When you’re a beloved blue eulipotifal with race car speed, all the gold rings, a buddy like Tails, and even a couple of hit feature films, you start to feel like you can do anything. This includes typing on a truncated mechanical keyboard without letters, numbers, or any other writing written on top of the keycaps.
Higround, known for its gaming hardware, is now releasing a trio of 65 percent mechanical keyboards made in collaboration with Sega, as spotted by Nintendo Wire, as well as other Sega-focused hardware, including keycaps and mouse pads.
The brand’s photographs feature a trio of keyboards come to life with colorful details that convey nostalgic imagery anywhere from, depending on the keyboard, the Green Hill Zone hinges and rings in 1991’s Sonic the Hedgehog to the contrasting profiles of Sonic and Knuckles from the 2001s. Sonic Adventure 2 to the rainbow-colored arrow keys that mimic the buttons of a console controller in honor of Sega’s latest globally released console, the Dreamcast.
According to Higround, the dye-sublimated PBT keycaps are 1.5mm thick, and the informative lettering on their topside is omitted in favor of an artful appearance when looking down at the keyboard. But from a typical seated position, you should see lettering printed on the side of the front of the keycaps. You don’t have to be a blind typist to use Sega keyboards, but if you don’t, they will be harder to use at first than a regular keyboard.
The Sonic needs to be fast, so it’s only fitting that the keyboards use TTC’s Speed Silver linear mechanical switches. They ‘re rated for a total travel of around 3.4mm, with a 1.08mm actuation point, and 45 grams of actuation force (if you don’t know what that means, check out our mechanical keyboard guide). These numbers make them slightly shorter than a regular Cherry MX Red switch (4mm/2mm/45gf); although the Higround could have been shorter with low-profile mechanical shifters to fit the speed theme even more.
If you’re looking for a quick way to fill out those spreadsheets, Sega’s keyboards don’t work because they lack a numeric keypad.
Ultimately, you need a combination of Sega and the line typing fandom, and the ability to work without a numeric keypad (some touch typing skills would be nice too) so that these keyboards can help you improve your productivity, not just some interesting collectible.
But the keyboards aren’t as polarized as they could be… at least they don’t force you to type in Elvish.