Turtle Beach VelocityOne Flightstick

Very Good, Immature, Lots of issues to sort out – The Turtle Beach Velocity One Flightstick is a very new, very flawed, flight or combat simulator controller for XBox or PC. It is relatively cheap at $220 Australian +/- $20. It is very well built, with lot's of buttons and sliders to use or adjust, and unbelievably poorly documented and presented. I have been using mine for 2 days ( arrived 03/03/2023 from Europe via Amazon.)

You will need tenacity and skill to sort it out, get it going properly, fix its incorrect assignments, unravel the meagre documentation that is riddled with errors, and become comfortable with it with your simulation.

I have just started on this journey. Just registering this device online has defeated me so far. In Australia, Turtle Beach is so far behind with localised information, it is barely worth attempting to find downloads or unravel mysteries. An example...the first thing you need to do is update the firmware. I use a PC but I have discovered you need to be in XBox mode to do this ( on a PC.) After repeated attempts, I managed it without being in XBox mode, but I have no idea how I did it.

Some default button assigments listed on the included quick setup guide are simply wrong. Which means if you use Microsoft Flight Simulator, you will need to spend an hour or two discovering the problems, then re-assigning buttons or sliders to match the flimsy documentation or set up a profile to your own needs. Sensitivities of axis controls are poor, so you will be accidentally dragging this heavy device across your desk to get it to do what you want, as it tips over easily at axis extremities as you wrestle with the controls. I could go back to my Thrustmaster joystick which is easy to use, but is neither sophisticated in functions, nor robust feeling.

It has all the hallmarks of a great device rushed to market with little support or forethought of customer needs. But I will persist, as it has great potential, and with future firmware updates, and a proper manual, may become the duck's guts of all computer simulation controllors. I hope.

If you don't like or can't be bothered, or are incapable or tinkering with flawed software, I urge you not to buy it for some months, until Turtle Beach gets its act together fixes it and presents it credibly.

At the moment it is a brilliant horrifying mess. ( February 2023)

Update 14032023: Have sorted out the bindings, and adjusted slider sensitivites inside MSFS2020.

Pros: I have upgraded this to 4 stars because it has more adjustability than I first saw, Lots of customisable buttons, and most importantly, it just feels precise and solid in the hand. The 2 hat buttons near the top are brilliant and have radically changed the way I change views within MSFS2020.

Cons: The throttle slider is still poorly sensitive and I can't work out if there is a way to adjust this. The inbuilt trackpad is gimmicky...a traditional mouse is so much better. As I don't wish to drill bolt holes in my desk, it remains unstable in extreme use. The sticker on the base with your Serial Number (SN) is sooo small, you may have trouble getting the right number. I did and could not register until I contacted VelocityOne by email and they did it for me manually, ( most efficient and top marks for that.)