Razer Announces New Lycosa Gaming Keyboard

Having criticised the Razer Tarantula for it’s lack of backlighting in my last gaming keyboard shootout, I have just heard of a new product that might answer that criticism. This comes in the form of a new gaming keyboard, the Razer Lycosa.

This is an all new design, based on a standard QWERTY layout complete with multimeda keys. In Razer’s trademark black, the Lycosa features keys coated with a non-slip rubber finish.The anti-ghosting and 1ms response time are carried over from the Tarantula so the Lycosa should be a strong performer, and it also features a gaming mode that allows the Windows key to be de-activated to stop accidentally triggering the menu key mid-game.

The backlighting is a tasteful shade of blue and offers two modes. One is to backlight the entire keyboard, the other to just highlight the WASD movement keys. This is great if you use WASD for movement in games, but not everyone does so I can’t see that particular feature being a big seller.

Priced at $79.99 and due for release in November, the Lycosa is $20 cheaper than the Tarantula. It doesn’t have the swappable symbol keys of it’s big brother, nor the BattleDock, but I would argue it represents better value for money as a result.

No news on a UK price or release date just yet, but I shall be keeping my eyes and ears open.

So will this be good enough to beat the Logitech G15 version 2, my current favourite gaming keyboard? Despite the cheaper price I still see the G15’s LCD display being a more useful feature, and all Razer have really done is introduce a keyboard with a feature that should have been included on the Tarantula in the first place.

Update 17/01/08 – you can now see how the Razer Lycosa compares with the Logitech G11 and see which is the best gaming keyboard of the pair.