The best joystick ever; the list to end all debate

[jbenam]

I've tried a bunch in my life, but I'm missing the Slik Stik, Zipstick, Competition Pro and TAC-2. I'll probably try to get hold of a TAC-2 soonish.

For now my favourites are the Quickjoy SV-126 (mostly for nostalgic reasons) and the Quickjoy SuperStar

By the way, I recently found myself in possession of a Konix Speedking. Gave it away with one Amiga almost immediately

[Devlin]

Originally Posted by jbenam

By the way, I recently found myself in possession of a Konix Speedking. Gave it away with one Amiga almost immediately

Rude! I have two and I love them both

[Yoto]

I had a couple of these, back in the day, these were the only ones that lasted longer.
Amigakit still sells the Maverick 3.

[lasborg]

I loved the WICO Ergostick, tight and precise, easy control with two fingers. No big movements needed the switches were good and easily replacable if they got worn.

[spudje]

So funny, in the Netherlands everybody (including me) prefers The Arcade joysticks, while these are hardly mentioned by other people. Makes me wonder, were they only available in the Netherlands?

[Amiga1992]

Originally Posted by spudje

So funny, in the Netherlands everybody (including me) prefers The Arcade joysticks, while these are hardly mentioned by other people. Makes me wonder, were they only available in the Netherlands?

I think they are an NL product. I use to see them in every flea market I would hit in The Netherlands

[demolition]

Originally Posted by spudje

So funny, in the Netherlands everybody (including me) prefers The Arcade joysticks, while these are hardly mentioned by other people. Makes me wonder, were they only available in the Netherlands?

They were also very popular here in Denmark, although quite expensive. Often about double the price of your common Quickshot etc. joystick.

There was also a Danish designed joystick which was similar to The Arcade called Danjoy (with 5 x microswitches):
http://www.mastersystem.dk/stuff/pics/dan_joy_1.jpg

I prefer The Arcade and have 6 of them now, 4 black and 2 brown.

[dirkies]

Competition Pro 5000 from Suzo (distributed through Netherlands office since 1984), have 2 of them, with leaf switches for the 2 fire buttons for ultra fast firing, still working fine after 30 years here!

The recent retro USB variant has nothing to do with the classic once you open it and check components (including dipswitches for firebuttons, yuk!).

There may be others, like ZIP Stick, but all people I knew back then in C64 and Amiga scene had Competition Pro's.

[onkelarie]

Yup, same here... competition pro was the choice for amiga games.

[dreamkatcha]

Well this is all very interesting, but it fails to fulfil the (unwritten) contractual obligation you entered into to supply me with joystick reviews when you chose to open this thread and absorbed my words with your peepers!

Anyway, the results are in!

I had the chance to buy a couple of brand new Star Cursor joysticks earlier in the week, but missed out because another, more local buyer was willing to throw fifty quid at them. Oh well, there was no nostalgic attachment there, just heard they were top quality sticks.

IMO the best joysticks - assuming you have an infinite supply, money to burn and a good sized plot for a joystick grave in your back garden to bury them in - are the Quickshot Pythons. They're silent, comfortable and responsive... just not built to last!

[Amiga1992]

I don't know any of the joysticks on the top 5 positions, ahead of the CompPros and Cruisers.
Do you have any photos of them?

Thanks for this list

[dreamkatcha]

The full details are in the raw data section - try control and F. I tried to upload the scans to Blogger, but it's an awful platform for managing lots of thumbnails and aligning them correctly. When I get round to it I'll just provide links to the full size images of the magazine scans. They're all freely available on the web though, I haven't had to scan anything myself, I just extracted them from PDFs. Some were already in image format that I've had lying around on my hard drive for when I finally got round to putting this list together.

Update: I've now added links to all the scans.

[Simmo76]

Originally Posted by crazyc

These were my absolute favourites:

Mine too! And this is the first time I've ever seen anyone else even mention them, let alone say how great they were.

Absolutley fantastic joystick for playing Sensible (World of) Soccer with!

[crazyc]

Originally Posted by Simmo76

Mine too! And this is the first time I've ever seen anyone else even mention them, let alone say how great they were.

Absolutley fantastic joystick for playing Sensible (World of) Soccer with!

And even better when the micro switches break it's not too difficult to fix them up. I have three or four fully working and a few more that need combining to make fully working ones!
They were great for hypersports and track and field.

[alkis21]

No offense boys, but all your joysticks seem like cheap, plastic toys to me compared to what I am used to, as I explained in detail in this thread.

[crazyc]

Perhaps but I never really went for the arcade stick type ones. Preferred something a bit more ergonomic. But yeah I can see your point about robust quality feel.

[alkis21]

It is true that Greek sticks are not meant to be held in your hand. Some of my friends do it, I have no idea how and why (but then again, I have much smaller hands than most). But you can't beat their quality, I mean 25 years and still good as new? That's insane!

[jbenam]

Originally Posted by dreamkatcha

IMO the best joysticks - assuming you have an infinite supply, money to burn and a good sized plot for a joystick grave in your back garden to bury them in - are the Quickshot Pythons. They're silent, comfortable and responsive... just not built to last!

Which coincidentally was my main joystick for my young Amiga years

I've still got one, only thing that broke was the autofire switch. Looks like I should get it out of storage then

[Thorham]

Originally Posted by alkis21

No offense boys, but all your joysticks seem like cheap, plastic toys to me compared to what I am used to, as I explained in detail in this thread.

Very nice, but the sticks are on the wrong side of the cases.

[dreamkatcha]

Does anyone have any experience with the model in the attached pic? They look cheap and nasty, but somehow intriguing. Maybe the manufacturer was too ashamed to put their name on them.

Where are all the Amstrad mag joystick reviews? I've not found a single one yet.

I added some extra data to the list and we have a new winner. A pretty worthy one by all accounts and there's no beating 10 out of 10, but not that widely known outside of Aussieland it seems.

Edit: these multi-coloured joysticks are made by a Polish company called MATT and are known as the AFFkolor. What's more interesting is that they're still in production so you can buy a brand new one without having to find the needle-in-a-haystack NOS variety.