Universal fighting stick by Naki, is it good?

[fantasystar]

My B.day is comin up soon and I plan on getting this one if its good.
http://www.gamestop.com/product.asp?product%5Fid=801990

[shinobi00]

No, it looks like total trash.

[NoAffinity]

I got one. It's actually pretty solid and seems well built...however, one of the buttons is already crapping out. :sad: I've had it about a month, and was using it pretty much non-stop for about the first three weeks, until the button started crapping out (it works intermittently at this point). I don't want this to be the end-all for your opinion of this controller, if you're thinking of buying it, because I would like to believe it is just a fluke (and I will be exchanging it when time permits...which will hopefully result in never having another problem with it :pleased: ). It is a very nice controller, otherwise....and wireless, too.

[Superking]

Want to make it a happy birthday? Buy a custom stick or a HRAP instead. :tup:

[stripes777]

for 40 bucks i cant see how bad it could be. sorta like the 40 buck univeral pelicans. as long as it works and its decent, i say go for it. if u dont like. change swap ths parts and its good as new

[FSgamer]

I got one. It's actually pretty solid and seems well built...however, one of the buttons is already crapping out. :sad: I've had it about a month, and was using it pretty much non-stop for about the first three weeks, until the button started crapping out (it works intermittently at this point). I don't want this to be the end-all for your opinion of this controller, if you're thinking of buying it, because I would like to believe it is just a fluke (and I will be exchanging it when time permits...which will hopefully result in never having another problem with it :pleased: ). It is a very nice controller, otherwise....and wireless, too.
Do you think that stick can be modded with Happ parts?

[Ducky]

The wireless PCB interests me, but the stick doesn't look too good.

[Toodles]

Please, if anyone has one of these, please post up a picture of what the PCB inside looks like, or at least mesurements.

Also, what kind and number of batteries does it take?

[Ramon]

You know, the wireless PCB would be quite the delight to have. It sure would make an arcade stick very very nice. No cords to follow you around, but Batteries would certainly be a drag....

Later,

[kcxj]

This stick will give you the fighting edge on both the PS2 and XBOX.

[lseelba]

Won't the wireless connection cause lag?

[Ramon]

Only one way to find out, is to go purchase it. Try it out, and if it doesn't work, return it.
Perhaps I'll go out and buy one if I see it at the local gamestop here in the Mall.
If I do, I'll try to get pictures of the inside, to see how easy the PCB can be hacked. And to see if there is any lag issues with it. (and to see if it is truly compatible with both xbox and Ps2s)

Later,

[Bernie]

The stick takes 3 AAA batteries. No lag so far with the PS2 (don't have an Xbox to test with) but the stick and buttons themselves are ass. I like the case tho, which is why I might keep it. I'll take pics of the inside soon and hopefully it's easy to mod.

There's also 2 balls on each side of the buttons that act as Dual Shock controls.

[Bernie]

Here are some pics of the stick. The quality isn't the best but all have is a camera phone so this is it until someone else takes better pics:

The stick by itself:
http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a399/wej4life/09-13-05_2318.jpg

What it looks like next to a Mas:
http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a399/wej4life/09-13-05_2330.jpg

Height comparison:
http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a399/wej4life/09-13-05_2331.jpg

Some gray crap glued to the bottom of the case (what is this for?):
http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a399/wej4life/09-13-05_2326.jpg

Interior:
http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a399/wej4life/09-13-05_2327.jpg

Stick close-up:
http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a399/wej4life/09-13-05_2328.jpg

Buttons close-up:
http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a399/wej4life/09-13-05_2329.jpg

I haven't actually tried anything yet but I'm willing to guess that Happ parts would be able to fit easily space-wise. What concerns me is that the pcb is mounted really close to the stick mounting and it's cut slanted on the corner so it probably needs to be moved if the stick is replaced. Also, I don't know how to go about mounting something like a competition stick in this case since it doesn't look like there's any mounting screws in place for the current stick. I could be wrong tho. Either way, I'm pretty new to modding sticks so any help would be appreciated.

