Thrustmaster

Much like the automotive sector, China is a huge market for gaming. Sony is capitalizing on that with a tour of the country over the next week, and Gran Turismo Sport will feature heavily at all three planned events.

In amongst the many announcements made at last week’s Copper Box blow-out of Gran Turismo Sport, Thrustmaster made a quiet reveal of their own on the show floor, showing off a new wheel coming in the future that will presumably be the official steering wheel of GT Sport.

Prominent accessory manufacturer Thrustmaster is back in the spotlight with another interesting product – the TMX Force Feedback racing wheel, with highly adaptive force feedback effect. The new steering wheel has been officially designed for Xbox One, but the manufacturer ensures full compatibility on Windows platform PC’s as well.

Thrustmaster continues their vie for peripheral domination with their newest add-on, benefiting those with the company’s TH8A and TH8 RS shifter assemblies – the TH8 Sequential Knob.

Coming hot off their DB9 adapter allowing non-Thrustmaster pedals to be paired alongside a competent wheel from the company, they’ve now released an adapter that further opens up the hardware ecosystem, allowing owners of the T3PA and T3PA-PRO 3 pedals to use them as standalone products.

Indeed, who could have seen that coming? The new adapter from Thrustmaster features compatibility with non-Thrustmaster pedals as long as they feature a DB9 connector. That naturally includes Logitech and its G-series pedals.

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Today, for XBox One players in North America and Australia, the wait is over – Forza Motorsport 6 is on store shelves. Japan and Europe must wait until the 17th and 18th respectively, while those racers that sprung for the digital Ultimate Edition have been enjoying the game since last Thursday (see GTPlanet’s review here).

Gaming news isn’t the only thing to come out of this year’s Gamescom as Thrustmaster have utilized the conference in Cologne, Germany to announce its TX Servo Base Racing Wheel, a standalone version of the acclaimed Xbox One TX Wheel. The wheel base will be available for the Xbox One and PC with the added benefit of being highly customizable within Thrustmaster’s ecosystem of products by way of a modular approach.

Thrustmaster has been aggressively expanding their sim-racing hardware line over the past year, first rolling out the new T300 RS wheel unit and then releasing updated shifter and pedal add-ons.

Shifters are sometimes forgotten in the sim racing hardware market today. Unlike the Logitech G25 and G27, which dominated the landscape in years’ past, few wheel sets include an independent shifter accessory nowadays, relying on paddles instead.

The Thrustmaster T300RS wheel is a great piece of hardware, but as I noted in my review last week, the pedals it comes with can leave you wanting a bit more – and they don’t include a clutch. That’s where the T3PA pedal set comes in, providing a plug-and-play upgrade that’s compatible with the rest of the company’s ecosystem of wheels.

When Thrustmaster released the T500RS as the officially-licensed wheel for Gran Turismo 5 back in 2011, it made quite an impact on the sim racing hardware market. Featuring sturdy construction, high-quality materials, and wide availability among retailers around the world, it got the attention of many enthusiasts looking for a PS3 and PC compatible wheel.

As you may recall, the Thrustmaster T300 RS wheel – the company’s newest model since the T500, the official wheel for GT5 and GT6 – was unveiled back in June at E3.

Thrustmaster, the company which produces the T500RS – the “official” wheel for GT5 and GT6 – announced a new model today at the E3 game show in Los Angeles.