The Panther XL by

Mad Catz Mad Catz Global Limited (formerly Mad Catz Interactive, Inc.) is an American Chinese-based company that provides interactive entertainment products marketed under Mad Catz, GameShark (gaming products) and TRITTON (audio products). Mad Catz distr ...

is a joystick and

trackball A trackball is a pointing device consisting of a ball held by a socket containing sensors to detect a rotation of the ball about two axes—like an upside-down ball mouse with an exposed protruding ball. Users roll the ball to position the o ...

combination that is used to replace the

keyboard Keyboard may refer to: Text input * Keyboard, part of a typewriter * Computer keyboard ** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping ** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware Music * Musi ...

and mouse for player movement in

first-person shooter First-person shooter (FPS) is a sub-genre of shooter video games centered on gun and other weapon-based combat in a first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action through the eyes of the protagonist and controlling the p ...

games like Quake and

Unreal Unreal may refer to: Books and TV * ''Unreal'' (short story collection), a 1985 book of short stories by Paul Jennings * ''Unreal'' (TV series), a 2015 television drama series on Lifetime Computing and games * ''Unreal'' (video game series), ...

. it could also be used for flight simulators so players can point their ship in any direction with the trackball. Based on a patent by James Barnes of First-Person Gaming, the Panther XL used technology used in the Assassin 3D controller. The Panther XL began production in late 1996 and was produced until 1998 with two main revisions in hardware in that timeframe. The controller remains popular with its fan base including many upgrades to the units functionality and internal workings to make the controller work in contemporary games and computers.

External links

Current home page of "ClanA3D" USB modified Panther XLs

Wayback Machine The Wayback Machine is a digital archive of the World Wide Web founded by the Internet Archive, a nonprofit based in San Francisco, California. Created in 1996 and launched to the public in 2001, it allows the user to go "back in time" and see ...

archived review of original Panther XL
"ClanA3D"
home page, archived on the

, for the original Panther XL and also the USB modded Panther XLs
"Game Vortex"

archived review of original Panther XL

References

Game controllers Joysticks {{videogame-hardware-stub