[ax0r]

what a horrible position for the Start\Select buttons..

and I am sure there is lag.. 1 frame combos must suck on that stick :)

[NoAffinity]

The stick's not bad...short travel, like Japan sticks, I assume. That one button I mentioned previously is definitely shot, tho (and after only a couple hours of play). I'm going to replace buttons w/ happ comp, but leave the stick. I haven't noticed any lag w/ cvs2, sf:ae, cfe, or any emulated games.

[ragnafrak]

I also bought one (but will be returning it). The buttons feel like garbage, but that is mostly because of the springs inside. They are shitty, but have the same type of parts as hori buttons, i took the springs out of the buttons, and they feel much better, but the switches on them still started to stick after about an hour of play, so the triangle/R1 buttons are already shit. the stick, while somewhat better than what would come with a pelican, has a horrible action to it, up/down/left/right is very consistent, but the diagonals only engage when you force it into the corners (this is a square gate-ish stick).

the button holes are a little shy of 1-1/4" wide, so you would need to do a little filing to fit happs in there, and even then i'm not sure how well they would fit. i would guess they could fit ok if you faced all switch tabs towards the top of the stick. i couldn't really notice any delay.. but if i had a real stick/buttons in there i would probably be able to notice it easier. the wireless signal itself is pretty reliable.

[Ramon]

Real question here, is...

Is there any delay/lag when trying to do commands? How long does the battery life really last. 30 hours? 60 hours? Is there a method of changing channels for it?

Later,

[Toodles]

']Real question here, is...

Is there any delay/lag when trying to do commands? How long does the battery life really last. 30 hours? 60 hours? Is there a method of changing channels for it?

Later,
For the power, the limitation is the battery used. The real usefull question is the power draw. If someone with a multimeter can guage the milliamps used, then you can can get a very good idea how long any battery you hook up to will last. All rechargeables have a mAh rating (milliamp/hour) so if you know the amperage it uses you can get as large or as small a rechargable battery as suits your needs.

[Ramon]

Reason I ask, was because Naki isn't really that...how to say...

Good.

Later,

[ragnafrak]

I would assume that the battery usage would be about the same as a gamecube wavebird. it also has vibration, which i would guess would reduce it dramatically, but that can be turned off. I sat in training mode (cvs2) practicing some links/combos for about a 1/2 hour, and I definitely wasn't impressed. I didn't notice any really significant input lag, the main problem was the buttons and the stick as I said before. I'm sure if the buttons and stick were upgraded to happ/sanwa/etc, I would have had a better idea of how much if any input lag it had. For the short amount of play time I had, I was pretty dissatisfied. The stick itself has a very sloppy action, like I said in my first post.. it was very difficult to get consistent diagonal inputs. The buttons themselves, while better than most other crappy store-bought sticks' buttons, were horrible. They are designed around jap style buttons, but with switches that seem to prone to getting stuck (my triangle, R1, and X buttons were all getting stuck within 20 minutes of use). They have springs inside the buttons that make doing repeated button presses difficult. Along with the sketchy stick, I could barely do a simple combo like sakura c.LK-c.LK-s.LK xx dp+HP. After removing the springs from inside of the buttons, they definitely had a better feel to them, but with the switches getting stuck every other button press, it was kind of pointless.

So I ripped the wire off the R2 and returned it ;]

[Ramon]

Alright, went and got one for myself to do some testing and what not.
Cons:
1. parts suck but we all know that no need to go into detail with that
2. watch out for the cement block it has in there...it hurts when it falls on your foot without warning(way to go naki for a poor job on glueing)


Pros:
1. this is the ONLY pro of it. the PCB, is actually really good

Yeah, the PCB, the only good part of the whole stick, if you replace the batteries with something else, like a different kind instead of 3 AAA, then you get longer battery life, I'm going to do some more expriementing with it. I used the stock parts and got no delay or latency from either PS2 or XBox, I'm sure if you replace the parts(stick and buttons) it would be a pretty darn good thing. I will perhaps put it into my own custom arcade sanwa stick. And see how things go from there.

