[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhcW3Rfc6qM[/youtube]
Presenting one of many post E3 shows. This one will be covering the new Logitech G29 and G920 first impressions. The Logitech G29 will work on the PC, PS3 and PS4 and the G920 will work on the PC and Xbox One . I’m going to cover both of them in this show since they are pretty much identical except button layout and placement.
It’s been six long years since the release of the Logitech G27 for the PS3 and PC. Logitech had announced a little while back that they wouldn’t be developing hardware for the console systems any longer. Well, I guess they changed their minds cause they’re back now and on both new gen systems .
The Logitech meeting room was my first stop on my E3 tour and I met up with Chris Pate who’s a Logitech Project Manager and who I’ve met a few times over the years. Great guy by the way and it was great to see him again.
Lets start things off with some pricing and specs.
Both wheels will retail for $399 and neither come with the optional Driving Force Shifter that will have a suggested retail price of $59.99. The G29 will be available in July while the G920 sometime later this year. You are able to pre-order either setup from the Logitech site with free shipping.
Both wheels feature a dual-motor force feedback transmission with anti-backlash helical gearing, a hand-stitched leather-wrapped rim.
Both come with the very familiar G27 style pedal sets but now have a rubber bumper type modification to add some progression to your braking. I was also told that they now use hall effect sensors and I assume they meant for pedal functionality but will find out more for my full review.
The G29 has the familiar shift / rev lights that the G27 had. The G920 does not have that option. Both have the same paddles shifters we are used to from the G27.
The G29 rim is now a combination of the Driving Force GT otherwise known as the DFGT and the G27. It has a D-Pad, the standard PS button layout including the X, square, Triangle circle layout, plus the 4 left and right bumper buttons. It has the 24-point selection dial and the plus/minus buttons that we saw on the DFGT. It also has the share, option and PS4 button. So if you include the plus minus selector, on the PC you will have 13 buttons you can map plus the dial.
The G920 has a Dpad, the Xbox One button layout with the A, B, X, Y buttons, LSB and RSB buttons, the Back and start, as well as the Xbox button. So on the PC, you would only have 9 buttons compared to the 13 on the G29.
Both will support up to 900 degrees of rotation.
No on to my initial impressions:
I drove the G920 on the Xbox One with Project Cars. Then I drove the G29 on the PS4 with Drive Club and Project Cars on the PC . All three were connected to Playseat chassis.
My impressions were pretty much the same across the board in regards to performance on all three systems. They all feel pretty much identical to the G27 in regards to force feedback and general performance. The wheel rim is now D shaped, but the leather feels the same as what you would find on the G27. The feel of the buttons were similar to how they feel on the DFGT. On the PC in project cars, it was recognized as a G27 in the menus so I assume they were using the G27 windows driver.
The pedals have the same feel and spacing as the G27 pedals but now have the additional brake mod that felt much better than a stock G27 brake. Felt similar to having a Nixim brake mod.
Finally the shifter.. It felt exactly like the G27 shifter without the buttons and dpad which have been moved to the rim.
The way it looks to me is that they are taking the , if it aint broke don’t fix it approach by basically upgrading the G27 in a few ways. Also looks like they went this route to add full compatibility on the new gen consoles versus getting the software developers to write code to make the G27s work. Seems the whole security chip debacle was a farce because the Thrustmaster T500 and Fanatec wheels work with Project Cars on the PS4. They don’t work on the PS4 menus, but they do work with the game because Slightly Mad was able to develop for them. Seems like Logitech wanted to have that full compatibility and also make a wheel that works on the Xbox One.
Would like to hear your take on this situation and leave a comment either here on You Tube, our Facebook page, Twitter or ISRTV forums.
Wish I had more to say, but I didn’t have much time with them. To really get a good feel for them, I will need some time to dial them in and try it with different titles across the board. Project Cars for instance as you may well know, there’s almost too many settings and if you don’t get them right, it won’t feel right. It did feel good though with how they set it up. Soon as I get them, I will put them through their paces and try them with multiple titles on all systems.
Hope you’ve enjoyed my first look and impressions of these new offerings from Logitech. Great to see them back in the mix and on the Xbox for the first time. Stay tuned to Inside Sim Racing for more coverage from E3 coming soon!
It looks like a good little wheel. If you are in a tight driving position that would be handy and with the small size there would be less need to swap to an F1 style wheel. Shape is different, but still. I did really like the red knob that let you control a lot of options on the fly but I wonder how many games will actually allow its usage? Project Cars lets me do some adjusting with my button box on the PC and of course iRacing does too, but on PS4 or Xbox1 will it work? Maybe Gran Turismo 7 will bring that option back from GT5. At any rate, I am glad to see a third manufacturer get into the fray for the newest gen of consoles.
More competition and more choices is generally always a good thing.
Who are these people writing these comments??? Do they work for logitech?
G29 is a knock off of the G27 with a break pedal mod and no shifter and 180 dollars more expensive! in short a rip off to force us to buy a new over priced wheel which is precisly why logitech have not added G27 support for ps4! This is an absolute joke! I would have bought a new wheel from logitech if they had actually made a new wheel! But i will not buy a re-skinned G27 for 400 dollars and 59 more for the shifter! It’s madness!
When i upgrade im getting a trustmaster! Logitech you have lost a loyal customer! And i’m not the only one!
Very disappointing move by Logitech, looks like a blatant cash grab. One wonders if they have even fixed the terrible reliability of the G27. Force feedback has moved on since the old G27 days and this isn’t a premium product anymore unfortunately. I was waiting for this wheel in order to make a decision on my Fanatec GT2 replacement but I think I’ll look elsewhere now. Thanks for the frank review.
Just got this wheel , have to say the brake pedal feels weird, almost impossible to lock up brake on Forza 5 with ABS off.
Apart from that feels solid, but not sure what to do with settings as my non FF wheel , i was doing 5 secs quicker laps.. 😛
Well it doesn’t get recongnised by iracing atm…getting all sorts of problems..
Also cannot get it to be recongnised in logitech profiler ffs on PC..
Both these issues shouldn’t be happening. You have a G29 or G920? We know the G29 for sure works with the profiler and iRacing. The G920 didn’t when we first got it but Logitech updated it not long after so everything should be ok.