you have used the standard one you can use this one with no problem.
All of the buttons are mappable through the companion app, and you can also use it to reconfigure the triggers, adjust dead zones, adjust vibration strength, and even run a diagnosis on the controller to make sure everything is working as intended. Of course, you can also change the light settings on the controller through the app.
The lights are the most obvious way to differentiate between the Afterglow Wave controller and the standard Xbox Series X|S controller. Wrapping along the grips as well as encircling each thumb stick, they really make this controller stand out from the crowd. While it does play a little bit into the typical gamer trope of “RGB EVERYTHING!”, it’s pretty tasteful in its execution and certainly not over the top. The lights can easily be turned off too if you find them annoying, and the brightness can also be adjusted.
The only real downside of this controller is the software which seems quite temperamental. After initial download and install it had trouble identifying the controller which was already plugged in. Next, it said there was an update which must be applied before continuing, which it did around ten times. Eventually, the update stuck, so access to the customization was finally available. It wasn’t totally smooth sailing here either, unfortunately, but the issues were more or less minor. The lighting profiles weren’t available which was fixed by going to a different tab and back a few times. Different sliders for speed of light effects and brightness, as well as changing colours, all seemed to take a moment before the controller actually responded to the input. Interestingly, the controller is rated 4.8 out of 5 on the PDP website, while the app has 3 stars on the Microsoft app store – the majority of the recent reviews for the app are actually only 1 star.
Overall, this controller is great for the price and very comparable to the standard Xbox controller. It doesn’t quite have the ultra-premium feel of the Dualsense Edge for PS5, but that controller is almost five times more expensive and has issues playing on PC. Presuming there are no compatibility issues, there’s no reason to choose the Xbox one over the Afterglow Wave.
