Specialized controller review: This product is designed for fighting games such as Street Fighter IV and BlazBlue. It is not meant for general ’all genre’ gameplay; it’s not going to work very well with Halo or Dead Rising or other games that rely on using true analog controls. Think of it as the equivalent of a dance pad for Dance Dance Revolution or a steering wheel for racing games. With that in mind, most of this review covers the concerns that tournament-level fighting game players would have.
$150 is a lot of money to spend on a video game controller, especially one that only works with certain kinds of games. But if you’re the sort of person who plays Street Fighter at its highest levels and want a good arcade stick, you know that’s not an unusual price for a top end product. It’s with that in mind that Madcatz offers their Tournament Edition Fightstick, an arcade-style controller that lives up to that name quite handily.
This is a Japanese style arcade stick, albeit unusually large for one (and that’s a good thing). For those mostly familiar with US-style sticks, the major differences are a shorter eight-way stick kept in a square gate (so you have a smaller range of motion and can distinctly feel corners inside the stick’s housing when you move to them) and the use of shorter buttons that press down a little faster than US style ones. In other words, Japanese style sticks require more precision from your hands, but you gain a lot of speed in return; special move motions can be done more quickly than you’re used to. It may take a few days to adjust to this style of stick, but it can easily be worthwhile.
The main features are eight face buttons (A, B, Y, X, LT, RT, LB, and RB), an eight-way joystick, a headset port (with adapter for use with old-style headsets), a control panel with turbo functionality that you can map to each main button, and a few anti-pause safeguards. The most notable of these is a digital lock switch for the control panel; if you press turbo or the Xbox Guide button with the lock engaged, nothing happens. This is good, since pressing Guide at a tournament is usually a forfeit-level penalty. The Start and Back buttons are on the rear panel (away from you) for this same reason, though they unfortunately can’t be locked out in the same way the Guide button can. The only other features of note are a 13 foot long USB cord (more than enough for any situation I can think of), and a plastic compartment on the rear panel for storing said cable in.
It’s worth pointing out that the parts on this stick are a lot more loose and soft compared to most Hori brand sticks I’ve encountered. Where most Hori sticks have a fairly stiff range of motion on the joystick itself and similarly hard, stiff buttons, this stick is much softer. This is neither good nor bad, simply a matter of personal preference.
Of course, this stick does work fine with several classic-style games like Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 1989 Arcade. You can either consider that a side benefit, or if you’re into buying very expensive ’toys’ for yourself, that might be your main point in buying this stick; it’s meant for Street Fighter, but nothing says you can’t play less competitive games on it. It works just fine with them, in my experience! That said, this is mostly being marketed as a competitive fighting game controller, so my review will deal with it from that perspective. If you’re the sort of person who knows what a phrase like "focus attack dash cancel into ultra, followed by a cross-up combo for the win" means, then read on; you’re the target audience for this review!
Next: A series of tests on various fighting games.
