Should You Buy the Hori Split Pad Pro Daemon X Machina For the Nintendo Switch

In this video, we unbox and test out the Daemon X Machina Split Pad Pro JoyCons for the Nintendo Switch from Hori.

When it comes to making accessories and gaming controllers, Hori knows quite a bit about the industry. They have made some of the best third-party accessories for generations of systems, dating back to at least the original Super NES. Their latest is designed for the Nintendo Switch, and it's called the Daemon X Machina Split pad Pro. It is a set of JoyCons that offer quite a bit more features than the originals, larger control surfaces, and potentially a better gaming experience.

The Split Pad Pro is designed to be used in handheld mode only. There's no wireless connectivity, no battery, and you can only use these while they are connected to your Nintendo Switch. There are other features that you will lose by switching to the Split Pad Pro. Motion controls, accelerometer and gyro, vibration, NFC and Amiibo support are all not possible with the Split Pad Pro.

"Great!", you might be thinking, "with all those features I'm losing, what am I gaining"? First and foremost you're gaining a larger surface area to hold onto while playing your Switch. Don't be mistaken, the Split Pad Pro is huge in comparison to the OEM JoyCons. On these larger JoyCons, you also get additional features. The left JoyCon gets a traditional d-pad instead of the 4-button configuration. You get two additional buttons on each JoyCon, one to assign functionality to a programmable trigger on the back of each grip, and one to assign a turbo function to each grip. The analog sticks have been greatly increased in size, I dare say they are the same size as the Pro Controller's. This will give you more precision while playing, better control, and theoretically more comfort. The same thing goes with the right JoyCon, the A/B/X/Y buttons and shoulder triggers are all much much bigger than a traditional JoyCon, again similar in size to the Pro Controller.

While the Split Pad Pro was designed to be released alongside Daemon X Machina, I will be honest and say I have never played the game. I did throw a number of Switch games at these controllers, including NES and Super NES Online titles. When playing Street Fighter, the analog stick did not feel like the best way to play, the d-pad definitely felt like I was able to pull off more moves. I played around with the turbo button functionality and assigning functions to the triggers while playing Star Fox, and I have to say, this is the best feature, to me at least, of the Split Pad Pro. The turbo was great, and being able to use the triggers on the back of the controller instead of the shoulder made it much easier for me to remember what I needed to press to do a roll.

Why it RoX:
- Large analog sticks
- Assignable back triggers
- Programmable Turbo
- Bigger buttons & triggers
- Adds a D-Pad to the left JoyCon

What could be improved?
- Makes the system feel HUGE
- Sacrifices a lot of core JoyCon features
- Can only be used in handheld mode
- I did not find them comfortable, but YMMV

Should you buy one?
This is a tough one for me, I can definitely see the potential and the appeal of a set of JoyCons like this, however, there are also some pretty significant misses to me. I can live without Amiibo support. I can live without gyroscope and motion control in a handheld. I'd really like vibration. The fact that was missing was a bummer. It also made a system that I feel is too big in handheld mode already feel even larger. I would love to see Hori take this design and make a single pro-style controller out of it, send me up if they ever do it. I mean, the buttons in the analog sticks all felt great, the increase in size was welcomed and I acknowledge you had to make a bigger JoyCon to accommodate that. However, for me, the Switch Lite is still my preferred way to play in handheld mode, and that doesn't have HD rumble either.

The content of this video is intended for viewers age 18 and up.

#NintendoSwitch #HoriSplitPad #DaemonXMachina

The footage used in this review are used under the Fair Use laws, referenced below:

https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/107

The fact that a work is unpublished shall not itself bar a finding of fair use if such finding is made upon consideration of all the above factors.
(Pub. L. 94–553, title I, § 101, Oct. 19, 1976, 90 Stat. 2546; Pub. L. 101–650, title VI, § 607, Dec. 1, 1990, 104 Stat. 5132; Pub. L. 102–492, Oct. 24, 1992, 106 Stat. 3145.)