On my last trip to Office Depot, I saw a cardboard display with a few different colors of these and another, more economical Schneider Slider (to be reviewed later) next to these. The blue and black retro-futuristic design caught my eye, and another $2.99 was deducted from my debit card.
Do we call it a needle tip, all be it a portly one? The ball is huge and may be akin to driving a large sedan on a frozen lake. Very smooth, but you do not get clean, solid lines with this one.
The Pilot Dr. Grip and the Uniball Jetstream were both more consistent and had darker ink. I prefer both of the former over the latter.
The barrel has this little kick-stand nub to prevent the pen from rolling off your writing surface, but this is only necessary when you're writing with the pen unposted.
The Viscoglide technology is certainly smoother than the Everyday Ballpoint, but there are white spots in the ink. Perhaps it would work better if the ink were pressurize.
I tried removing the end and the section under the cap, but I was not able to take off either part. I don't think there any refills, and I didn't find any online when I searched for them. Not refillable is almost a certainly deal breaker to be qualified as an 'economy pen'.
The mug shots.
You can see my Nikon in the reflection of the image on the left. The clip is quite large and, as you can see, quite shiny.
If you love ballpoints and all things 'super-smooth ink', then you might want to try this one. I think it needs to be refillable and should have more consistent ink, then it will be worth the asking price.