I’ll be the first one to admit that current generation controller prices are shockingly high. Maybe it’s because back in the day the consoles used to come with two controllers and extra ones only cost a wheat penny. But who among us hasn’t suffered the sticker shock of paying $60 dollars just so your six-year-old cousin can bang around a second controller and think they’re playing a video game when really you’re just trying to distract them? Leave it to former George W. Bush-era White House Press Secretary Ari Fleischer to do the most American thing possible and buy a Chinese bootleg controller then act like he bought the genuine thing while commiserating on social media about it. It’s no DualSense, that’s for sure.
In a Tweet from yesterday by Fleischer that has since been deleted, the former Bush mouthpiece spun a tale about buying his kids a PlayStation 4 and heading to that bastion of quality goods, the Amazon third-party seller’s market. Instead of buying an official DualShock 4 controller sold on that very same site, Fleischer borrowed the tactics of every grandparent attempting to buy something video game-related at Christmas and went with whatever was cheapest, because it’s all the same, right?
After all, who could forget the PlayStation 4’s iconic L, 3/4ths circle, and X-ish(?) buttons or the first draft of the Persona 4 logo as a home button? After some digging, it appears that the controller Fleischer purchased is the CHASDI PS4 controller, released in 2018 and typically retailing for about thirty bucks. In fairness to Fleischer, “anyone” could have been hoodwinked by this near-flawless recreation of the DualShock 4.
And if the exact replication of design wasn’t enough to convince you that this thing is definitely worth the money, allow some of its sterling user reviews do the talking.
Grandmothers everywhere thought they were making the right purchase, so at least you’re in good company, Mr. Fleischer. Sorry about your grandson’s controller, Kathy.
CHASDI even has its own store page on Amazon, you know, if you’re looking for the complete knock-off gaming experience while we wait out the current hellscape that is the world.
I think we all learned something here today: If you’re going to buy your kids something don’t assume that quality doesn’t matter because you think kids are dumb with zero discerning taste and deserve whatever old crap is cheapest. And more to the point: If you go on social media acting like you’re making a good-faith complaint then don’t be shocked when you get ratio’ed all the way back to the Iraq War.
This page contains affiliate links to products, but we urge you not to actually buy this knock-off garbage, even if the purchases do help PlayStation LifeStyle. Please by legitimate quality goods like these actual Sony DualShock 4 controllers (also an affiliate link).
