MSI has crafted some fantastic hardware inspired by games over the years, from its radioactive STALKER 2 bundle to its Monster Hunter collection unleashing a beast of a graphics card. Although there are no official partnerships sitting on the Comptuex showroom floor this year, I can’t help but notice how its STRIKE Pro Wireless Special Edition gaming keyboard bears an uncanny resemblance to the incredibly stylish Clair Obscur: Expedition 33.
As if it was brought into existence by The Paintress herself, MSI treats its STRIKE Pro Wireless Special Edition like a canvas, dripping a chroma-like substance over its translucent keycaps. Admittedly, it doesn’t have the same comfort as Lumiére, but will have you staring in wonder, taking in its eerie beauty from a distance.
Okay, perhaps I’ve been playing a little too much of Sandfall Interactive’s indie RPG, but there’s no denying that it looks like it’s been sculpted by some surrealist metallurgist with its lattice wrapping around each key like organic armour. Pop a dye-sub PBT keycap off and you’ll see it come in two parts, with the skeletal outer shell sitting separately.
It’s eccentric, impractical, and entirely unnecessary… which is precisely why it’s brilliant. This is MSI throwing caution to the wind and building something for the enthusiast who’s seen it all. It’s weird, it’s wild, and frankly, it’s wonderful.
Under the abstract exoskeleton is a surprisingly practical core. MSI equips the board with Kailh Midnight Pro silent tactile switches, actuating at 45g with a short 1.9mm pre-travel. Don’t worry, though; you can hot-swap switches like Pictos, choosing your own if you fancy something a bit different.
Beneath the dye-sub PBT keycaps is tri-mode connectivity spanning 2.4GHz, Bluetooth, and wired options. Multimedia controls come in the form of dedicated keys and a volume wheel, and you can swap between profiles with three M keys.
FORGE GK600 TKL Wireless Special Edition
MSI didn’t just bring one gaming keyboard to Taipei, it brough a whole art installation. Despite its summery colour scheme, FORGE GK600 TKL Wireless Special Edition showcases a debatably more reserved design taking a more traditional approach to its flare using custom keycaps.
Not one to totally blend in, these keycaps still stand out from the pack thanks to opaque patterned legends (as is standard for dye-sub PBT) met with a transparent cutout to let the RGB lighting shine through. It’s the best of both worlds, as I personally find pudding variants to feel a little cheaper. Here’s hoping MSI releases these separately for those of us content with our typers, although I wouldn’t hold your breath.
Back to business, it’s much like STRIKE Pro Wireless under the hood, featuring tri-mode connectivity across a low-latency 2.4GHz dongle, Bluetooth, and wired. You can connect up to three Bluetooth devices at any one time, cycling through them as you see fit.
FORGE GK600 TKL Wireless packs HIFI linear mechanical switches with an operation force of 45g, but it’s once again hot-swappable so you can substitute your own into the mix. Whatever you choose, it’ll thwack against bespoke sound-dampening layers to ensure a beautiful sound profile.
