THE BUZZ: Japanese game peripheral developer HORI has announced the Tactical Assault Commander 3, a new keyboard-styled controller and mouse set developed specifically for use with the PlayStation 3.

The T.A.C. 3—licensed by Sony Computer Entertainment—features an 11-key mini-keyboard which provides basic movement and function buttons, as well as an integrated d-pad and palm rest. Included with that is a mouse, whose stats are as of yet unclear beyond featuring a DPI/sensitivity toggle.

The Tactical Assault Commander 3 set will retail in the United States for $99.99 (according to an Amazon pre-order page), and in Japan for 9800 yen.

EGM’s TAKE: This is a rather strange announcement in my mind. The PlayStation 3 already supports standard USB keyboards and mice for games that support such options, but the amount of games which do so are few. Thus, I’d imagine this is a peripheral that emulates keyboard + mouse control via the standard functions of a regular PS3 controller; for example, having the mouse simply replicating the movement of the right analog stick.

So why the timing on this peripheral? It feels a little late in the PS3′s life to decide to release a controller like this, especially with the big peripheral-based push for first-person shooters at the moment being Move support.

Source: Gameranx