Wish me luck

Later,

[Shin-RoTeNdO]

Now I mentioned a little about this stick at the custom arcade stick thread when I first bought it about a month back now. It's a great stick for a mod job, but for a stand alone stick, I'd rate it a 5.5/10 The analog buttons seem pretty cool, but takes some time getting use to. I had no problem as far as lag on either the PS2/XB. I cannot use it on my pc and that was about the only other negative I had for it right out the bat. Like it has been stated, the buttons are crap, but can be replaced. I had planned to create a new thread about the Naki Universal Stick, but with the site being down a lot and etc... I got beat to it. I also have pics, and these are pics of mine plus comparison alongside a SFA stick.

The Stick
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/RoTeNdO/Gaming%20Rig%20Setups/100_3881.jpg

Side
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/RoTeNdO/Gaming%20Rig%20Setups/100_3882.jpg

Back
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/RoTeNdO/Gaming%20Rig%20Setups/100_3884.jpg

Receiver
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/RoTeNdO/Gaming%20Rig%20Setups/100_3885.jpg

Guts
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/RoTeNdO/Gaming%20Rig%20Setups/100_3889.jpg

Base
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/RoTeNdO/Gaming%20Rig%20Setups/100_3890.jpg

Side to Side with SFA Stick
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/RoTeNdO/Gaming%20Rig%20Setups/100_3886.jpg

Side view of side to side
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a314/RoTeNdO/Gaming%20Rig%20Setups/100_3887.jpg

Its late right now and if I feel like it, I'll post more info and maybe more pics later.

[Ramon]

My one many concern is, if I were to remove one of the Analogs (the Left Analog that has a cord stringing from it to the PCB iself) would it act up like most PSone PCB's? Or would it be just fine, I might have to just desolder it then test it, and if it does act up, probably have to resolder it back into place and locate it somewhere in my case. Seems like extra luggage if it can't be removed.

Another concern would be channels, what if you have more than one, and plan on using both at the same time? Does it have a method of switching channels between A, B, and or C? Or would they both interfere with one another? This would make it very uncomfortable if people did start using the PCB, and went to a home console tourney where alot of people had one. Would the signals be all jumbled together and make it very difficult to use? Or is there a method of switching between the channels?

So turns out, you can put normal Sanwa stuff into this stick(no idea why you would unless you really like the size of the case) but yeah it fits, just get screw ins. And some caps to cover the other holes you don't want. The only difficult part is putting the Sanwa stick in, just gotta be creative. If you know what I mean. I only put the sanwa buttons in just to check the latency again, and none was really found, It's really good actually.

Later,

[ragnafrak]

']I only put the sanwa buttons in just to check the latency again, and none was really found, It's really good actually.that's what i figured, thanks for confirming

[Ramon]

that's what i figured, thanks for confirming


No problem, if anything else is needed don't hesitate to ask. I'm all about taking this thing apart and testing parts out left and right. I don't really intend on returning it.

Another nice thing about the PCB is the fact it's a 2.4 GHz chip, and it has auto sleep functions. How conveneint. Though it has a 'auto scan' for detecting the signal. So I don't really feel comfortable with that. I prefer manual channel switching. 1-2-3-4 etc.

It indeed claims it has up to 40 FT of working wireless distance (that I don't believe, but it's nice to know...even if it is a 'bit' of an exaggeration)

Also after some reading and whatnot, seems like the battery life is that of somewhat equal to the uh, Wavebird for Nintendo Gamecube. (lasting up to 100 hours)

The chip itself requires alot of cleaning up, since alot of the soldering job that was done on it, was quit sloppy and nasty (I like my work clean and organized)

Later,

[adonis_minus_20]

I bought one of these initially because I wanted to play Dragonball Z Budokai Tenkaichi with a stick, and thought the design was pretty ingenious (having the little analog trackballs on there). As already stated the stick and buttons are terrible. I liked the design of the case and wanted to put a sanwa joystick and buttons in it.

