Probably you will agree that it is not always comfortable to play games on smartphones and tablets. The disadvantages are often caused by the absence of mechanical buttons. You have to press the softkeys on the display of the smartphone. In tense moments, you can miss the right key and lose the level. In addition, if the display is small, the buttons can cover its part that has to show the game image, so the viewing area becomes small. That is why we want to tell our readers about the Bluetooth video game controller for Android.
Contents
Choosing the right controller
There is no unequivocal option, and we cannot choose the best Bluetooth game controller for Android.
For some people, the compactness will be the criterion in choosing, because we speak about playing on the mobile devices. Other people will prefer the gamepads that are comfortable to hold and not tiring their fingers after long-term operation (in such a case, the device will not be compact).
At the time of writing, we have found several popular and comfortable devices.
Compact
This list includes small and comfortable game manipulators.
Ipega PG-9017S
SteelSeries Mobile Gaming Controller
Duo Gamer
Nyko Playpad
The form factor that is similar to the console gamepad
As you may have guessed, here you can find comfortable, but not the most compact joysticks. By the location and size of the keys, they are similar to the long-proven comfortable console gamepads.
Power A MOGA and its Pro version
Sunflex Snakebyte iDroid:con
Nyko Playpad Pro
EXEQ Renegade
We will talk more about the last model in this list. We will show how to connect it and use in the games.
This gamepad, like the other ones that we mentioned in the list, is the wireless game controller for Android, Windows and iOS devices. It can be connected via Bluetooth.
We want to pay your attention at the phone holder, which is a feature of some gamepads in our list. In practice, it is very convenient. You receive a portable console, which is comfortable to play on even on the road. Our example has a holder that can hold a phone up to a width of 9 cm.
Connection
If you are not sure that you will be able to connect the joystick to your device, we will provide a step-by-step instruction (we will use the abovementioned manipulator as the example). Note that the connection of this model is the most difficult. Other controllers will be easier to be connected to the tablet or smartphone.
- Enable the Bluetooth on Android.
- On the EXEQ Renegade, hold «Х» and «Home», to activate the detection mode on the gamepad. If the indicator is flashing, the mode is activated.
- On your phone, search for available devices. Find the name of the game controller and click it to start pairing.
At this step, the connection could have been completed, but this model required additional steps to perform. Other models will not require them. - Turn off the controller by holding the «Home» button.
- Turn it on again and press some buttons, for example, arrows or the right stick. After these actions, the smartphone should detect the gadget.
Next time, you will need to perform only the step 5 to connect the device.
Control in games
We did not need to configure anything in games to play with the controller. If the game supports the control from external device, it will detect it automatically. However, not every game supports controllers.
If speaking about the genres of the games, you can be sure that races (GT Racing 2, Asphalt 8 etc.), platformers, shooters and arcades will support joysticks.
Conveniences and disadvantages
We want to note some facts about using gamepads, which can be useful when you will be thinking of buying such a device.
The strengths:
- responsive and accurate control.
- fingers do not get tired so fast, as if you pressed keys on the display.
The inconvenience: game developers have not created a common standard of control (the PS and XBOX consoles have such a standard). For example, if you use a gamepad for your mobile device, in different games different keys will be responsible for shooting. In such a case, you will need to adjust to the different control in different games. As a result, it may happen that you will confuse some actions.