These PS5 DualSense designs look better than the real thing

These PS5 DualSense designs wait better than the real thing

(Prototype credit: Sony)

When Sony announced the PS5 DualSense controller, I thought it was a pretty ugly contraption. I polled my coworkers to encounter if I was alone, but about one-half of them agreed with me. Something well-nigh the two-toned color scheme, the redesigned grips and the stark blackness PlayStation button but felt a niggling unfriendly — futuristic, sure, merely more than similar Neuromancer than Star Expedition.

Now that I've had a few days to get used to the controller, my views on information technology have softened a chip, particularly since I think the vertical grips will ultimately make the device more comfy. Simply non every fan was as content to leave things be. Some digital artists put their own unique spins on the DualSense, and so shared their creations with the online community.

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While none of these DualSense concepts is all that likely to make it to a shelf anytime before long, it is fun to think well-nigh what might have been — and what variations Sony might produce afterward on downward the line.

Illuminated face buttons

ps5 controller concepts — (Image credit: Nikolay Mochkin)

I of the prettiest renders comes from Nikolay Mochkin, who goes by "Ellejart" on Instagram. Mochkin produced a curt video of a DualSense with illuminated buttons. Unlike Sony'southward controller, Mochkin's is gray-and-black rather than white-and-black. But the bigger departure is that Mochkin'south buttons light upwardly. The D-pad buttons all take subtle blue underlighting, as does the touchpad and the PlayStation button. The triangle, foursquare, circumvolve and X buttons light upwards green, pink, red and blue, respectively, just as they're color-coded on older PlayStation controllers. While information technology's attractive, though, a setup like this would bleed a lot of power in practice.

As practiced as gold

I of the most popular DualSense fan designs (at least according to Reddit) is the "aureate DualSense" from an creative person named Iésu, who goes past "itsalastor" on Twitter. This relatively simple redesign gives the buttons and touchpad border aureate highlights, and adds a gilt cantankerous-hatch pattern to the grips. If I had to guess, I would say this model resonates with people because information technology'south elegant, but not as harsh as the default blueprint. Golden and black go together much more easily than white and black.

Sony exclusives

A user called "dormstreams" came upward with a novel DualSense pattern on Reddit, where he made four different DualSense mockups using Sony-specific series. A God of War design has a red "Ω" symbol confronting a white background. A Spider-Human design has ruby webbing and a white logo in the middle. A Last of Us pattern is nighttime green with a black Firefly symbol in the center. A Horizon Zero Dawn blueprint is blue and gray, with faint outlines of robotic beasts on the grips. I imagine that Sony will probably release controllers like this eventually, so nosotros tin only promise the existent things look equally skilful.

PlayStation archetype

When seeking inspiration, sometimes you've got to go dorsum to the classics. That's what Reddit user "asgardian_mike" did with his concept art of a PS1-style DualSense controller. This model is black in the center, with PS1-colored gray grips, a multicolored PlayStation logo button and face buttons with colored symbols. At that place's a subtle bluish calorie-free effectually the touchpad, but otherwise, it's about as close as you can get to an sometime-school DualShock without changing the DualSense'southward physical design.

Video touchpad

The most aggressive DualSense fan concept is also, for meliorate or worse, the least realistic. Reddit user "SYROBONKERS" posted a short video with a black-and-white DualSense. Like other fan concepts, this one had light-upwardly buttons; unlike other fan concepts, this one also had an interactive touchpad with an LED display screen. In this fanciful rendering, the DualSense could display notifications, battery levels and even present users with a tiny keyboard to type out messages. Commenters were quick to indicate out that such a contraption would be prohibitively expensive and probably wouldn't add together much to the experience — but what are fan renders for, if not to dream?

Marshall Honorof is a senior editor for Tom's Guide, overseeing the site's coverage of gaming hardware and software. He comes from a science writing background, having studied paleomammalogy, biological anthropology, and the history of science and engineering. After hours, you lot can discover him practicing taekwondo or doing deep dives on classic sci-fi.