I don't have any pictures of what I did, but on the bottom of the joystick there are four tabs on the plastic piece. I pushed these tabs in and it freed up the bottom cover of the base. I slid the bottom cover off of the joystick base. Next is the little force feedback motor, just grab onto the spinny thing with pliers and pull while holding the joystick taut from the other side (you probably want to cut the wires from the PCB first from the FF motor). After a little tugging the thing came out, and now I was looking at the little e-clip on the bottom of the joystick. I pried that off with a flat head screwdriver, but the stick still wouldn't come out of the base. The plastic piece that the FF motor was sitting in was the problem. I took my pliers again and braced the stick on the other side, and pulled hard, and it finally came off, spring popped out, etc. I then pulled the joystick out of the base altogether. Next, I took out the four screws left holding the base (I cut the wires going to the joystick before I removed it, and noted what wires went to what directions).

Wiring: Black wire was ground to the joystick coming from a common ground off of the 8 regular buttons, it looked like start and select buttons had their own ground.

Yellow = Up
Red = Right
Tan (Lighter) = Left
Brown (Darker) = Down

After noting the wiring, I pulled the base of the joystick off entirely. I saw that there were four plastic posts that the screws mounted the base into. I don't know how you would mount a HAPP joystick in this thing, the screw holes just don't match up, and I don't think there is enough depth to the case anyway. Luckily for me, the two mounting holes on the sanwa joystick matched up with two of the four plastic posts. The screws were too long, so I had to cut them shorter to get them to fit tightly to the base of the sanwa (used dremel tool to cut them). I mounted the sanwa and tightened up the two screws into the base and plastic posts. I'm not sure how a sanwa joy is normally mounted, I'm a bit of a noob with this stuff, but the two screws into the posts seemed to hold it OK. I made it that the left/right direction movements for the joystick would be the ones that would have the screws in the posts, I figured that up/down would be used less frequently than left/right. The left/right movement of the new stick is fine as it is directly supported by the two screws. The up/down movement does not have screws and posts to support it, and there was a tiny bit of play to it when moving up or down. I'll have to see over time how it holds up, you may be able to put something else into the case to try and brace the unsupported parts of the stick.

After mounting the sanwa, I stripped some wires for the ground and direction connections and soldered them to the appropriate spots on the sanwa stick, connecting them to the right wires coming from the PCB. After finishing with the stick, I tried out some SC3, and it worked perfectly! No lag that I could tell as well. I didn't get to do the buttons yet, but definitely will, as they suck pretty badly. I only have snap-in sanwa buttons, I know someone was saying they replaced the buttons with screw-in sanwas, will the snap-in ones fit in the case OK and work?

I'm very happy with the stick being replaced, I just hope the mounting holds up OK, I'll post updates as I go. I think if you're pretty rough with the stick, you would probably have a problem, but if you're a little more controlled with it, perhaps it will be alright.

Finally, I bought another one of these joysticks, just in case I f'd up the one I was trying to mod. I did a test to see if you could use both of them at the same time (two player). The first joystick you turn on connects to the first receiver that it happens to connect to. The second joystick refuses to connect at all (it won't connect to the first receiver or the second receiver). So, it seems you can't use more than one of these at a time.

Hope this helps, and please someone reply about the snap-in sanwas for the buttons.

Thanks.

Jim

[Ramon]

Ah thats what I thought, I knew it wasn't going to work if you had more than one of these arcade sticks. Seeing how there isn't no way of changing the channel manually. It probably has difficulty trying to recognize the channel between one stick and the other.

Snap-ins to be honest, I dont' believe they will grasp very well in this case, Screw-ins are better, I have a set of both and it seems Screw-ins would be more fitting for this situation.

