Does the clicking sound bother you?

[drunkninja42]

Doesn’t bother me, but your ‘old school’ memories are clouded. American style parts click, too. (p360 excepted, see below)

I’ve played on several American cabinets where the sticks were leafswitch-based, which doesn’t make much sound (if any) at all. Obviously, they’re terrible for fighters, but that is what several arcades (in my area, at least) used.

[RaishinX]

^ Truth. I like the quiet but that shit helps big time.

[craze]

Doesn’t bother me, but your ‘old school’ memories are clouded. American style parts click, too. (p360 excepted, see below)
Somewhat. The clicking comes from the microswitches. There are a few sticks that don’t use microswitches though, like the Suzo Inductive, Perfect 360, and Sanwa Flash. Suzo Inductive I don’t know much about so can’t comment. Perfect360’s seem to be a hit-or-miss ordeal, with most recently manufactured ones having difficulties detecting corners properly, but they’re easily available to buy direct from Happ Controls. Sanwa Flash is the only option for in Japanese style, but they went out of production something like 4-5 years ago, and the flash assembly by itself can easily run >$200 in the second hand market. **There’s rumor of some hacker in Tech Talk trying to make an optical replacement for Sanwa sticks, but nothing has come of it yet. **

Can you get/make a silent stick? Sure, but expect to go American parts or pay out the wazoo. Or you can get used to the clicky. For less noisy but not quite silent options, you could try to locate quiet versions of the standard microswitches in most sticks; all of the microswitch datasheets I’ve seen include a noise volume, so you can look for the quietest replacement and switch the clicky switches out for quieter versions, but this is almost guaranteed to require a bit of wiring work.

I see what you did there lol

craze

[TheRealNeoGeo]

You can put some sound damping material in it, they make some pretty high tech stuff today, you only need a few millimeters thick. Go for quality and it will be good for sure, I am doing this myself on a stick…

[Arsenal]

I actually like the clicking. The way it feels and the way it sounds help me when I’m executing/practicing combos.

[speedlolita]

The clicks let me know that it’s working, I love dem.

[Mr_List]

only thing i dislike about the clicking is having your opponent listen to sounds to figure out what you are doing.

[Arsenal]

You can use that to your advantage though if you truly think your opponent is able to tell the difference between QCF + K versus QCB + P just by the sound.

[drunkninja42]

You can use that to your advantage though if you truly think your opponent is able to tell the difference between QCF + K versus QCB + P just by the sound.

Yep, isn’t this exactly what Gamerbee did to Justin at Evo?

[Kyle]

Not really. Like others have said, if you’re bothered by the clicking you’re probably not focused enough on the game. Some options:

http://shoryuken.com/f177/optical-joystick-discussion-221737/

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[punkpc]

I personally like the click too,
But like you I don’t remember the click back in the day of arcades. Like it was mentioned before, arcades were loud and it is hard to hear the click sound.
When I’m playing now at home I can’t even hear the click really in game. So you start to tune it out.

I have mostly Sanwa JLF-TP-8T (or copy’s of) in my stick now and they all click. I do have 2 Happ sticks (like the ones in US Arcade Machines) and 2 arcade cabinets with Happ sticks with a much lighter click, but I am finding the spring to be to stiff for me in the Happ sticks for my liking. Granted the ones in the cabinets are a bit looser (and not as quiet as the new ones), but they are also the original sticks that came with the cabinets and really broke in. I still prefer the Sanwa sticks over Happ because of there ease of use (pulling combos, and dodging projectiles) and the fact of them being less stiff. I am thinking of trying a Sanwa JLW-UM-8 to see if it will bridge the gap between the JLF and the Happ.

Now I have read a lot of what Kyle has posted on hardware and he is pretty spot on. so if your really looking for good alternatives to clicking, I’d check out the options he posted.

Hope that helps

[Andarel]

i like the click it lets you know that your stick is doing what you what it to

This, and this exactly. For me, the clicking sound is a way to know that everything is working perfectly - when I’m moving my character right, say, it’s the joystick saying “alright, you’re going to start moving…now” and I find it perfect for anything timing-intensive.

[cammy-white]

The noise gets me off