Out of the Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer 3.0, Wheel Mouse Optical, and IntelliMouse Optical, the IntelliMouse Optical (IMO for short) has always been the least popular among gamers. The reason for this is simple: The IMO goes against the commonly accepted design principles by widening considerably towards the base, resulting in a silhouette like this: / \. While not necessarily bad, most people find this design to be more difficult to pick up and less ergonomic than designs with straight or concave sides. Nonetheless, the IMO still has its fans, which is why Ninjutso took it upon themselves to recreate it as faithfully as possible with the Katana, updated with modern internals.

One of these internals is PixArt's PMW3389 sensor, a highly dependable model for wired mice. Unfortunately, and for whatever reason, the Katana suffers from a major sensor issue. Essentially, roughly every 20-40 minutes, the cursor will "skip" across a certain distance. Of course, due to this happening entirely randomly, these sudden cursor jumps are highly irritating even outside of playing any competitive games. Apparently, not all copies are affected by this issue, or not everyone is using the mouse in such a way that the conditions to trigger this issue (whatever they may be) are met. Still, such an issue simply should not be present on a sensor as established as the 3389, no matter the circumstances. A firmware given to me by Ninjutso fixed this behavior for me, but others report that it didn't fix the issue fully for them.

Other than that, sensor performance is almost flawless. CPI deviation is virtually nonexistent, general tracking fine, and motion delay as expected from a 3389. The only issue I could find is minor polling instability across the board. Click latency, on the other hand, is a bigger issue. While the Katana does come with a software which allows lowering debounce time, doing so does absolutely nothing, which is why click latency is permanently stuck at 11.1 ms, and quite literally lags behind the competition. I have received a firmware from Ninjutso which enables click latency adjustment, and if set to the lowest value, click latency finally is as competitive as it's supposed to be, but unfortunately, that firmware doesn't include the fix for cursor skipping. Accordingly, one has to choose between either fix, which essentially means that nothing is fixed as both are critical issues. And of course, neither firmware has been publicly released.

It's a shame really, as aside from these blunders, the Katana is a good mouse. At 57 g, the Katana is impressively light, especially when considering its medium size and lack of holes. Build quality doesn't suffer either, as there is no creaking on my sample, and actuating the side buttons by squeezing the sides is impossible. The only place where holes can be found is the PCB, which I'm really not a fan of as some of them are worryingly close to traces, and smart PCB design is a much better way to save weight than holes. As for the main buttons, Kailh GM 8.0 switches are used, which provide a snappy and firm response. Lateral button movement is minimal, too, but if pressed at a specific spot, the right button on my copy does squeak. The side buttons are good as well, but due to their construction, some pre and post-travel is present. The scroll wheel is fairly noisy, yet tactility is on point, providing clearly defined steps and controlled scrolling. Lastly, while the cable isn't the most flexible, I've found it to be perfectly usable, and the feet are fine, too.

Overall, the Katana has many things going for it, but between the sensor skipping and high click latency, it is difficult to recommend currently. Thankfully, all these issues can be addressed through updates, and I hope Ninjutso will get around to doing so in the near future. Until then, I'd hold off on getting the Katana.