Can we ban brands from using the word “ecosystem” when they announce new sim racing gear, please? At least until they can be trusted to use it responsibly. I’ve played with a fair few of the best racing wheels for PC, and it feels as though every time new gear comes along it’s with the promise of an expanding range of extras and add-ons “in the future”.
“Start with the basics and expand over time as your racing habits evolve and your wallet recovers,” that sort of thing. Which is great, in theory. It’s a logical plan for both company and player, but the problem is this never seems to be a promise anyone keeps.
There is an emerging exception to the trend though, and it’s from an unlikely place: Nacon.
Likely known to most people for its range of controllers and peripherals, including the excellent Revolution X Unlimited, it launched its dedicated sim racing brand with some success last year. The Revosim RS Pure bundle: a 9Nm direct drive wheelbase, round wheel, and load cell pedals for £699/$799, undercut plenty of the established names on price while largely matching them on build quality and performance. It was a strong debut in isolation, but it also followed the ecosystem script with immediate talk of not just what was here now, but what was to come in the future.
Arguably, Nacon was even more brazen than others, as the wheelbase shipped with connection points on the back labelled “shifter” and “handbrake”, but that hardware didn't exist yet and didn’t even have a release date at the time. Just a promise that it was on the way before the end of 2025. It wasn’t a promise Nacon kept initially, but the best part of a year later, backup did arrive, and what landed is actually rather good. The Revosim RS Pure Hybrid Shifter, Load Cell Handbrake, and Clutch Pedal filled in those empty slots on the back of the wheelbase and completed the initial picture.
But this is territory we’ve been in before.
Turtle Beach made it this far with the VelocityOne range and has gone MIA since. The Race wheelbase arrived in early 2024, and it too was complemented by a Multi-Shift shifter and handbrake. Then, eighteen months on, a second wheelbase joined the range, and the F-RX Formula wheel arrived with it. Things were looking good. The F-RX in particular is lovely; in fact, it’s one of the nicer wheel rims I've used and was proof that Turtle Beach had the know-how to compete. But since then, nothing. Turtle Beach's next round of simulation hardware announcements went to flight sim gear instead. Racing got two good years, and seemingly that is that.
هەفتانە هەرسکردنەکان، چیرۆکەکانی ئەو کۆمەڵگایانەی کە خۆشت دەوێن و زۆر شتی تر
سەرچاوەی فەرمی بە زمانی ئینگلیزی: https://www.gamesradar.com/hardware/gaming-controllers/brands-keep-promising-sim-racing-ecosystems-but-nacon-is-one-of-the-few-starting-to-follow-through/
