Are x-arcade sticks worth it?

[Atariboy]

MAME used to have that option, but a quick search here shows a thread saying it was removed.

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/87055-is-there-a-non-standard-current-build-of-mame-that-still-has-the-defender-cheat/

 

Seems like there should be a solution, but the easiest way if you want to play it on your PC might just be to grab an old build of MAME. That or track down Midway Arcade Treasures for the PC.

Edited November 25, 2014 by Atariboy

[Hydro Thunder]

I have had my X-arcade Tankstick for a decade or so, and have been in love with it since day one. I get my absolute best scores on basically everything using it, from Robotron to Street Fighter. Highly recommended.

 

Now considering adding a Solo stick since they're so cheap. Hard to beat $65 shipped!

[atarilovesyou]

I own the double stick version, but would have gone for a single if it was available at the time. It's simple to use, authentic enough for me and was just the easiest way to get what I wanted at a decent price.

 

I always get tempted to buy when they do the Black Friday sales every year...but after shipping, I'm still looking at 100 bux for the single stick (which is now available again)....the same price I paid for my double stick.

 

While not perfect, it's close enough for me. Fantastic customer service as well...any problems I've had, they just ship me new parts. Great company.

[+wongojack]

 

It depends on the application. In a six button layout it's logical to move from weak, to medium, then to fierce attacks. Want the next strongest attack? Simply move up the button chain. Unfortunately it doesn't always quite work like that in four button fighters, particularly 3D ones that often give you more than eight different attacks for a single button when different diagonal inputs are given along with the button press (that's not counting the varying quarter-circle/half-circle commands they integrate that you find more of in the 2D fighters). Street Fighter II's move set overall is actually far more simplistic and less complicated than many other fighting games out there, despite the extra two buttons at the end.

 

Instant headache - I don't understand why people think those games are fun.

[Austin]

 

Instant headache - I don't understand why people think those games are fun.

That's not a very fun mindset to be in.

[MrMaddog]

I can't figure out how to make the stick work with Defender in MAME because you can't simply map thrust and reverse to left and right as your orientation is constantly changing. The game actually needs modification to handle reverse being the opposite press to whatever direction you are traveling. I end up playing Defender on a console port or compilation because of this.

On my gamepad, I map the thrust to the left & right of the stick but put the reverse on a shoulder button and tap that to change direction why moving with the stick.

 

As for the 6 button convention fighting games use, blame it on the original Street Fighter. It had two big buttons that determined the strengh of your attacks on how hard you hit them but they never worked right. So now we have six plain buttons. You only need to use the light and medium attacks and only use the hard ones when you're really up close.

[Reaperman]

The difference in reaction to the x-arcade sticks between here and the neo-geo forum is kind of dramatic. From AA I got 'yes, it's worth it with some flaws' and from n-g I got a passionate '100% hell no, because of the terrible flaws.' Since everybody seemed to agree on flaws, and I'm easily put off by them, that's really what I most picked up on.

 

Because of that, I snagged the Fightstick Pro by madcatz. I had hoped it would hit black friday sales, but didn't, so I snagged it at its regular $99 retail price. I think I made the right call on this one, even if it broke the bank. Nice weight, solid deck, and easy to upgrade as its Sanwa parts offer huge aftermarket support. Over the last week or so I've been glued to the stick, experimenting with square/round/octagonal gates, larger actuators, stiffer springs, and if I want, this Madcatz offers the mounting points for swapping in the Seimitsu LS-32-01, which is *the* stick choice for shmup cabs. (I think I do want, but have never touched one) These are all stick options I've never been offered before, and I'm a bit spoilt for choice.

 

Being a fan of IL convex buttons with 75g cherry switches, I find the Sanwas seriously lacking in tactile feedback, but still very responsive. The ILs won't actually fit the Fightstick Pro, but I knew that going into it. They would have gone into the x-arcade fine--however I suspect that I wouldn't have been able to live with its stock buttons as well as I'm doing with the Sanwas. I'm currently enjoying the extra button surface area which is good for shmup 'flutter kicking.'

 

Sorry for the departure from the topic, but I figured an update wasn't the worst thing I've ever done.

