Ducky Halloween Theme Keycaps Review

Hello everyone and welcome back to Tiro Finale! While it may be a little late to the show, I finally managed to get my hands on Ducky's Halloween Themed keycaps for the 2020 holiday season. We will be taking a closer look at this seasonally limited set of PBT keycaps and how they stack up in comparison to other aftermarket PBT keycaps specifically those from Tai Hao and Ducky themselves. Without further ado, let us jump right into the review.

This would not be a foreign sight to any of you who have purchased Ducky keycaps in the past before. A sturdy cardboard box with a cut out of the "Ducky" wordings up front keeps the contents within it safe and snug. The Halloween version differs from the regular plain black Ducky packaging with the inclusion of a special Halloween design. In fact, the designs seen on the box itself are those incorporated onto the modifier keycaps as well.

Opening up the box, you will be greeted by two layers of keycaps with more than enough keys to fit your standard full sized mechanical keyboard. The rows of keycaps are held in place neatly by EVA foam cutouts. While it may seem like a fairly benign addition, these foam cutouts are an absolute gem especially when you own multiple sets of keycaps. They not only keep your keycaps neatly organized, they also hold them in place snugly preventing the keys from falling out and jumbling during transport. I much prefer this solution whenever possible compared to the use of plastic blisters or, worst still, just jumble together in a box.

The first layers of keycaps comprises of the crucial 60% of the keys on your keyboard. This is the layer which we will be focusing the most on for this review and is also the set of keys you would most likely be spending your time upon in any keyboard. Note how the modifiers use symbols with almost no relation to the buttons it is corresponded too?This is a theme we will see throughout the rest of the keyboard.

So much so, that anything outside of the standard 60% layout is almost entirely comprised of symbols. If you are the kind who is not accustomed to touch typing or averse towards symbols on their keycaps, you might want to look away. Aside from the standard 101 keys seen on most full sized keyboard, the Halloween set also comes included with several additional keycaps. This inlcudes, a novelty spacebar and four additional Row 1 keycaps. 

For the purpose of testing the keycaps, I will be using my trusty Ducky One 2 SF equipped with Cherry MX Brown switches. This 65% layout keyboard has been my go to keycap tester for the better part of the year. As I primarily use this keyboard for work, I am able to get a healthy amount of typing time on a daily basis. So out goes Tai Hao's awesome Sakura Michi set and in its place, the brand set new of Halloween keycaps.

Having two types of spacebars to choose from, I decided to go with the original yellow-orange spacebar solely because it matches the aesthetics of the rest of the set better. I would have loved to use to the black Halloween spacebar too but perhaps in a different keyboard. Personally, I think the black spacebar would look right at home on a simple all black keycap set.

As with all of Ducky's keycaps, these are molded from PBT. There is hardly any flex in them with nice thick walls all throughout. They are roughly the same thickness as Tai Hao's PBT keycaps on the Sakura Michi. While they are listed as double-shot PBT keycaps on Ducky's official website, I highly doubt that to be the case. There are no signs of injection molding on the back of the keycap and closer inspection reveals that it is more likely to be dye sublimation.

The inclusion of symbols over a large number of keycaps outside the standard 60% layout proves to be a very versatile bonus to have. Especially on a keyboard such as the One 2 SF with it's unconventional Delete, Page Up and Page Down layout. I am able to use standard Row 1 to 3 keycaps to ensure a smooth transition down the rows without placing completely irrelevant keycaps above it.

Aside from those keys, I have also taken the liberty to switch out several other keycaps with those I felt more suited to the occassion. Such as, the little Grim Reaper for the Escape/tilde key.

As the One 2 SF does not utilize a standard bottom row or right Shift key, I had to be a little creative when it came to employing suitable replacements. Normally, a standard 101/104 keycaps set would leave you high and dry, having to resort to non-corresponding keys. While this may not be an issue for  most, it may leave others a little annoyed by the lack of consistency.

While I was hoping that there would have been an included 2U right shift seeing as to how Ducky were the manufacturers of both the keyboard and keycaps, I had no such luck. Nevertheless, I must say that I really do like the vampire fangs replacement available from using the 0 key.

With everything assembled, pictures alone cannot do justice to how bright the colors of the Halloween set are. While PBT keycaps are often considered to not produce as vibrant and bright colors as their ABS counterparts, Ducky really knocked it out of the park with these colors. Aside from being really bright, the combination of purple and yellow is another winning combination that really sealed the deal when it came time to make the decision on purchasing these keycaps. While I may not be the biggest fan of the alphanumerical font and colors, it is by no means a deal-breaker in regards to getting this set. It is however worth pointing out that this set does not have shine-through legends. Not that it would matter too much as the main star of the show are simply those bright yellow and purples.

Surface-wise, these are very similar, if not identical, to the rest of Ducky's aftermarket lineup of PBT keycaps. As with most Ducky PBT keycaps, they are often much smoother than the textured, chalky surfaces from other PBT keycap manufacturers such as Tai Hao and IKBC. Compared to my other Ducky keycaps, they feel smoother than the OEM black Ducky keycaps and more textured than the too smooth Pudding keycaps. The textures in no way have affected my typing experience nor have they affected the accuracy of touch key recognition. While I personally prefer a chalkier surface for my PBT keycaps, there is no doubt that the Halloween set feel really nice too. Couple that with the lovely sound signature from these PBT keycaps and Cherry Browns, and you are in for a treat.

Having a full week's of typing time on this keyboard so far as of the writing of this review, I have yet to find any negative remarks about it. Being a relatively light handed typist, these keys felt good to type on and took little to no time in getting accustomed to. Even my coworkers who were new to mechanical keyboards did not have issues typing on it short of recognizing which keys were which. Certainly no regrets getting my hands on these set then.

I am certainly planning to make a follow up long-term impressions article on these set sometime in the future. Do let me know in the comments section below if that is something you would be interested in seeing or of any other of my keycap sets for that matter. Until the next time, thank you so much for reading and have yourself a wonderful day ahead!