I want to like this set, I really do. The first picture of the caps basically sealed the deal for me, but then I bothered to look closer. While I prefer centered legends for a uniform spherical profile, I can see the targeted aesthetic and appreciate that the look as a whole is good, reminding me of vintage Apple boards. Beige on grey is a welcome change from the light grey on grey that I see so often. The icon mods, while coming across as somewhat strange, do not feel bad. In fact, I believe that I would give them a chance over the text mods, if they weren't centered and contrasting with the alphas alignment. Looking at the F-row keys, I notice that a capital F is used for each key instead of a lowercase f, while every other text legend in the set uses a lowercase letter. I think it would have looked more like it belonged if lowercase f's were used instead. Including a centered stepped capslock key in the main kit feels odd, but the inclusion of an offcenter one in the Tsangan kit makes up for it, though since the rest of the text mods are all on a single line, I feel that changing the capslock key to simply read "caps" would better fit the feel of the set. Coming to the Bauhaus kit, I have a much stronger feeling of misgiving in that I feel that the addition of colored mods is really just due to the fact that every "granite wannabe" set happens to have them, and that I don't see a clear connection between including generic colored mods and bauhaus mentality. The Calculator kit feels complete with plenty of keys, but the fact that most of the modifier keys for this kit have their legends centered instead of corner aligned feels wrong. The corner alignment is what gives this set much of its look, but it feels like the numpad mods were given less thought than the main kits and just had a kit thrown together because it's not usually purchased as much. This lack of thought on some of the legends continues in the Ortholinear mods kit and the Ergodox kit. In each kit, the backspace key is the only text key that spills into two lines of text instead of one. This makes it feel quite different and constantly draws my eyes to it. I think this could be remedied by simply having it say "back" instead. Finally, my last and perhaps most serious complaint, the Mono kit. While every other alpha key in the set has their text corner aligned, the mono kit included centered legends. It's obvious that a lack of thought was involved in porting over this often used granite kit, and that it was added simply to be used along with the generic emblem/rune kit that is always included in granite-esque sets. I can understand wanting the two kits to be center aligned with one another to fit together, but it feels kinda half-assed that they're separate kits when they're pretty clearly made to complement each other. There is not a render of the mono kit with any of the other kits, and I am glad that I don't have to see that contrasting mishmash of alignment.
Overall, the look of the set is quite pleasing, and I may be coerced into buying some of it if the price is right, but I feel that it shines badly on the community when some of the half-thought out ideas in this set are meant to represent a finished product.
Overall, the look of the set is quite pleasing, and I may be coerced into buying some of it if the price is right, but I feel that it shines badly on the community when some of the half-thought out ideas in this set are meant to represent a finished product.