[atarilovesyou]

Nice pick up. I've tried those types of sticks, but I find them only fitting the newer fighter games. I couldn't imagine firing up Contra or something like that. The layout is a bit too modern, for my taste.

 

That could be why there's the big discrepancy in forums. My X-Arcade is used for 80s video games (some early 90s), and that's really where the Neo Geo guys get started. From what I understand, it takes a little more work (and some is simply swappable), but aftermarket parts can be installed in X-Arcade stuff. Plus, if you like what they provide, the lifetime guarantee is awesome. I have no worries with my X-Arcade. My only issue with it was the lag when i used it with an older adaptor on my Playstation 2. But i'm planing on picking up one of the newer ones that has fixed whatever error it had going on. Well, I hope they fixed it...or else I'll be out the shipping cost to send it back, just like i did the first time around

 

Enjoy!

[+wongojack]

That's not a very fun mindset to be in.

 

Yeah, I guess that was a little negative of me. I just have never really appreciated the game design choice that a "secret" would be discovered about gameplay through repetition. This doesn't appeal to me in platformers, and in fighters where it is almost essential (eg: learning secret moves), I consider it a non starter. Add to it that the secret moves only work for me like 25% of the time and the genre gives me no reason to ever go back to it again.

 

 

On my gamepad, I map the thrust to the left & right of the stick but put the reverse on a shoulder button and tap that to change direction why moving with the stick.

 

As for the 6 button convention fighting games use, blame it on the original Street Fighter. It had two big buttons that determined the strengh of your attacks on how hard you hit them but they never worked right. So now we have six plain buttons. You only need to use the light and medium attacks and only use the hard ones when you're really up close.

 

There are plenty of ways to play Defender with a modern controller outside of MAME. I was commenting on how it is tough to re-create the original control panel without a very specific button layout.

[atarian63]

The deluxe tankstick with trackball has been excellent for me, however the collection from Rom collector using hyperspin hates it, or should I say it's not configured for it as advertised. Was supposed to work with no programming of hyperspin with a file that was included from rom collector. no go.. works fine by manually loading each game. so its not the fault of the tankstick.

[Reaperman]

Nice pick up. I've tried those types of sticks, but I find them only fitting the newer fighter games. I couldn't imagine firing up Contra or something like that. The layout is a bit too modern, for my taste.

 

I know. I recently acquired skullgirls, and I'm midway through its excellent tutorials. Before I played it, I had actually removed the 3 rightmost lower buttons for blanks but it convinced me to put them back. Shmups are my major genre, but since I have an 8-button stick, I figured I'd get used to resting my hand on those 3 buttons to give me more (fighting) options.

 

Really Madcatz has been doing a lot to bring themselves upscale this gen. Congratulations on their first annual 'reaper award.' The 'fightstick' is a capcom fan's dream, even if I'm an SNK modded optical stick fan. And then there are their new 'enthusiast grade' wheels, keyboard/mice, tritton headsets, and saitek flightsticks. This is truly how Madcatz should bring themselves upmarket from the $30 generic gamepads of lastgen. I would even consider them for a racing wheel upgrade, and that's no small feat from my antiquated but excellent/expensive Logitech G25. (serious additional research is required in that department, of course), but generally I wouldn't have considered 'madcatz' an appropriate use of $100 lastgen, much less $400 a wheel, but now I do.

 

Still, as far as Contra--the NES Super C is my 'old jam' and emulation is *NEVER* my voice, no matter how much dough it saves me. D-pads forever on that--and real hardware, because even on clones my hands know the way but fail on software reproductions.

 

Don't mind me too much, I'm drunk and should probably go home. Really ditto for last night. Sometime tomorrow I'll regret all of this post but for right now it's pretty honest--though perhaps too much so.

 

Biznis, biznis, biznis. Numbers. Is it working? YAY!

Edited December 15, 2014 by Reaperman

[Austin]

This doesn't appeal to me in platformers, and in fighters where it is almost essential (eg: learning secret moves), I consider it a non starter.

