Sony‘s new PS5 controller is not like other two-handed controllers, and not for all the obvious reasons. Sony’s “Project Defiant” battle stick now has a new name, FlexStrike, and an unspecified release date of 2026. But the most intriguing and annoying aspect of the combat stick is how it will connect to your PlayStation 5 or PlayStation 5 Pro.
The FlexStrike has all the face buttons and triggers of a regular DualSense controller, as well as a single Japanese-style battle stick with a spherical top. All buttons are based on mechanical switches, which should provide a more tactile pressing experience than anything you get with a controller. A special feature of the FlexStrike is that it has a bottom panel that consists of several different types of restriction gates. There are square, octagonal, and round restraints that fit under the stick, creating a feel typical of your favorite arcade consoles.
All of this would be good enough for today’s demanding fighting game fans. However, FlexStrike is no ordinary Bluetooth controller; it also uses its own connection standard called PlayStation Link. This is a PlayStation-specific connection at 2.4 GHz using a special codec that provides faster response times than Bluetooth. Microsoft uses a similar proprietary standard to connect devices to the Xbox Series X (you can’t connect Bluetooth headsets to Xbox consoles without an adapter). Sony has not mentioned this standard since early 2024, when it debuted the PlayStation Pulse Elite headset and Pulse Explore wireless headphones. Both of these devices use a USB-A adapter that must first be connected to a PS5 or PC. The new version of the FlexStrike uses USB-C. This is a pretty important change, as the slim versions of the PS5 and PS5 Pro no longer have USB-A on the front.
You can connect up to two FlexStrike controllers to a single PlayStation Link and use them with Pulse audio products. Your regular DualSense controllers work via Bluetooth, and Sony says you can use both at the same time if you want to switch between them to navigate menus. If you don’t want to connect the PlayStation Link to a computer or console, you can use a simple wired connection.
Since the introduction of the PlayStation Link, Sony has released many updates to its consoles and pushed the $700 PlayStation Pro console off the market. Why Sony didn’t just build PlayStation Link into its premium gaming hardware is a mystery that I’ve never been able to solve. If companies continue to use proprietary 2.4 GHz codecs, they should be like HP with its HP Omen Max gaming laptop, which makes connectivity with its own products seamless.
Sony should start thinking about a universal 2.4 GHz connection for all its products. The company also sells Inzone headphones and headsets for gaming with a separate 2.4 GHz dongle that doesn’t use the same codec as PlayStation Link. There are also products such as the Bravia Theater U headphones that connect to the PS5 controller to access the console’s touted 3D sound features. Why, oh why, can’t we have one key for everything? Or, you know what’s even better? For low-latency connections, you don’t need a dongle at all.
