Nacon RIG R5 Spear PRO HS

I've reviewed a fair few RIG products now, from mics to headsets and other peripherals and accessories. Largely, the products sell themselves on high ambitions and low price tags, and the same is true for their latest innovation, the RIG R5 Spear PRO HS. This headset, designed primarily for PlayStation consoles (as the HS tag notifies us), looks to elevate RIG's audio game to a whole new standard.

Making use of 40mm graphene drivers, the RIG R5 Spear PRO HS is optimised for 3D audio. RIG understands that modern gaming, especially competitive gaming, can be determined by sound as much as visuals. Footsteps, reloads, the slight ping of a grenade pin being pulled. They're all key to someone who wants to elevate their performance or even make a career out of gaming, and RIG aims to help you hear them with this new headset. Optimised for 3D audio, it goes beyond just highlighting footsteps, and really wants to add another layer to the audio immersion you experience while gaming.

That's quite a bold undertaking, especially when RIG is still aiming to keep its price at the budget friendly point of £69.99/$69.99. At that price, it's certainly not the cheapest headset you can pick up, but you would expect much pricier headsets to be aiming for such high audio quality.

And that's what RIG delivers with this R5 Spear PRO HS headset. It really feels optimised to take audio up another level, and delivers smooth audio that even challenges my go-to, more expensive SteelSeries Arctis Nova 5. I don't often play shooters at the moment, but with the games I played while putting this headset through its paces, I did notice a very, very strong audio experience compared to what I'd usually expect at this price range. Every gunshot, every click of a weapon needing reloading, every call out and map notification was clear to my ear. Playing Deadlock, Valve's latest hero shooter MOBA, those audio keys are incredibly important, and I'm glad to say that RIG's focus on audio performance paid off in delivering all of them.

There's a premium feel to the audio here you'd expect to hear from a headset ten, twenty, thirty or even forty pounds dearer. The feel of the headset reflects the premium audio, too. The overall look of the design is rather basic, but I've often criticised RIG for weightless, cheap-feeling headsets and I can't say the same for this latest model. The magnetic, customisable snap-lock cup exteriors help adding a nice bit of weight to the model, and while it remains a plastic kit, you'll notice a significant increase to the RIG R5 Spear PRO HS' sturdiness compared to other models from the manufacturer. A real win here when it seemed to be a lingering problem with RIG products for so long.

The headset also feels comfortable to wear, even on my sizeable noggin. The cups are soft if a little tight to the ear, but didn't feel like they squeezed even during long gaming segments. My only real criticism from the design perspective is the headset's basic level of functionality. Costs had to be cut somewhere, but while the customisability of the RIG R5 Spear PRO HS makes it feel more premium, the fact that it's wired with just a 3.5mm jack connection shows where the budget comes in. The fact we don't have a USB connection makes sense, considering this is primarily designed to stick in a PS5 or PS4 controller, but it's worth raising that you shouldn't just stick the RIG R5 Spear PRO HS into the headset jack on your PC. The audio at least in my experience was really distorted and nothing like the quality I got when I plugged the headset into the 3.5mm port in a controller I had connected to my PC. Workarounds, I guess.

The mic for the RIG R5 Spear PRO HS is pretty good. The broadcast-grade mic offers clear and natural sound, with an emphasis on the natural element. Positioned by your mouth, don't be surprised if it picks up most of your breaths, lip smacks, and everything else a separate mic is likely to ignore. The quality is undeniable, though, just as it is with the audio output, when you look at what you're getting for the price.

If you're looking for an exciting headset with tonnes of features and flash, you won't find it here, but if you want what matters in a headset like great audio output, a comfortable feel, and premium weight, then you'll find it with the RIG R5 Spear PRO HS. RIG's latest is a leap in the right direction, and if you're looking to make a big step up in your audio without breaking the bank, this is one of your best options.