Which controllers/joystick do you recommend?

[Arjen Gnodde]

Hi

I know this question (or similar) has been asked before, but the most recent one I found was over 3 years old so I thought it is time to ask it again.

Which joystick do you use? Is the Hotrod still available? What is the best joystick on the market right now?

I am still using a keyboard and I realize that I can't be competitive without a good joystick.

Thanks,
Arjen


update: After searching the internet I came across this joystick. It looks very good and sturdy. Does anyone have any experience with these?

[Chad]

own a hotrod for 7+ years now, still going strong, the X-arcade looks a lot like the hotrod, so maybe it'll last as long.

Was debating on getting a slikstick for about the same time, since it comes with a spinner but never got one. And now their website is down http://www.slikstik.com/

one bad think about this NEW message board is it doesnt' do target=_blank for default links that show up, or it didnt for Arjen's link, so if you close the link window you close the board window!

[AL]

I had a Hotrod for 4 years and after quite a lot of abuse (mainly on T+F/Hypersports), one or two buttons became unreliable and 'sticky',also my new PC had no ps2 connection (and the adapter wouldn't work) so I went for an X-Stick. While this indeed is a sturdy piece of work, I have found a big problem with it. Not sure what the technical term is but basically when playing a game, if you suddenly let go of the joystick and it 'wobbles' the same thing happens to your man/life/whatever on screen. Not good. I'm told this has to do with the controller mimicking the keyboard, or something. I didn't have this problem with the Hotrod.
Anyways, I've to get a new mother board which has a ps2 connection and am gonna go for this:


http://www.slikstik.com/webstore/websto ... ategory=64

I've added the 'Lightning' overlay (extra $109). Total cost including shipping to Europe equals $905, which equates to €615 (hehe...thanks Dubya for screwing your countrys economy).


One advantage that I found the X-Arcade has over Hotrod is finding the diagonal is 100% better. Games like Robotron are much much better to play using the former.
My Hotrod used ps2, and X-Arcade USB if thats any use.

I'll let you know how the Slikstik works out. Gonna order next week. Yeah the site seems to be up+down. It was working the other day cos I got a shipping quote e-mail from them.

Cheers,


AL

[Arjen Gnodde]

Thanks AL and Skito.

Is this the Slikstik both of you are talking about: slikstik?

That thing looks huge!

At the moment the single player x-arcade is my first choice. Second choice is the x-arcade tank stick.
I would really like to hear some first hand experience with either of these. Oh, and ofcourse, once I have my joystick I will let you all know my experiences. You will notice when I have it when the huge, almost unbelievable scores will be uploaded! (only joking )

[Zhorik]

I am still using a keyboard and I realize that I can't be competitive without a good joystick.

Which games? If you get used to the keyboard, it's possible to be competitive on a much wider variety of games than you might think. I play everything except analog games on a keyboard. Admittedly there are some specialized games that might be much better with a joystick(s), but most games are very playable with a keyboard if you practice a bit.

-George

[Alessandro.S]

I bought the X-Arcade Tankstick with Trackball (239EUR in Italy, duh - MUCH more expensive than in the US) mainly to play Track'n'Field, but I'm not truly at ease with it - too much excursion for my own taste going left-right and back; I'm considering some easy hack to reduce that, when I defeat my laziness.

It also has the bounce-back effect that can be deadly in Frogger - possibly again too much excursion ?

Diagonal is very good, yes, and I can play Crazy Climber even better than with arcade controls (but still crap, as I'm no good at that).

Even a first stint at Crazy Kong clones left me a bit unsatisfied vs. the keyboard (with which all my .inps have been made so far).

But at Galaxian clones, dodging bullets is FAR easier with the Tankstick. Ditto for Phoenix (despite again all my posted .inps are played on my Dell D610 keyboard)... I plan to have a proper area on a desk for the huge beast in the next months, when I'll dedicate a bit more attention to it. I'd also expect Lady Bug to be more playable with the joystick.

[BeeJay]

I've had a HotRodSE for about 7 or 8 years now and it certainly improved the playability in a number of games, although I still prefer the keyboard for some games, especially 4 directional games such as Frogger.

Probably the main annoying things are:

1. No USB support - can't use it on my newer laptops due to no PS/2 keyboard plug

Edit: I did try a PS/2 to USB converter but found that this introduced a very large delay and also was no good with two player simultaneous play as the players would "lock" each other out when both trying to do the moving and shooting at the same time etc - probably some horrible keyboard ghosting and/or the people who developed the converter didn't have enough "channels" to handle 10 simultaneous keypresses, which naturally would not be a normal circumstance for plain old typing or single player gaming.

