Hey I've been a Xim user since the Xim4 and have had an Apex since April 2020 and have just created a forum profile to chime in on the Nexus.
Everything I've seen from the dev blog post and discussions on the forum, to XIM Central's youtube channel showcasing the controller, has been amazing. I've always been a potato aimer on controller and have stuck with KBM for FPS games, so it is exciting to think that I could have the convenience of playing with native controls and the benefit of added precise aiming in one package.
I hope to get my hands on one as soon as I can
I like Od1n's idea of adding some server-side checks to help mitigate against bots:
What i think is much more important though is to strengthen the XIM Store against scalping bots. You can have the best community solution but if the store isnt fortified against bots then its all kind of meaningless.
It should not be possible to buy more than 2 XIM Nexus controllers within 1 month:
- under the same IP
- under the same account
- under the same credit card or bank account
- to the same address
- idealy email or phone verification code to check out
- email/phone verification is tied to the account, the same phone/email cannot be used under a different account
- captchas or artificial pause times between steps to delay bots (must wait 10 seconds before you can proceed to the next step)
These are all great points, especially anti-bot captcha-like implementation.
All it takes is one person motivated enough to automate the ordering process to ruin it for a lot of folks if the online release is overlooked. It's clear that money can be made off this release by scalpers, which in turn robs existing users and members of the community the opportunity to buy it at a fair price.
LinusTechTips wanted to sell some graphics cards to 'actual gamers' and dropped a Youtube video that contained a segment inside where they tell you to go a particular subdirectory on their store (e.g., `/asus/3090/strixextreme`) in order to answer some gaming-related trivia questions and only the first X number of people to watch the video and complete the quiz had the opportunity to buy a card.
Obviously that is not feasible to expect your dev team to imlement this and QA test it if the planned release is still this month.
My idea that can definitely be improved upon:
- Drop a message to forum members letting them know when the release is
- Store page updates and has a simple puzzle that links to a trivia form.
- The easy trivia is random (and X wrong answers will fail the test, resulting in punishment for bots)
- successful completion of the test will generate a one-time use token associated with the user's account that will allow them to place an order with the Nexus.
- could be something similar to the human verification for forum posts (e.g., How many numbers are in asdf969s) but would have to be revised so it couldn't be scripted.
This way existing users that want to get a Nexus at release will have a chance to complete these tasks before a bot programmer can account for the change in checkout process. I would also prevent guest checkout for the initial release, in addition to all the points mentioned.
Here's a link to the sold ebay listings of the Apex, sorted by newest:
https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_nkw=xim+apex&_sacat=0&rt=nc&LH_Sold=1&LH_Complete=1
Yes, the Apex is not the same as the Nexus and greatly marked-up prices for used Apex does not mean demand for the Nexus will be the in the same capacity. But I would err on the side of caution if I were XIM Tech, to offer the best chance to existing and loyal customers.