CES 2015: Mad Catz Reveals the L.Y.N.X.9 Controller For Android

One of the most ridiculous controllers I’ve ever seen

It seems Mad Catz isn’t content with just having two excellent, and reasonably priced, mobile controllers on the market with the C.T.R.L.i and Micro C.T.R.L.i. No, they decided to go in a much more ambitious direction with the L.Y.N.X.9

Before we get into the nitty gritty details, this is Android only. Mad Catz took a year to port their C.T.R.L.r to iOS, so we may not be seeing this on the Apple side any time soon.

With that out of the way, Mad Catz has opted for a somewhat unique modular controller design. The entire controller can be disassembled and rebuilt to fit better with Android tablets (I’m sure someone somewhere owns one), Android phone, and wireless console control. A keyboard and trackpad module can be attached to the bottom, and a microphone allows for full voice control (wait, don’t tablets and phones already come with mics?).

Oh, and it costs 300 dollars. Yeah, I probably should have lead with that. It’s 300 dollars for this controller. Not Yen, not Pesos; $300 american. The next time someone calls MFi controllers expensive, I’ll have to remember to direct them to the L.Y.N.X.9

Honestly, I don’t even know where to begin to know what to think about this one. It seems ridiculous, but I have to hand it to Mad Catz for their ambition here; this is NOT a rehash of an existing controller design, as their current mobile pads are. This is, in fact, an entirely new design that completely addresses MANY of the problems facing mobile devices. And although $300 seems like too much to blow on a controller, I know me – I’d probably be first in line to grab one of these guys if it comes to iOS.

Assuming this isn’t a very early April Fool’s joke, the L.Y.N.X.9 should be available in a few months. It’s already up for preorder, so the Android gamers out there with $300 to spend on a controller should definitely give it a look.