As I removed the Roccat Burst Core from its box, one of its feet fell off.
Budget gaming mice can, and often will, break eventually – but not normally this quickly. I stuck the foot back on, pressed it into place for 30 seconds, and hoped for the best while expecting the worst from this $20/£15 mouse.
After a few weeks of heavy use, is it as bad as my first impression suggested?
Design and Shape
Foot fiasco aside the Roccat Burst Core has, I'm pleased to say, remained in one piece.
It's actually gone beyond that: it's impressively solid and feels more expensive than it is. The shell feels reassuringly sturdy in my hand and doesn't bend or creak when I squeeze it. I tugged, flicked and pushed at every crevice, and forced the main mouse buttons upwards – everything always returned to its rightful place. It's also worth saying that mice feet are to some extent designed to come off so that you can swap them (although, clearly, they should never fall off!).
But it can't completely hide its cheapness. If I tap the bottom of the mouse, or certain spots on its sides, I hear an echoey rattle, presumably from the scroll wheel. Compared to the best gaming mice, the left and right clicks require more force to depress, making them feel stiff – and when you do click them, they lack the crispness I'm used to.
The two side buttons feel mushy and hollow, the central DPI button is wobbly, and the stiff rubber cable is permanently kinked. No matter how much I twisted and adjusted it, it defaulted to an abrupt left turn out of the top of the mouse, resting on the mouse mat.
It also looks cheap: it's the gaping indents at the bottom of the main mouse buttons and the dark, chunky middle section, varnished in a faux brushed metal.
But I can't knock it too hard for any of these faults. Almost everything is imperfect, but it's all good enough, especially at this price. Those left and right clicks, while not luxurious, are the same low-latency optical switches used in the more expensive Roccat Burst Pro, and should last a long time – meanwhile, the scroll wheel is smoother and tighter than some I've used on mid-range mice, and it even has RGB lighting.
What really stands out is its weight and shape. At 68g it's far lighter than the best budget mouse, the Steelseries Rival 3 Gen 2, and it's particularly nimble for a sub-$50 mouse: it glides quickly around my mousepad with very little force, although the stock feet are a little scratchier than other mice I've tested.
I enjoy the simple, symmetrical shape. Its wider base won't suit very small hands, but everyone else should be fine. My hands are ever-so-slightly larger than average, and I enjoyed using it in fingertip and claw grips as well as palm grip, where the hump filled my hand. It's wide enough to give my index and pinky fingers somewhere to sit at all times, and I used it for long sessions of four hours and more without ever feeling uncomfortable. While it's not pleasant to click, it is pleasant to hold.
Performance and Gaming
The Roccat Burst Core's PixArt PMW3331 sensor is a downgrade from the Roccat Burst Pro and has a meagre maximum DPI of 8,500 DPI. But that number doesn't really mean much: what matters is how it feels while you're gaming. I tested it in Arc Raiders, Fortnite, Hades 2, Norco, and Dishonored 2 – I wanted to see how it dealt with both hectic firefights and casual pointing and clicking.
It performed admirably. I felt like it was tracking my movements precisely, with no noticeable hitching, delays, or overshooting. Cursor movement felt smooth and snappy, and my flick shots landed where I wanted them to. I enjoyed using it no matter what game I was playing and, whenever I died in Arc Raiders – often, sadly – it never felt like the mouse was the reason.
Its maximum polling rate of 1,000Hz – the number of times per second the mouse reports its position to your PC – is far lower than the 8,000Hz allowed by many high-end mice. But as you climb past 1,000Hz, you get diminishing returns in smoothness and responsiveness and unless you're used to high polling rates, this will be absolutely fine. Remember: some FPS pros still play at 1,000Hz.
Its low-latency left and right mouse clicks also never failed, and I could spam them consistently when I was firing semi-automatic weapons.
The 2.4mm lift-off distance – the height above a surface where the mouse stops registering movement – is relatively high and you can't adjust it in the Roccat Swarm software. If you're used to lower LODs then it'll take an adjustment but again, it's fine for most people. I play at low sensitivities so I'm constantly picking up my mouse at the edge of my mousepad and moving it back to the middle, and I had no problems.
The Roccat Burst Core confirms what we already know: the price of a mouse isn't proportionate to its performance. If you spend five times this amount you will, technically, get a more precise sensor that can track faster movements. But it won't feel five times as good. Paying $20 for something this solid makes a lot of sense if you're on a budget.
Software
Roccat's newest software, Swarm II, isn't compatible with the five-years-old Burst Core, and the original Swarm software is so old-school that you can't even download it from Roccat's website. Or not easily, anyway: Roccat's download page is broken so I went to a third-party site to nab it.
It looks amusingly retro, the text size is far too small, and its options are spread across too many tabs – but it handles the basics well. Adjusting sensitivity and polling rate is simple, as is changing the scroll wheel speed and double-click timing.
The scroll-wheel RGB is governed by an "intelligent lighting system" that I found unfathomable. A link that promises to explain the system is broken and when I tried to switch to one of the simpler options – a blinking light, a breathing one, a heartbeat – nothing happened. It's nice that RGB lighting is there for people who want it, but don't expect it to actually work properly.
Samuel is a freelance reporter and editor specializing in longform journalism and hardware reviews. You can read his work at his website.
