XSReviews

There are plenty of ambidextrous mice on the market, but most don’t really live up to the description. After all, a truly ambidextrous design should be more or less symmetrical throughout, including additional buttons on each side where they can easily be pressed by a thumb on the left or right hand. We are looking at one such mouse today, the Roccat Kova Aimo. It sports a unique mirrored shape, with three buttons on each side for an impressive ten programmable buttons in all. Here’s our rapid-fire review.

Specs

• Pro-Optic Sensor R6 (Pixart PMW3320DB, h/t TweakTown)
• 1000Hz polling rate
• Rated for up to 20G acceleration
• 1ms response time
• 131 x 66 x 38mm
• 99 grams

Design

The Kova Aimo is a comfortable mouse for palm or fingertip grips, starting out quite slim for the front half of the mouse and becoming wider towards the bottom and back. Two pairs of side buttons are in a comfortable position to push with the thumb, while the remaining side buttons flank the primary buttons. That means there’s relatively little space to rest your index and middle fingers, but you do have extremely rapid access to these two extra top buttons. The scroll wheel and DPI adjust button just below it bring our total up to ten. One of these buttons can also act as a modifier, allowing nine additional functions to be selected.

Software

The Kova Aimo gets its surname from the Aimo lighting system, which is controlled from the Roccat Swarm software. Here, you can control the colours displayed on the scroll wheel and the tail light, with options for various effects. Other functions include assigning buttons to various inputs, setting up different profiles, adjusting the polling rate and so on. There’s no setting for lift-off distance, but I appreciated the inclusion of a single button to change between default bindings for left and right-handed users.

Impressions

Playing a spot of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare (2019) with the Kova Aimo, I was first struck by the cable. The cable is braided and therefore somewhat inflexible, making a mouse bungee a near-necessity for use. I’d much prefer to see a softer and more flexible cable in future designs, as this would make moving the mouse easier and more predictable, increasing accuracy over the long term.

Next, the weight. At 99 grams, the Kova is nearly double the weight of the mouse I was using before, the diminutive Finalmouse Ultralight 2. That required a bit of muscle memory re-learning, but before too long I was able to snap to targets with reasonable precision at 400 DPI. This weight is about as heavy as I’d recommend for most people, even for those that aren’t fans of ultra-light designs.

Part of that weight is due to the number of buttons, and these do justify their inclusion. In Call of Duty, I was able to set up individual buttons to melee attack, throw tactical grenades, activate voice comms and mount my weapon to nearby surfaces. Being able to slam the left-top button to melee, for instance, was incredibly handy and saved my (virtual) life on several occasions. For other games that benefit from quick access to even more commands, such as MMOs, I’d recommend using one of the thumb buttons as a modifier. It’s nice that this is an option.

Overall, the Kova performed well in my testing. I would still prefer a lighter version, but for the weight it is comfortable and accurate.

Conclusion

The Kova Aimo is a nice ambidextrous mouse that makes some clever decisions about button placement and shape, allowing more buttons than you’d expect within a relatively lightweight design. The addition of Aimo lighting is a nice touch too, especially if you’re already invested in the Roccat ecosystem. While I personally prefer lighter mice and don’t require the extra buttons in the games I play most often, I suspect most people will really enjoy the Kova Aimo.