And yes, gotta remember that start and select have the same ground as the power LED's and other LED's in the pcb, if you ground it with the rest of the buttons, then you won't have any start and select any more.

I've completely disassembled this stick and gutted it, I found out that with Sanwa, it runs better. Xbox has no lag, but I did notice a bit of small lag on the PS2. Which saddens me.

Also if you have any questions of what goes where when you are wiring, just remove the PCB and look on the bottom of it, you'll notice it has them all labeled to buttons and direction. Makes it alot easier than having to try and write everything down to figure out what goes where.

I've already made use of this PCB and did a project with it, soon to be unvieled, and it will hopefully be a mind blowing project. :karate:

Later,

[adonis_minus_20]

Thanks for the information Ramon. I look forward to seeing what you've done with the project using this PCB. Did you keep the analog nubs?

I really like the case and layout of this thing with the little analog nubs on it. What I would like to do is create another case with basically the same layout (and include cutouts for the two analog nubs), to just transplant the PCB, analog nubs, stick, and buttons into. I suck at the woodworking piece, so I'll probably never do it. The sanwa joystick mounted into the Naki plastic case is holding up just fine so far, after several hours of play.

Jim

[cricket_egg]

Really good info on this stick everybody, I recently got one of these, and the stick's spring resistence is HORRIFIC, so I'd LOVE to get a gumball and Sanwa buttons on this thing just because it's wireless and dual console, any info on how I'd go about doing it?

[Ramon]

cricket_egg:

Ask and thou shall recieve.

Just break it down into detail with what you want to do. And I'm sure we'll figure something out. After all I have this working with sanwa things. ThOUGH, what I have notice is the small bit of lag on PS2 consoles. Seems fine on Xbox, but PS2 has a bit of lag from what I noticed while playing Guilty Gear XX# Reload.

Though feel free to ask if you have any additional questions, I dismantled it and found everything I could about it.

~Goodbye

[AmbiguousCrosup]

I wanna mod this stick but I'm a picture person. SO anyone that has done this can they post pics? I will gladly spread the rep if so.

[Ramon]

AmbiguousCrosup:

I'd probably pass on really modding this up, there have been some issues of random signal loss, and it ends up not working until you shut off the unit, let it idle for a few minutes, and reconnect and search for signal. Often happens.

Though I still modded it, and use it. It just can be hectic trying to find a signal every so often. and you can only use one stick at a time, more than two, and you won't be getting any connection from either of them.

~Goodbye

[AmbiguousCrosup]

Shit. Guess I'll keep my money and try to make my dream stick instead. Now if someone would be willing to part with a flash stick...

[adonis_minus_20]

I just finished modding this thing, and I'm happy with the results. My wiring job is crappy, but it works. Again, I could only mount the joystick via 2 screws, but it seems like it's holding up OK (I'm also not violent with it). I used screw-in buttons, as recommended by Ramon. They were a little difficult to get in, but with some patience, it went well.

Here's links to some pics...

http://img522.imageshack.us/img522/3593/nakitopsmall9rz.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

http://img522.imageshack.us/img522/2517/nakicrappywiringsmall1cq.jpg (http://imageshack.us)

Jim

[Ceramiclion]

OMGZ!!11111111 that looks sweet! But is definitely not a mod I would consider. The way the buttons are placed doesn't seem comfortable and well white gets all full of crap. Congrats to Adonis tho. Kick ass mod

[adonis_minus_20]

OMGZ!!11111111 that looks sweet! But is definitely not a mod I would consider. The way the buttons are placed doesn't seem comfortable and well white gets all full of crap. Congrats to Adonis tho. Kick ass mod

Thanks for the compliment! The button layout isn't that bad after getting used to it. The only real problem with this thing, as Ramon has said, is that it loses the wireless signal from time to time. I don't notice any lag, but I may not be that discerning. Other than that, I'm very happy with it. I think the all white look is very clean, and I always wash my hands before using it.

Jim