It’s probably because I just outright suck but even “easy” mode on Street Fighter IV is no cakewalk. About half the time, you actually have to pay attention and use proper timing to win a fight, and even when you figure out how to deal with the final boss, he’s still super-cheap. Crimson Viper is not the only design that seems to have been influenced by SNK’s games…

(Note that there are also “very easy” and “easiest” below “easy” mode.)

The $40 Mad Catz FightPad is pretty nice. The d-pad is essentially an enlarged version of the “floating circle” the standard 360 pad has, but it feels so much smoother and is less…bad. It’s smooth, and I’ve not developed a callus from the three hours I was stubbornly trying to complete a single play-through. I don’t know how people pull off SF-style circle motions (as opposed to MK-style directional taps) on the Playstation’s disjointed d-pad; seems like it’s just asking for trouble. Because it’s a circle rather than a cross, it’s crazy easy to do “shoryuken” (uppercut) motions. For example, on a cross pad (like all of Nintendo’s, Sony’s), you press forward, shift diagonally to down, and…forwardanddown, trying to find a way to bridge the gap between two different “branches” of the cross. If it’s the Playstation, that last motion is essentially two seperate buttons. With a circle, it’s forward, shift diagonally down, then rock forward again. There’s some plastic where the “down+forward” “virtual” direction is located. I feel that’s why Japanese joysticks have a square bracket. To have a circle/octagonal bracket restricts the full range of a diagonal movement.

Earlier this week, I played some Xbox Live Arcade games, and it’s a dramatic, reassuring improvement over the standard 360 d-pad. I never felt my movements in Lumines or Bomberman did anything I didn’t actually intend to. I got so caught up, I didn’t even try out Pac-Man CE yet. Then I gave the pad a go on on some old arcade games on my PC, but I had to do some awkward button remapping several times. Though the controller gives you the option to make the d-pad emulate the standard analog stick, for some reason the software wouldn’t recognize when I pressed Up. So…I had to remap everything to the “hat switch.” Many, many seperate times.

I didn’t try my old Hori Fighting Stick EX2 yet. I figure I’ll just wait until my (backordered!) MadCatz SF4 FightStick Tournament Edition arrives.

For those keeping track, that’s an $80 Collector’s Edition game, a $40 control pad, and a $150 joystick. Plus tax. Plus…additional expenses…::cough:: The controllers, due to their nature, can’t even be used on too many other games!