You just know that when a modern day piece of computer hardware arrives in a tin, there's likely to be something a little different about it. And this particularly device is certainly different.

But with a £35 price tag and without wireless support (the mouse requires a USB port to operate), the Raptor Gaming M2 gaming mouse may initially seem like a tough sell to the casual buyer. Yet for anyone who plays a number of first-person shooter games on their PC, there's a compelling argument for forking out the necessaries.

Inside the tin you'll find the mouse itself, a disc of driver software, a small manual and - this is a new one on us - some weights. The idea is that you can manually adjust the weight of the device until it suits your particular style. A nice touch, we thought, and one that does actually make a difference.

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The mouse itself is quite big and plays host to eight different buttons, each of which can have certain functions attributed to it. It's, to be fair, an exceedingly comfortable rodent, and one that suited whatever task we were undertaking at our PC.

But it's clearly gaming that the mouse is designed for, and it's gaming where it excels. We took the opportunity - any excuse, right? - to put games such as Call Of Duty, F.E.A.R. and Half Life 2 through their paces and found the mouse to be both fast and responsive, and up to the tasks we threw at it. Granted, we were only noticing marginal real performance differences between the Raptor and our usual optical squeaker of choice, but in a world where online games can be won and lost by fractions, that marginal difference may well be enough for most.

The reason for the increased performance is the mouse's support for 2400dpi (easily scalable up from 400dpi); the upshot of this is that the mouse responds to the tiniest movements in the tiniest ways. In games, this does take a little getting used to, but there's little denying that again it gives you a marginal advantage should you use it properly in your favour.

In all, we were suitably impressed with the M2, finding it both comfortable and effective. Its price tag should rightly deter all but the hardened gamer, for this is a piece of kit specifically targeted at a specific audience. But that audience is likely to be pleased with the results.

This is a luxury purchase for many, but a worthwhile one for regular players of first-person shooter games looking to gain an extra edge.