A Matter of Perspective

I'm fortunate enough to have a spouse that's geeky about all the same things I am, and blessed that she's also become a rabid World of Warcraft fan.  Warlocks, demons and curses are her bread and butter, and pain and suffering music to her ears.

Like any good and nerdy husband I wanted to encourage this kind of behavior, so when she got a laptop a few years back and needed a mouse to go with it I suggested looking at gaming accessories instead of standard, plebian, cheaper peripherals.

What followed was an important lesson I would forget multiple times, despite my best intentions not to.



Hands-On

My wife and I looked at several gaming mice at the local Walmarts and Best Buys to find one that was right for her.  I was looking for something that would feel like an instrument of destruction, like a well-crafted Colt revolver in the hands of a gunslinger.  She just wanted something that wouldn't cause her hand and wrist to cramp up.

She originally settled on a Logitech MX 15; it looked ergonomic and sleek, had extra buttons she could bind to her favorite curses, and was inside our price range ($40).  She was excited about getting a new mouse, and I patted myself on the back for leading her further down the gaming path.

However, a few months later the mouse was sitting unused, and my wife was back to using a wrist brace on raid nights.  The Logitech was way too big her her hand, which she describes as "short with stubby fingers".  We wound up buying another $40 laptop mouse from Walmart that was half the size, and I adopted the Logitech.

What stuck with my wife, though, was how common this issue was.  "Gaming" mice are designed and marketed toward people who spend many hours a week playing PC games and have the extra income to buy a more expensive accessory to add to their gaming experience, which by and large are larger-handed males.  Despite searches around the internet and local electronics stores my wife couldn't find a gaming mouse in our price range designed to fit the smaller, slimmer hands of the female gamer.

Every so often when we were shopping I would point out a mouse I thought would work for her, but a quick size check showed they were all still nowhere near "just right".

A Second Chance

When my wife's headset broke recently she decided to go shopping for another one while I was at work.  Later that day, I got a text message from her that pleasantly surprised me:  she had bought a Razer.

The Orochi by Razer is a laptop mouse made for traveling gamers, which is a subset of the breed that apparently enjoys head-shotting n00bs in Counterstrike while flying their corporate jet.  It's very slick, very wide at the front even for a Razer, and cost around $80.  You can wire it to the laptop with its USB cord, or connect through Bluetooth to game wirelessly.

My wife loves it.  She was giggling while she hooked it up, and even put the Razer logo decal that she described as "a flock of sperm" on the front of her laptop.  Now she's increased her gaming cred, and taken the cramp out of her hand all at the same time.

So if you're of the "small-handed" persuasion, or looking for a good laptop gaming mouse, consider the Orochi.  My wife gives it 4 out of 5 stubby fingers, a glowing recommendation indeed.