 

Proper arcade fighters generally display move lists on the control panel or the arcade monitor bezel so the player has the tools to play the game. Likewise on consoles, such moves were printed in the instruction manuals. Of course, there were also companies that just said, "just experiment and find out yourself, wahoo!", but those guys were dicks and probably aren't in the industry anymore. In Mortal Kombat it was OK because such "secret moves" were just the fatalities, and those weren't necessary to play or win at the game. Those made the game more intriguing when it was new at the time.

[atarilovesyou]

I know. I recently acquired skullgirls, and I'm midway through its excellent tutorials. Before I played it, I had actually removed the 3 rightmost lower buttons for blanks but it convinced me to put them back. Shmups are my major genre, but since I have an 8-button stick, I figured I'd get used to resting my hand on those 3 buttons to give me more (fighting) options.

 

Really Madcatz has been doing a lot to bring themselves upscale this gen. Congratulations on their first annual 'reaper award.' The 'fightstick' is a capcom fan's dream, even if I'm an SNK modded optical stick fan. And then there are their new 'enthusiast grade' wheels, keyboard/mice, tritton headsets, and saitek flightsticks. This is truly how Madcatz should bring themselves upmarket from the $30 generic gamepads of lastgen. I would even consider them for a racing wheel upgrade, and that's no small feat from my antiquated but excellent/expensive Logitech G25. (serious additional research is required in that department, of course), but generally I wouldn't have considered 'madcatz' an appropriate use of $100 lastgen, much less $400 a wheel, but now I do.

 

Still, as far as Contra--the NES Super C is my 'old jam' and emulation is *NEVER* my voice, no matter how much dough it saves me. D-pads forever on that--and real hardware, because even on clones my hands know the way but fail on software reproductions.

 

Don't mind me too much, I'm drunk and should probably go home. Really ditto for last night. Sometime tomorrow I'll regret all of this post but for right now it's pretty honest--though perhaps too much so.

 

Biznis, biznis, biznis. Numbers. Is it working? YAY!

 

 

BIZNIS

[glazball]

Bumping this old thread to ask a question of those of you who use the Tankstick.

 

I'm on the verge of buying one of these. One of my deciding factors is the use of console adaptors so I can use the stick on Dreamcast, PS3, PS4, etc. but I'm worried the adapters will introduce lag. Anyone here using new-ish, recent revisions of Tankstick and adapters that can speak to whether it is laggy on consoles?

[NE146]

I've had an x-arcade since 2001 I think?.. so for years and years at this point.

 

I'd say it was "fine:.. but sometimes the controls (joystick and buttons) weren't as responsive as I would normally prefer. where I'd really have to make solid contact when pressing a button and over time fatigue kind of sets in. I will say I recently built a mini-barcade machine, equipped it with Sanwa joystick and buttons and there is a huge difference between the responsiveness of each. So in summary, I think the X-Arcade works, but if you have the ability to just wire up your own with quality parts, that will obviously be better.

Edited December 19, 2017 by NE146

[tschak909]

I love the X-Arcade hardware. It is extremely durable, and for me, it's a big plus that they went out of their way to make their stuff field serviceable.

 

They also sell bags of spare switches, buttons and even complete sticks so that you can keep the thing running for a very long time.

 

-Thom

[R.Cade]

X-Arcade makes nice, heavy controllers that work well. The warranty is great also. After probably 10 years, one of the wires on mine wore through and USB stopped working. They happily sent me all the guts that could be bad to replace it, and just asked that I send any unused parts back to them. That is service!

Edited December 19, 2017 by R.Cade

[negative1]

Here is my take on my x-arcade single stick.

-------------------------------

1 hardware - excellent

2 configuration - excellent, emulates keyboards, so you can remap easily in MAME, etc

3 buttons - fine, plenty of them

4 ease of use - moderate, took awhile to figure out which switches to adjust, and then to get working.

 

i bought mine several years, and never had a problem with it for windows games

 

==============================================================

 

Problems:

--------------------

i bought mine for use with and XBOX 360, and NEVER got it to work.

 

i talked to their tech support, and they said they would ship the proper cables, those didn't work, and was never able to use them.

 

 

I thought maybe they fixed them for the XBOX ONE, so i tried to get those cables, and adapters.

