SteelSeries Stratus Input Lag

Update 2/20/2014

The firmware update is now available! Follow this link for instructions:
https://afterpad.com/steelseries-stratus-firmware-update-now-available

Update 2/17/2014:

SteelSeries got back to me with a firmware patch that seems to fix the lag completely. They’re targeting the end of the week to publicly release the firmware update.

Personally, I’m really impressed. This is a fast turnaround time for something that I wasn’t sure could be fixed at all.

I’ll have a full review of the SteelSeries Stratus controller coming soon, but for now, with this problem fixed, I can absolutely recommend the controller for iPad gamers.

Original Post:

The recently released SteelSeries Stratus controller is excellent in a lot of ways, but a rather serious bug has recently come to our attention regarding input lag. Pressing any button while holding the D-Pad causes a half second delay in that button press being registered. This can be a pretty serious issue in twitch based platformers such as Sonic or Mikey Shorts.

Hopefully this problem will be fixed soon. The SteelSeries Stratus (and all MFi controllers) can receive firmware patches – with any luck, SteelSeries will issue a patch sooner rather than later, because the Stratus is otherwise an excellent controller.

To clarify, this problem only occurs with a button press in addition to the D-Pad being held down on the SteelSeries Stratus controller. The analog sticks are unaffected, and the problem doesn’t occur on any other MFi controllers.

A full review of the SteelSeries Stratus, as well as full reviews of the other controllers, will be coming soon. For the time being, I feel that it is still appropriate for this warning to be up.