Finally had a chance to play with the 4 Kai and I'm pretty happy with it overall so far. Keep in mind I'm not a high-level player by any means, and I'm surely repeating what my expectations were pre-release, which I guess is good in that there are no curveballs.
I don't mind the Kuros at all (for now). They felt good enough to me for that I'm not going to mess yet with the warranty (no idea how long that is) to swap them out even though I have a extra black and grey sets of Sanwas ready to go. Maybe I'll wait until the return/exchange window closes just in case of other issues. I could see if someone is not used to them how they might not like them at all, but I'd bet if it's your first stick, you might not give them a second thought. I do like the lighter touch of the Sanwas, but these are not too bad. I was expecting to hate them.
One thing I actually like is that compared to my SFxT Pro Mad Catz sticks which I like a lot, the buttons are much quieter, even thought they have an occasional squeak. They may be due to the Pro being more hollow and echoey, and how much I slam on them, but man using that stick is loud as heck. This may be a combo of the buttons and less hollow space of the Kai, but it much less offensive in terms of overall noise.
Gonna keep the Hayabusa stick in there to stay. Feels much like the Sanwa to me, but maybe a little stiffer perhaps. I was never that great at FADCs to Ultras in SFIV, and felt like I was missing a ton on my old stick, and it feels like I was able to do them way more consistently right away.
In terms of features, which I'm a sucker for, it's not missing anything unlike the TE2s, and I like having the Start/Options button on the top actually. I'm kinda sick of reaching around the top of the Mad Catz sticks since I don't play in tourneys. The touchpad and click worked well enough, which might be handy for messaging.
The button assign feature is kinda nice, because you can use it to make the far right (L1/L2) buttons or the options button work as up to any three button combos or disable them totally. You can make the options button empty if you want and remap options to the side turbo button.
For example, in Injustice PS4, I was able to map the touchpad button to the L1 button, so I could reset the training mode without having to move my hand to reach to the top side of the stick. So, already it'ss an option I appreciate being there. It might come in handy if a future fighter overlooks something in their button config or maybe something in another genre.
The instructions are just atrocious, so I thought it didn't work, but figured it out. In case anyone wants to know, here's what the manual did not explain.
-Turn the Assign mode switch on. (turbo light turns on)
-Tap the button you want to change (L1/L2 or option) - turbo light blinks
-HOLD the button or combo you want to map to it until it stops blinking and the assign light comes on
-turn off A switch.
My only beef, as I mentioned before, is that there's not a lot of horizontal wrist space, so it felt much more like my hand was floating in space. I wish they made the case a little deeper. The Kai's buttons are are little higher already than the Regualr RAP, but it's not that much to offset this. It feels odd coming from TEs.
As far as the extra stick spacing between the stick and buttons on the Kai, I didn't really notice that much of a difference.
Anyway, can't wait to get my second stick for 2P so I can try to get some friends to start playing fighters. If someone didn't already have a stick preference, I'd easily recommend this one over the TE2 considering the price point and features for sure.
So now that the Kai is out there in people's hands, with English instructions, can someone clarify what the Assign mode does? This is what I would like to do:
Remap L3 to L1
Remap R3 to L2
This way I can have a 6 button layout on the face, but keep the functionality of the L1 and L2 buttons on the side of the stick.
Thanks.
The instructions might as well not be in English. You can remap the side L3/R3 to the top L1/L2 or Option or disable the L1/L2 or Option. You just can't remap anything to the side L3/R3. If you disable the Option, you can remap it to the side Turbo button though. Dunno if that serves the same purpose you're going for.
EDIT: Ok, yeah, the buttons squeak more than I originally noticed. Mostly when pressing a button multiple times in a row. With a single firm hit it doesn't seem to happen that much or be as annoying.
_/¯
