Fighting sticks: square or octagonal gates?

[SAint Mark]

This is a question for people who are REALLY into fighting games like Tekken, Street Fighter 4, Soul Calibur etc.

Everyone who seriously plays fighting games knows that the only correct way to do it is with a fighting stick. There are two types of figting sticks, ones with octagonal restrictors and ones with square ones (which means that the stick will fit into defined corners instead of rotating smoothly around).

I myself am a Tekken fan and have decided to master the stick as soon as Tekken 6 is released. Now I want to ask you what pros and cons you see with square and octagonal gates. Which is better suited for Tekken?

 

[holyorders]

I have been looking at arcade sticks too. In my opinion, with many years spent at arcades when they were more popular, I would go with the octagonal gates. The best Japanese joysticks (Hori and Sanwa) usually have this as standard. All those Street Fighter pros I see use Hori. The tight movements allow for tighter controls. They are more effort on the wrist though.

This is a great website for custom joysticks. They are heavy on the wallet though. Arcade-In-A-Box, LLC

 

[SAint Mark]

I have been looking at arcade sticks too. In my opinion, with many years spent at arcades when they were more popular, I would go with the octagonal gates. The best Japanese joysticks (Hori and Sanwa) usually have this as standard. All those Street Fighter pros I see use Hori. The tight movements allow for tighter controls. They are more effort on the wrist though.

This is a great website for custom joysticks. They are heavy on the wallet though. Arcade-In-A-Box, LLC

Thanks for your reply! As I've understood it, the American arcades use the octagonal gate. Japanese arcades use the square gate and so do the Japanese Hori sticks. But mind you, I've found contradictory information on the subject so I'm not entirely sure... From what I've gathered square gates seem to be more usual than octagonal ones and I've found more people caliming that Hori uses them. So I'm a little confused

That website u posted looks really cool! Pricey, but COOL!

 

[Breetai]

I have been looking at arcade sticks too. In my opinion, with many years spent at arcades when they were more popular, I would go with the octagonal gates. The best Japanese joysticks (Hori and Sanwa) usually have this as standard. All those Street Fighter pros I see use Hori. The tight movements allow for tighter controls. They are more effort on the wrist though.

This is a great website for custom joysticks. They are heavy on the wallet though. Arcade-In-A-Box, LLC

Agreed.

The best arcade stick you can get is a custom built one. I'd go with Sanwa parts, unless you can find Hori for a really good price (both are good, but Sanwa is generally considered top). Go with the Japanese style, which, as far as I know, is 8-point ball type. I'm not an expert though. I've had a couple Hori Dreamcast and Saturn sticks, as well as my Neo Geo AES sticks. They are all beautiful.

 

[molimar]

Ive seen the best players play on both and even gamepads. Practice on all of them.