Which is used more at tournaments?
Oops, DP.
I’ve heard for tekken many players prefer a pad over a stick anyway except for Mishima players.
Personally I find a stick easier to use because everything is just laid out there for you and easy to access.
Retarded.
I recently placed in 2 MVC2 tourneys using a pad. One DC pad, and the other a PS2 pad with a converter. One was streamed “OMG HES USING A PAAAAD!??!”
The winner of these same 2 tourneys was also a pad player (my pal of near 20 years). I also beat JWong in ST at Seasons Beating on a DC pad.(He took the set)
Its all preference. I only find one thing better on stick through out all games… doing Magneto/Storm combos in Marvel. Anything else can be done either. And for Balrog TAP’s that’s what x3 is for. Besides, fighting games is one of the LAST things anyone should be elitist over…
More surface for adding artwork is obviously why sticks are better.
That’s what shoulder buttons are for…of course assuming the player maps them.
setting aside “Personal Preference” and srs bsns tournaments as stated by the kind gentleman that called me retarded.
Getting to know your game on the arcade stick helps in the event that you come across an actual arcade cabinet. In a realistic scenario: Your out on the town with your friends, you stop by the local arcade, you see SF4, BB, Tekken, whatever. one of your friends looks at you and says “Dude I can so kick your ass in this game”, of course you know he’s wrong, because he takes 5 tries to pull of a Metsu Hadoken in training mode.
So you guys get ready to fight, and you are commandeering the arcade stick. Chances are, you still beat him, because lets face it, he makes flowchart Kens look like skilled players, but you didn’t do any combos, accidentally did an EX SRK when you meant to use Metsu Hadoken, and you kept jumping back when you meant to be blocking high.
Now if you don’t like using the stick, thats fine, your loss, plus you save a good 150 Dollars. But it doesn’t hurt to have experience using one. It took me a decent amount of time and effort to get used to the arcade stick, mostly the Joystick, but sometimes I would be pushing buttons, but my hand would be in the wrong place, so I’m pushing HP when I mean to push LP. But once I got used to it, there was no way I could go back, It feels strange picking up a pad, even when I’m not playing fighting games. The arcade stick has become an extension of my own hands essentially.
It’s complete preference these days.
I learned stick back in the arcade days because YOU HAD TO if you wanted to play the good competition.
These days, competition is usually on console. Meaning you can pick whatever plugs into your usb port, and is comfortable to you.
For me personally, stick was easier once I was able to learn it. Everything was laid out properly and accessible, there was no weird discomfort or “claw grips” to hit triggers for 3P or 3K, it was just there. So I was able to adapt pretty easy because stick was more comfortable and let me play better then I was doing on pad at the time.
But I mean if you’re already a competitive player on pad, really no reason to switch now.
As all these knowledgeable individuals have said, fighting games were designed to be played on a stick. If you wanted to get the full experience out a racing game you would use a steering wheel; in this same way a stick is better for fighting games.
I was a very skillful pad user (I just switched over a year and a half ago). I believe I am now more skillful on stick because the stick allows me to naturally access all my tools when I need them, i.e. jab, short, etc.
It should be noted that skill in fighting games and any sport for that matter, is a result of hard work and determination (as I said above I was very skillful on pad). However, the stick made me more skillful by allowing me to naturally access my tools.
Hi,
I started tekken on pad, but switched over to stick.
- I cannot do inputs in tekken with consistency on a playstation pad. I will often get two directional inputs where I just intended one diagonal. It probably has to do with the size of my thumb or something simple.
- I have seen many top tekken players consistently do the things I never could on a pad, and I have no idea what’s different for them, but for them pad is best.
- Switching sides, 1 player vs 2 player, always changes things just a little bit because of the way the sticks are held, but it was always a lot worse for me on pad than it ever was on a stick. So more consistent.
You need practice then.
I prefer stick just for the sake of consistency, Saturn Pad, Dreamcast controller, DualShock2/3, 360. I could learn to use each of them for various games/situations, but it’s just easier for me to have the same control scheme for every fighter on any console I play. I actually prefer to use a stick on any game that doesn’t require an analog stick to play.
Arcades don’t have much of an impact, as I’m probably 150 miles from the closest fighting game arcade cab so learning stick just for the arcade isn’t a driving reason for myself.
Wasn’t Vangief using a modded 360 pad and not a DS2/3?
I know someone will probably start some shit with me for this. But after years of playing fighting games on a stick, this is my take.
I play on a stick because of peer pressure. Everyone said if you wanted to be good at fighting games, you had to play on a stick. Because of that I practiced with sticks a lot. However, I have come to realize and accept STICKS ARE NOT SUPERIOR TO PADs. I came to this conclusion recently with the growing community of pad players.