 

NONE OF THEM EVER WORKED either.

 

 

Tech support and Company

=======================================================================

 

This is by far the WORST company I have EVER had to deal with,

 

They have terrible customer support, never refunded me for the cables that I sent them back,

banned me from using their customer support (which is 3rd party in Europe), never replied to

my emails and wouldn't take my phone calls

 

I WILL NEVER BUY OR SUPPORT ANYTHING THAT IS X-ARCADE related again,

 

(maybe i should tell you how i really feel).

 

this company is a rip-off artist, and and worst a scam company.

 

Anything you buy from them is at your own risk.

 

later

-1

[negative1]

X-Arcade makes nice, heavy controllers that work well. The warranty is great also. After probably 10 years, one of the wires on mine wore through and USB stopped working. They happily sent me all the guts that could be bad to replace it, and just asked that I send any unused parts back to them. That is service!

 

Sorry, but i had the exact opposite experience. My cables that they sent me, at my own cost, 6 months ago, were considered not to be refunded, and has been a support nightmare ever since.

 

They have the worst customer support ever that I have dealt with in a tech company. They have been extremely rude, when I was patient, and asked politely for updates. They responded

by blocking my emails, banning me from calling, and I have no recourse but legal means, which I won't do, because it's not worth it for the items I sent them back.

 

later

-1

[negative1]

Bumping this old thread to ask a question of those of you who use the Tankstick.

 

I'm on the verge of buying one of these. One of my deciding factors is the use of console adaptors so I can use the stick on Dreamcast, PS3, PS4, etc. but I'm worried the adapters will introduce lag. Anyone here using new-ish, recent revisions of Tankstick and adapters that can speak to whether it is laggy on consoles?

 

Obviously, i'm biased, but I will tell you to avoid them like the plague. I wonder if any of their adapters work at all, I am mostly on the XBOX microsoft side, but never got them to work.

Maybe you'll have better luck, but just remember they have terrible support if you have any problems.

 

Buyer beware,

 

later

-1

[glazball]

Thanks negative1, I want to hear the good and bad. I'm reading Reaperman's thread on the NeoGeo forums along with other threads here and Amazon reviews, trying to digest the complaints. They range from "love it" to "avoid avoid avoid." I'm not sure I want to give them my business, but the price is right. I can't stand poor customer service though. That drives me insane.

 

I don't need top of the line gear, but I want it to last me a long time. I'm struggling to find a quality arcade control panel besides the X-Arcade Tankstick that would also work with consoles though. All others have USB for MAME/PC but no PS4, etc. I've written a few places inquiring if their sticks could be customized with PS4 support, but haven't heard anything back from anyone.

[NE146]

I'm surprised there's even a 360 adapter available.. when I last checked (admittedly years ago) the news was they could not get the license to make them, or something like that. So that's why I packed it up and haven't touched it for a while.

 

That said, I have adapters for the original Xbox, and those have always worked fine.

[moycon]

I'm surprised there's even a 360 adapter available.. when I last checked (admittedly years ago) the news was they could not get the license to make them, or something like that. So that's why I packed it up and haven't touched it for a while.

 

That said, I have adapters for the original Xbox, and those have always worked fine.

I have the 360 adapters but admittedly never hooked mine up to the 360.

From what I recall you couldn't just use the 360 adapters on their own, you had to use the Playstation 2 adapter and then use attach the 360 adapter to that, or something weird like that.

[Newsdee]

I have a Hanaho Hotrod joystick (earlier than the Tanksticks). I ended up replacing the PCB dedicated to PS2 into a 2 player USB adapter. That makes it generic USB HID so I expect it to work with ps3 and ps4 at least. For the xbox it might need an adapter.

[glazball]

Went ahead and purchased the Tankstick last night, along with adapters for various consoles.

 

I know it's not going to be the best stick in the world, but since I'm just getting into MAME (finally) this should be suitable enough to let me play some games with my stepson while having a solid arcade feel. I looked at more expensive options, but those will have to wait. This will have to be my jumping in stick; perhaps later I can install higher-quality buttons and sticks. I also plan to add 2 spinners and get an overlay to cover up the awful factory "X" artwork.