Two pads, one in white and one in black. Each costs £74.99, each carries the VI logo engraved into the touchpad, and each has palm tree etchings running around the grips.
UK preorders for the special edition DualSense controllers tied to Grand Theft Auto 6 have gone live, and it’s the black model causing headaches already.
The black one is a PS Direct exclusive, and that’s the bottleneck
Anyone chasing the black GTA 6 pad is facing a lengthy queue, since it’s sold exclusively through PS Direct. Wait times there have ballooned as shoppers flood in.
Set your sights on the white version instead and you can skip that line entirely. It’s stocked everywhere apart from Amazon for the moment, and going through retailers such as Argos or Smyths spares you an hour-plus wait. The bigger chains do appear to be lagging behind the smaller shops here, although that should even out shortly.
Whichever you pick, it stays boxed until the game lands on November 19.
Why the hardware push makes sense now
Rockstar rolled out the first GTA 6 gameplay last week and invited select media to participate in previews. The studio’s long stretch of silence looks to be over at last, with the November release date now locked in.
Sony has been talking up the idea that GTA 6 will “play best” on PS5, pledging exclusive features unique to the console. Expect the game to lean on the DualSense’s speakers, haptic feedback and adaptive triggers, plus the console’s Tempest 3D AudioTech. Against that backdrop, a couple of themed controllers hardly counts as a random tie-in.
The bundle that didn’t show up
The notable absence is a console bundle. Whether one is still on the way remains unclear, though the odds now look a little slim.
Launching a controller is the obvious moment to unveil a bundle alongside it, and no such thing was confirmed by Sony or Rockstar. Draw your own conclusions from that.
So for the time being it comes down to this: white, on sale nearly everywhere, or black, on sale at the back of a queue.