Well after losing enough matches due to my Peice of shit 360 pad (cant pull of a super in critical times, cant move properly etc.) and banging my D-pad against a hard surface out of anger and frustration, i knew it was time for a stick, ive searched on ebay for the Hori stick everyones been talkin about but they sold for no less than $60-$70. Then the day after christmas i went looking to spend some christmas cash and got lucky at game stop and immediatly picked up the last Hori ex2 (360) in south jersey for $50.
But I have some things to say about this. Ive been a D-pad player my whole entire life, except when im in a arcade and of course didnt play an arcade game as effective as i could a d-pad console game.
The Hori Ex2 is a great stick, but It feels like its fixing my problems and creaating new problems that were already fixed.
Pros: problems that were fixed
1.Supers are a breeze to pull off
2.I can dash and move smothely in Soul calibur IV(and any other game), deflect, and pull of attacks with ease.
3.360 rotations can now be done (almost impossible on a 360 pad)
4.I cant beleive how simple and smooth it is to parry in 3rd strike with this thing, WOW!!!
Cons:New problems
- Hard to shoryuken (and other zig zag rotations), especially in the hea of battle.
- Hard to do my Rekka Kens with fei long and players like him (yang,etc).
- Hard to super cancel (ex.Hadouken immediatly followed by a shinku hadouken)
- doesnt feel as effective on street fighter games.
The first con not being able to do zig zag commands is what really kills me, but Ive only had a couple days to practice and try to get used to it, maybe 6hrs total when i think im used to it i go on a real match and get beaten.
So obviously i need more time and practice, but how much time do i need to devote to be ready? Any special training methods i should try to get more comfortable and used to the stick. Any moding needed? Should I just stick to mastering one game then moving on to the next?
thanx in advance for any tips and advice.
yea thats it, its that square plate that makin it hard to do zig zag commands. So im guessing the square makes it 4-way so i need an 8 way. im scared to take this thing apart tho, if i mess up, thats 50 bucks down the drain. but who knows, i might give it a shot anyway.
people get the terminology mixed up all time. 4 way and 8way refer to how many directions you can move, not how many corners your gate has. a square gate and an octogonal gate are by default 8 way, but it also comes with the option of making it 4 way.
manuvering joystick
i like to play sfa 3 on the ggpo client but i can’t play to my maxiumum potenial cause their is a slight problem with joystick movement when facing right with ryu i have a hard time doing hadokens but when facing left they come out nice and simple i know it is not because some people are better when facing right then left you can feel it in the joystick you can’t feel the round edge of the joystick when doing a hadoken when facing right but when you face left the movement comes out smooth and easy any advice on how to help this problem
yea the rights not my best side either, maybe its due to me being right handed, or jus used to being on the left side. maybe practice on the 2p side and see wht happens.
A couple of reason why you aren’t performing at optimum level (my opinion)
1.) Practice makes perfect. It’ll take weeks/months for you to be comfortable playing on a joystick. It’s like learning anything new, it takes time to master but in the end it will be worth it, despite you losing or not being able to do things that consistently. Once you get over the big bump, it’ll be a breeze.
2.) You’re using a Hori EX2. It’s a joystick, which is a step up from a D-Pad or keyboard but it’s still a ‘entry level’ joystick. The parts are not the best quality. So my sugggestion would be to either mod that joystick with Sanwa/Seimitsu/Happ parts (whatever your preference is) OR to buy a custom joystick.
Tip: If you watch matches on YouTube, try to emulate what the players are doing on your joystick while you’re watching just to get the movements ingrained in your hands/head.
What game are you trying to dp in? ST has a very strict timing and 3s has a very relaxed one.
Think of the motion as a Z or do as i do. I think of like ‘forward, pull it back, whack it into the corner + punch’.
Practice makes perfect, it will come eventually.
sure
yall sure cause i play charge charicters sometimes and when you do the back + foward charge sometimes you have move the joystick slighty above the foward mark but below the diagonal mark
wow all those new problems will easily be solvable in time
ST does have pretty strict timing but you’ll just get used to them. give it like a week of practice(i’d think this is the most time you’ll take) and you should be able to get used to doing those things fast. Otherwise its 2 weeks.
well i been using the ex2 for a while. and heard many bad things about it but everything will get better in time. dont sweat it. it just takes practice .
Dragon punch motions vary by gate and stick for me. If the zig zag z doesnt work for you, try it the other way. Push Forward and then immediately do a QCF motion followed by punch. IF you timed it right you will get a dragon punch and not a fireball.
There’s one of these threads just about every two days
And the answers are always the same
PRACTICE MORE. a couple days isnt enough
i been practicing more and getting used to it, its coming along nicely, the cool thing with this thing is the sound clicking of the stick, it has 2 different click sounds when it hits the 4 corners or the 4 other directions. my zig zag commanding is pretty much down packed because of this all i did was the z rotation and when the corner sound clicks, it gives my that cue that i did it right, its like following a beat. i still need to get more of a feel for it before i take this thing online again.