This thing is big and beautiful. Hori crafted a stick that can easilly stand up to the ultra-expensive Thrustmaster line that were generally considered king of the hill for PC flight jockey's over a decade ago(minus the sturdy metal base construction). -I always gravitated towards the cheaper 3rd party solutions in those days myself, eventually falling in love with Microsoft's line years later, but I digress-
The stick is loaded with more knobs and switches than even AC5 knows what to do with. Many of them sit idle and worthless in actual play, the stuff that covers most of the throttle particularly(and I doubt we will be seeing much support in the future, particularly since Windows doesn't recognize this thing...grrr) but they look kewl.
Covered in rubberized grip, it's very comfortable and includes optional suction cups to add to the base for surface support. There is force feedback built in(feel the G's!), and the spring mechanics are ultra smooth. You can also adjust the torque of the throttle piece with a philips head screwdriver(out of the box, it was pretty much locked down hard and near impossible to move without loosening)
AC5 takes the most advantage of this thing obviously, and it took a good 20-30 minutes of practice and conditioning in the training exercises to get the hang of using this. It's extremely sensitive and amazingly accurate in your subtle movements, unfortunately I don't believe changes can be made to the button layouts or sensitivity settings. With a bit of practice, it's as easy to handle as the Dual Shock, and definately far more entertaining. (I really can't stress how fucking great it is to play AC5 with this!) You have d-pad functionality on both the stick and throttle making menu options and wingman orders very easy as well.
I do have a few issues however. For one the analog viewpoint hat on top of the stick(which emulates the R-stick functionality on the DS2) is extremely touchy. Changing view perspectives requires clicking it in(I often like to switch between external and internal) but this also can lock the perspective on strange undesired angles and you often have to fool with the thing to get the reticle view re-centered again midflight, extremely irritating.
Also, this stick does NOT feature Z-axis rotation for pitch and yaw on the flight stick(something I loved on my MS stick for the PC), thus you are required to use the rudder control switch that lies directly underneath the throttle stick where your fingers rest. It's actually very uncomfortable in practice particularly since your pinky and middle finger on your left hand end up being the ones to handle that strenuous duty.
Final complaint is that the USB cable is pretty short, about the length of the GC controller wire. I plan to get an extension of some sort eventually, cause I have to personnally move the couch and table forward to play the game.
This stick works beautifully with AC4 too, you lose some slight functionality in a few key areas over AC5, but absolutely nothing is entirely lost in terms of control. Since AC4 sticks the view change on the d-pad(no wingman orders), changing views is less of a nigthmare.
Unfortunately, Air Firce Delta Storm does NOT work as far as I can tell. No biggie cuz the game pretty much sucks, but I was hoping to take the Vic Viper and Twinbee out with this new toy.
