Xbox 360 Street Fighter IV FightPad - Chun-Li

I have the controller with Chun Li on the front. First, let me say that I have read various complaints on web forums from people who say that the diagonals on these controllers don't work quite right. While I don't question the accuracy of these claims, a lot of people (like me) aren't experiencing this problem, so it is clearly something that's only affecting some of the controllers. Oh, and there are apparently some issues with pulling off special moves in Mortal Kombat vs DC. If you're interested in using the Fightpad with that game, I'd suggest you do a bit of research on it, as I'm not sure of the specifics. Now, onto my review ...

I have played with many, many d-pads over the years, and I can say hands down that the best one ever made was the one for the Sega Saturn, specifically the Japanese version. Playing Marvel vs Capcom with that controller is about as close as you can get to 2D fighting game nirvana :) This new Madcatz Fightpad is supposedly modeled off of...Read more

So I'm not a professional when it comes to SF4 and basically just loved it from my SNES childhood. So, I opted for a pad and not an arcade stick. The 360 controller just SUCKS for Street Fighter. It has the worst DPad ever and is too clunky for fighting game usage. I moved to a PS3 whose controller is better than a 360 but still not the best. When I finally was able to find an SF4 gamepad, I was overjoyed. There are definitely pros and cons which I will go over.

CONS: The controller has a diagonal that you REALLY need to get used to. Blocking low, for instance, sometimes doesn't happen at all. I'll be in the middle of a block string then get hit because I'm not pressing down and back. When throwing shoto fireballs, you can't just spam them and hit Down to Forward. You basically have to use the outer edge of the circular pad to make sure that the DownForward also gets inputted.

PROS: Pretty much the rest of the pad is a pro. The buttons are laid out very...Read more

There are two reasons to buy this for playing Street Fighter over using a traditional 360 controller: The D-Pad, and the buttons. That may not seem like much, but in the end they're both perfectly executed.

The D-pad is an interesting design. Essentially, it is a very, very small joystick with a d-pad mounted on top. Thus you can move right by either pressing down on the right side, or pushing the pad towards the right. Because of this the movement is very fluid and dynamic, but there is a bit more travel than you would get with a traditional d-pad. I've found it to be very helpful with rotation-based moves (down, downforward, forward), but the distance is less helpful for charge moves (back for 1 second, forward). Directions are quite precise, and I never find that I'm accidentally pressing the wrong way. Overall, it beats any d-pad available on the 360 easily, including previous Mad Katz pads and Hori imports.

Further, the buttons are pure beauty to...Read more