Ratpadz Review @ Kannibas.com

If you’re a serious gamer there’s probably no better investment than a “real” mouse pad/surface. I used to use the cheesy little logo pads that companies gave away as advertising gimmicks just like 80% of you do. That is until about 18 months ago when 3M came out with the Precise Mousing Surface (PMS for short – and didn’t that just make all you married guys cringe?). The PMS was unique in that it is very thin and has a pattern of tiny little “pyramids” that the ball glides across. The concept is a sound one and this was, at the time, the best surface I’d used. One problem – I’ve been buying these in bulk because after two months or so of serious fragging, they get puckered and the surface loses it’s slickness. Oh and one other problem – tiny.

As I said, the PMS was the best surface at the time. We then saw the arrival of the Everglide and more recently the Ratpadz which are brought to us by Kyle Bennett – the stud behind HardOCP.

I’d finally reached my limit when I kept sliding the mouse off the damn PMS during a clan match and, in all likliehood, cost us the match (we lost by 5 and 3 points!). Since I’d been a fan of HardOCP for some time and dig the tongue-in-cheek manner Kyle delivers the goods, I figured I should throw a few bucks his way and just maybe his pad would solve my woes. I also knew I didn’t care for the Everglide after having tested a friends at a LAN party. Nothing really “wrong” with it – it just didn’t flick my bic.

Because I’m a really cool guy with lots of cash burning a hole in my pocket (yeah right) I opted for the custom logo version. The first thing that hit me was the size of it. It dwarves the PMS by about a two to one margin. Maybe finally my big, clumsy hands wont be sliding the mouse all the way off the mouse surface! So to test this puppy I fired up Q3, jumped onto my Q3 Insta-Gib server and proceeded to rack up some very impressive (if I do say so myself) frags. A few midair twisties and a couple of bot accusations and I was convinced – Kyle has done a great job here.

But here at the Ole’ Smoke Shop we don’t just test things for their intended use. No siree. The next order of business was to find other ways to use this baby. I found that in addition to being good for a little seed and stem removal the Ratpad works well as a small serving tray when your “good company” is over. I also found that it’s got nice solid edges. This was discovered when my wife wacked me over the head with it for taking the picture of the “seeds and stems.” Unfortunately I was bleeding too much to snap a pic of that.

Oddly enough I was skeptical at first. Don’t ask me why – I should have known Mr. Bennett would deliver. I now have one stashed away that I’ll be using as a prize for some sleazy contest here soon, and the other sits proudly beneath my gaming mouse and handles all I can dish out.