So this week, thanks to recent developments, I was able to get a Street Fighter IV Fighting Stick Tournament Edition.

I got this stick at a Fry’s for $104 (- tax = $95 subtotal), and it happened to be the last 360 TE at that location. It was a pretty surreal feeling finally getting my hands on an arcade-perfect stick. I have an NES Advantage stick and a SNES Super Advantage stick, and really, those are toddler’s toys compared to this mofo. For those who have played on a Street Fighter IV or BlazBlue machine, this is pretty much the same kind of setup you’ll find on either of those.

However, transisting to the stick was not without its hurdles. For one, the restrictor is square-shaped, as opposed to the circular ones of most American arcade cabs. This takes some getting used to, as it can result in accidental diagonal movements. The buttons are also unlike American cab buttons; less clicky and more sensitive to the touch, so hovering a finger over a button could accidentally trigger it. Also, playing on a stick causes me to think differently; twists become harder to do in Tetris: The Grand Master (in which I rotate the restrictor for 4-way movement), and I have to relearn some bullet patterns in shmups.

The hurdle and the $104 is definitely worth it, though. Dodging shots with a stick feels wonderful and almost dream-like, as opposed to playing on my SF2 PS2 pad or my 2nd-generation Sega Saturn pad. Using individual fingers on each of the large buttons allows me more control over button presses, and is less likely to make my fingers sore from holding down or mashing buttons than a pad does. After several sessions with the stick, I can finally start really enjoying shooting games (to hell with the term “shmup”); all I need now is a tate’d monitor for my vertical shooters. I’ve also been able to improve at shooters I’m already playing; I broke my NOIZ2SA Stage 9 record, pushing myself from 2.8 mil to about 3.3, as well as PSY Stage 5 records in rRootage and my Parsec47 Lock-Normal record (admittedly, I did the latter just so I could post that I used a stick in the P47 Shmups Forum high score thread).

My current dilemma is the effort needed to rotate the restrictor for TGM; unscrewing the bottom plate, rotating the restrictor, and putting back the plate doesn’t seem like something I’d like to do twice a night. I’ll probably rotate the restrictor every week instead; one week play shooters on it while playing TGM with a keyboard, the next week play TGM while using a pad (which I’ll be using on campus anyway when I play shooters).

Obviously I’m not lugging this thing to campus, partly due to it being heavy, and partly because I don’t want it to get jacked. I have a friend who lives on campus and has this stick anyway, along with a homemade stick made out of a wine box with easier access to the innards (and by extension, the restrictor gate).

Mushihime-sama Futari Ver 1.5 comes out next month. Now that I have this stick, I definitely look forward to playing some Futari when it comes out.

And on an unrelated note, Space Invaders Extreme 2 got released this week. I may get it this weekend. I’m already lamenting the closure of the GameStop across the street from campus.