For my money, there’s no greater malaise in modern gaming than stick drift. After forking out hundreds of dollars for a console and sometimes a similar fee for a top-of-the-line pro controller, seeing one of your thumbsticks jittering or failing to properly respond can be a massive pain. I’ve got very vivid memories of playing Saints Row IV as my controller constantly veered the camera to the right, taking me out of the experience entirely.

It’s an issue that continues to plague current-gen consoles, with Nintendo often facing flak for the Joy-Con’s stick drift and spare DualSenses becoming almost obligatory if you’ve got a PS5. Fortunately, for Xbox players, the Thrustmaster HEART Controller seems to have all but eliminated that issue. Even better, the separate but similar ESWAP Hall module means those who have already invested in a Thrustmaster pad can get in on the upgrade without purchasing an entirely new peripheral.

Since both of these pieces of Xbox-exclusive kit operate in the same way with identical functions, we’ll be tackling them together in this review.

Thrustmaster HEART Controller

The first thing that struck me about the HEART controller is how premium it feels. It’s slightly heavier than your regular Xbox Series X|S gamepad, with a sleek green LED running at an angle down the middle when the controller is plugged in. Yes, it’s a wired controller, meaning you can’t hook it up to your Xbox via Bluetooth like regular gamepads.

Ultimately, that’s only an issue if the USB-C wire provided with the controller doesn’t stretch long enough for your purposes. That happened to be the case for me when testing this product, but fortunately I had a spare one lying around that ran the length of my gaming room. There’s no additional setup required after that point, meaning you can boot straight into a game of your choice.

As soon as you start playing a game with the HEART controller, it becomes clear just how much more tactile and responsive it is compared to the regular Xbox pad. The face buttons click in much faster due to their flat-faced nature and less distance to push for it to receive the input, meaning it’s much easier to pound on them than the less responsive Xbox ones. The same goes for the D-pad, which eschews the controversial grid format for a more traditional four-directional structure, which is much nicer to the touch and incredibly responsive.

But aside from just the pleasant design and refinement of the main buttons, it’s the twin thumbsticks on the HEART controller that make it stand out. Embossed with a Thrustmaster design against the matted surface, they’re slightly stubbier than regular thumbsticks but just as responsive. Rather than reinventing the wheel each time you use them, their main USP is what goes on behind the scenes, using magnetic sensors to detect where the sticks’ resting position is and eliminating any drift automatically.

It’s a really novel idea that is sadly quite hard to tangibly comment on, given that its impact is technically felt under the hood instead of more explicitly during gameplay. Regardless, it’s good to know that you can effectively store the controller in any way without worrying about the sticks gradually wearing down over time.

ESWAP HALL Module

If you’re already baked into the Thrustmaster ecosystem with one of their ESWAP controllers, there’s a dedicated thumbstick module that performs the same role as the HEART controller. Named the HALL module after the Hall Effect technology within it, it’s effectively a more compact plugin that does the same thing.

As such, it’s another one of those situations where it’s hard to specifically quantify how successful the hardware is in action. I’m sure it’s working in the background, but given how decidedly un-flashy its function is, all we can do is observe the sweet lack of stick drift.

If that’s an issue you often come across when playing on Xbox, the HEART controller and HALL module are both pretty easy to recommend. They’ll all but ensure you never need to worry about stick drift again, even if they don’t do anything to directly revolutionize your gaming experience. Instead, you’ll get uninterrupted thumbstick movement – but there’s no downside to that at all.