The first thing I noticed when I tried out this mouse is how lightweight it is. It took a little getting used to, but it definitely allows for quicker, more responsive and agile movement, having less inertia. The very smooth, slick surfaces that the mouse rests on help it to glide easily across your mousing surface, as well. The cord is a fairly standard issue rubberized cord, which surprised me, at first; I've come to expect mouses for serious gamers to have cords with braided covers for higher durability, but this cord is lighter than a fancier cord would be, and the
G402 Hyperion Fury is all about speed, it seems. In extreme conditions, in fact, the
G402's patented High-Speed Fusion Engine is designed to combine the input of a high-sensitivity optical sensor with an accelerometer to assist in keeping accurate track of movements to provide lag-free dead-on control. DPI sensitivity levels range from 240 to 4000 and you can set them manually if you know what DPIs you're comfortable with or you can simply set the
number of DPI levels you want to use and use the default values - something that might be a good place to start if you haven't determined your sweet spots, yet. You can also set the mouse's polling rate to your choice of 125, 250, 500 or 1000 reports per second.
The accompanying Gaming Software (a free download) provides a visual interface to easily set the programmable buttons to your choice of standard mouse functions, DPI Adjustments, media controls, keystrokes or multi-key macros. You can also set a button to be the "G-Shift," which almost doubles the number of control possibilities, allowing the other 7 programmable buttons to have an alternative assignment that is accessible when the G-Shift is held down. This effectively takes you from 8 functions to 14.
The software even includes a meter that will allow you to turn the Fusion Engine on or off and measure the G402's response in either IPS or M/S. The meters keep track of the highest value, so you can even start the meter in the background, then play your game and see what your actual usage looks like during gameplay conditions. Sadly, this software only works with this mouse, so you would have to get your hands on a G402 before you could get any readings with it. However, if your friend has one and you're curious whether it would improve your game, you can try this out to see what kind of mouse movement speeds you're getting in-game. Try it with and without the Fusion Engine turned on and you'll see what normal gaming mouses are missing when you play.
I'm not a hardcore FPS player, but I've been known to dabble. I tried the G402 Hyperion Fury out with some Call of Duty II multiplayer and some Mechwarrior Online (not an FPS, but still in need of dialed-in aiming) and found the control to be unerring and the DPI On-The-Fly switch to be easy to use to tighten up my aim when lining up a shot. Did I miss shots? Sure, but I couldn't blame it on the mouse. While my speed readings on the meter weighed in under 26 IPS, even at these low values, there was a small discrepancy without the Fusion Engine, meaning my control wasn't as tight with the Fusion Engine turned off. Further, this meter gives me a tool to gauge my mousing speed, allowing me to set goals and work toward improving one aspect of my FPS gaming.
As for style and comfort, the G402 is lightweight, comfortable and sleek-looking, with a black-on-black-on-black appearance: satin finish top surfaces, rubberized thumb grip and shiny black accent down the center. It also features cool blue lighting accents, on the DPI indicator (near the thumb) and the G-Series logo on the face of the mouse. The brightness is adjustable in the software and the G-Series logo can also be set to have a "breathing" effect, where it pulses between dark and bright blue. If your color scheme on your gaming machine is black with blue light accents, then this will fit in nicely. I have an Alienware Aurora which features RGB accent lighting so I could change the settings to pulse between dark and light blue and the two would match nicely. The color of the lighting on the G402 isn't adjustable, however, so hopefully you like blue or you don't care about the color.
One nice feature is that the G402 Hyperion Fury can store control mapping profiles on-board. This means you can set it up in the comfort of your own home, then take your G402 with you and use it on another machine, such as at a LAN center or a friend's house or just your laptop when traveling and your settings are ready for you, because they're stored in the mouse, itself. This is a cool feature that is something I look for in a gaming mouse, but this particular mouse only stores a single profile in the on-board memory, which limits you to designating your G402 as a mouse devoted to a particular game if your profiles are a bit oddly mapped.
Additionally, the Gaming Software allows game profiles to be stored on your gaming rig and switched to automatically when the software detects that you've launched that game. This allows you to set up several different profiles and let the PC switch for you when you play your games.