Sticks are indeed more popular than pads for understandable reasons: Arcades. Traditionally, the world’s best players was forced to play in arcades to be competitive because of the lack of home console versions and home console competition (games not being online). This of course means they played on sticks by default. Home pad players would never be able to compete on a skill and knowledge base with these players which creates the initial illusion that sticks are better than pads. And following with new generations of players looking to be the best; they followed the examples of the previous generations and picked up sticks.
However, Street Fighter IV has really changed things. It is the first major Capcom fighting game with official online support. This has created a whole new scene. The online competitive community, from home. This means serious pad players are maybe outnumbering serious stick players either now or soon to come. With this growing community of competitive pad players, we are seeing pad players compete with the stick players and even beat them.
Taking this new generation in mind and being open minded to what they are capable of, it is easier to realized that sticks are no better than pads. Inthul shocked everyone at ECT2. He beat Sanford and Arturo with a pad and almost had Flash Metriod too. Vangeif and Shizza both made top 8 at Evo with pads. Those victories are no flukes.
Some people argue that the buttons are sticks are better because you can access them faster. And sticks better than D-pads because you move it faster and less prone to accidentally movements. Neither false nor true. The hands and wrist have POTENTIAL to move and respond faster than the fingers alone. However, this does not mean they are at an inherit advantage over the fingers for fighting games. What you practice with will be what you are good with. You fingers will become faster and more precise just as your hands and wrist will given time. The mistakes you make whether it be a D-pad or stick will decrease with practice. Your response time with the buttons will also decrease with practice, whether it be a pad or stick. No matter how much faster the hands and wrist might be able to move compared to the fingers, it doesn’t matter because the fastest links in the games are 1-frame. And expert pad players can be seen pulling off their 1-frame links with as much consistency as the stick players. Therefore, the demands of speed of the games DOES NOT exceed the capability of pads or pad players.
I also disagree with the argument that the game was intended to be played on a stick, therefore sticks are better (OT: SSF4 was actually originally intended for a home console release only). Being compatible with a stick and “meant be to played” on a stick are not the exactly the same thing. When you break it all down, the game is designed with SIX BUTTONS AND EIGHT DIRECTION. Both sticks and pads have that. They are simply layed out differently. It can be compared to how different stick players prefer different button layouts (vewlix vs astro city). There is nothing a stick provides you with that a pad does not.
Remember, the game is essentially six buttons and eight directions. Both pad and sticks have these. Which ever you practice with will be what you are good with.
i use sticks because i dont want to be the guy who whoops his friends ass at home on a controller but cant do jack in an arcade
Fighting games were designed to be played on arcade sticks. That’s what is kept in mind with the motions and moves, the combinations you have to do. The level of execution just fights the design of an arcade stick and on a controller it is essentially watering that down. It’s just like how MMOs and RTS games flourish on the PC, because that genre is tailor-made to use the keyboard and the button layout there. It’s the same thing with fighting games and sticks, that’s how they are designed primarily, with the arcade stick in mind.
certain movements I can see are easier on a stick than a pad. I am a pad player, but there are certain movements that are incredibly hard.
i.e. jumping and immidiately performing an ex tatsu (remembering one of kens trials in sf4 vanilla) you juggle then have to ex tatsu in the air (its not impossible on the pad, but far easier on a stick because a slight motion up jumps and you can hit the ex tatsu almost instantly because you hardly have to move the stick at all, I would always end up executing the tatsu too late on the pad) I have a stick, I just dont use it often, way too acclimated to the pad, and I dont compete in tourneys or anything so it doesnt really matter to me if there are somethings that are just too hard on the pad.
Don’t you guys get tired of the same threads and questions?
I bought my first stick because I wanted to experience the real deal for shmups and fighters. I never played in arcades much because we didn’t have many nearby when I was a kid and they’re practically extinct here now. I love my share of arcade games nowadays of course. Reason 2: they just look oh-so-awesome. I’m not a very competitive player.
Following many arguments here, yes using a stick doesn’t mean you’re better than a pad player.
However, learning to play on a stick was a whole lot easier from what I’ve experienced. I started playing fighters on pad, over the years my executions got fairly consistent but there were still erronous inputs here and there. Especially if I didn’t play on it for say 2 weeks it got even worse.
Everyone who picks up a stick for the first time feels awkward coming from a pad, but it took me much less time to be accurate with a stick than with a pad (and that’s from a guy who came off a pad in the first place). Right now I still play on a pad sometimes when i’m at a friend or something, but inputting 2 QCBs and hitting a left shoulder button is still awkward as hell for me.
Concluding my story: years of casuals on a pad and still being inaccurate versus not even a year of playing stick and being completely accurate. The winner is stick for me, if you don’t play competitively already on a pad I think a good stick is a great investment.