2. You have to have a keyboard plugged into the HotRod or it won't work - annoyed the crap out of me when I took it to someones place to show it to them and they had only USB keyboards and I hadn't thought to take a PS/2 keyboard with me.

3. The buttons are just a little too far apart to be comfortable for games that require frequent use of 3 buttons. eg: Gunsmoke gets very painful on the hands to the extent that I now have the keyboard next to the HotRod so that I can use the joystick on the HotRod for the moving and the buttons on the keyboard for the firing.

Cheers,
BeeJay.

[mahlemiut]

I don't I ever got the attraction of joysticks that connected to PS/2 ports... at least USB works well, and is portable. My OzStick works fine under Windows and Linux, with no drivers needed, and it apparently works on MacOS too.

[Arjen Gnodde]

I am still using a keyboard and I realize that I can't be competitive without a good joystick.

Which games? If you get used to the keyboard, it's possible to be competitive on a much wider variety of games than you might think. I play everything except analog games on a keyboard. Admittedly there are some specialized games that might be much better with a joystick(s), but most games are very playable with a keyboard if you practice a bit.

My favourite game is Lady Bug, and I can't reach the scores I used to reach in the early to mid 80's. My goal is to upload a 1,000,000+ score to marp on this game and I can't do it on keyboard. Hopefully a joystick like the Tank stick will help. Other games I play that might see an improvement when using a joystick are Wonderboy, Mr Do, Pang, Elevator Action Donkey Kong Jr. and a variety of shooting games like Chopper 1 and Vapor Trail. I really can't play shooters on a keyboard. Additionally, since the tank stick comes with a track ball, I hope to enjoy Centipede, Millipede, Crystal Castles, Marble Madness and S.D.I. a bit more, although some people play these fine with a mouse. Other games I play on which I don't expect any improvement when using a joystick over a keyboard are Q Bert, Crazy Kong, Dig Dug, etc. It's mainly the fast paced games that require sudden movements and quick responses (read: panic mode!) that I hope to improve on whith a good joystick. If a tank Stick can do that for me, it is worth the money.

Arjen

[destructor]

Don't buy arcade parts from SlikStik, you can wait years for shipping
For good arcade parts go to Ultimarc or Happ Controls. If you are interesting in japanese parts go to Akihabara Shop.
Currently I use Ultrastik 360 (Ultimarc) for almost all games, for professional play on shmup games I use modified Perfect 360. These 2 joysticks don't use microswitches. Joysticks with microswitches are betters than U360 and P360 for fighters.

For more info about arcade parts and custom made arcade sticks go to BYOAC forum. Info how modify P360, what buy for U360 is on BYOAC forum too.
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php

PS. X-Arcade is very weak.

[AL]

Hey, thanks for the heads-up Des. I just read through that slikstick thread. Not good.
You've saved me a lot of stress. Pity though cos it's a great control I was gonna order.

Ah well,


Cheers again,


AL

[welby1]

I still stand by the X-arcade. I have (2) 2-player models. I wore out a couple of buttons in 4-5years, and a rubber foot. When I told them, they honored their warrantee(lifetime...of the company I assume) and sent me a pack of 6 buttons and a set of new feet. Zero stick problems to date...the only difficult part to replace, due to the security/safety screws.

I do want to get an X-arcade trackball someday. They don't offer a spinner yet, but I'm hopeful they will someday.

For some reason, my X-arcade quit working properly somewhere between 118 and 120 and on...definitely a MAME issue, but I haven't found an updated controller file. Anyone know what's up with that?

[Arjen Gnodde]

Well, I have bought my X Arcade tank stick and have been playing on it for a week now. I am very impressed. It feels just like the joysticks on the games I used to play in the 80's. However, I am not the player I used to be and I haven't got a decent recording to upload yet. But there is time .

It is a bit bigger than I expected, and my next purchase will be a bigger desk!

Regards,
Arjen

[Phil Lamat]

My favourite game is Lady Bug, and I can't reach the scores I used to reach in the early to mid 80's. My goal is to upload a 1,000,000+ score to marp on this game

1M on ladybug !! Would like to see that ;
what was your best in the 80s ?

[Arjen Gnodde]

My highscore is 1,160,000. This was in the mid eighties. We had a good competition back then, 2 other guys also had scores over 1,000,000. I think the world record is over 4,000,000 by someone from Italy. Now that's impressive!