Armor3 Taiko Drum Controller with Sticks

Hardware Type: Controller

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Review:

Over the years I have reviewed numerous games in the Taiko No Tatsujin franchise, which started back in 2001 in Arcades and saw its first home release in the West on PlayStation 2 in 2004’s Taiko Drum Master. And while they’re excellent Music-Rhythm games, their gameplay is also somewhat reliant on a fairly unique drum controller that’s not really the sort of thing you would use for any other game.

This makes it harder to invest in one of these controllers, because you’re spending $40 or more on something you will be using for at most only a small handful of games – on Nintendo Switch, as of this writing, there are a grand total of four Taiko No Tatsujin games – Taiko No Tatsujin: Drum ‘N’ Fun!, Taiko No Tatsujin: Rhythm Festival, Taiko No Tatsujin: Rhythmic Adventure 1, and Taiko No Tatsujin: Rhythmic Adventure 2. I suppose you could argue that a drum controller like this could potentially work with other games, (Patapon 1 + 2 Replay, recently announced for Nintendo Switch, comes to mind), but the Taiko No Tatsujin games are really the only ones where such a controller feels essential to the core experience.

The Taiko No Tatsujin series has tried to adapt to this reality, adding in controller support, motion-sensing support, and touchscreen support into its games on platforms that include those features, but there’s just nothing like banging on an actual drum.

As it happens, I’ve found myself with the interesting opportunity to test out taiko drum controllers for the Nintendo Switch, both at the very low end of the pricing spectrum, and at the absolute high end. Let’s see how they compare!

At the low end, we have the Armor3 Taiko Drum Controller with Sticks. Currently priced at around $45, this places this roughly on par with a mid-range Nintendo Switch controller. In addition to the drum itself, this set comes with two thick hollow plastic taiko drum sticks, as well as a fairly easy-to-assemble plastic stand that attaches to the backside of the drum and includes storage compartments for the drumsticks and for the controller and cable attached to the drum.

The drum itself is a circle that’s about 9″ wide, and it is constructed of plastic with a flexible plastic membrane at the front to give it a more rubbery feel. For those unfamiliar with the Taiko No Tatsujin games, depending on the song and difficulty level, the drum has four inputs – left and right on the inside of the drum (“don”), and left and right on the rim (“ka”). And using this drum, these notes are mostly pretty accurately detected by the drum, though I did occasionally have notes that didn’t seem to detect properly. I’m not sure if this is due to me improperly hitting the note or the controller improperly detecting it, though.

As I mentioned before, connected to the drum is a cord with an attached controller, which includes many of the functions of a standard Nintendo Switch controller but lacks analog sticks or ZL and ZR buttons. This controller is mainly intended for navigating menus, and works well enough for that, though the short length between the controller and drum feels a bit limiting, and the controller’s shape can make it take a moment to determine which way of holding it is right side-up.

Continuing past the controller, the rest of the 10′ cord leads directly to a USB plug to attach the controller to a Nintendo Switch dock. While some may find this cumbersome and disappointing, that the controller is wired and not wireless, I do feel like this is a sensible choice, as having a wired controller will reduce input delay, which is absolutely vital in a Music-Rhythm game.

Finally, I’ll get to my main annoyance with this controller, though I feel like this may be a personal issue – it is far, far too easy to move this thing around by pounding on it, requiring you to either find a way to secure it in place, or adjust it every half a minute or so as it gets drummed away from you. This drum does have little rubber foot pads, but these didn’t seem nearly enough to keep the drum from being pushed around. This may be due to me hammering away at it far too hard, but… well, it is a drum, and that is what people do with drums. Plus, hammering on it hard seemed to be the best way to ensure that my notes were properly detected.

Overall, I think the Armor3 Taiko Drum Controller with Sticks is a decent way to control Taiko no Tatsujin games, and while this is better than using a standard gamepad (or the horribly inaccurate gyroscopic motion controls), it’s still not quite ideal. However, if you’re a fan of this series and want to play it in the way it’s intended, this is a good way to go that shouldn’t break the bank (and if you don’t mind breaking the bank, you can check out my review of the IINE Professional Taiko Drum Controller Pro Max).

tl;dr – The Armor3 Taiko Drum Controller is a wired Taiko Drum controller for use with the (as of this writing, four) Taiko No Tatsujin games on Nintendo Switch. It’s not quite as accurate as I would like, and I keep pushing this thing around while I beat on it, but overall it’s preferable to using a standard gamepad when playing the Taiko games, and it’s not priced absurdly high… at least, not if you’re a fan of these games.

Grade: B-

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