X-Arcade coming to Frys

YellowDog

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I just got an email announcing that Frys is going to be selling X-arcade's 2 player control panel. I am guessing that this is the proverbial testing the waters on both sides.

If you build MAME machines or are looking to build one, these are not a bad way to start. The controls are all microswitch, but the cabinetry is solid and they come all pre-wired up to just plug and play.

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Plus Fry's will be selling them for $99 ($30 off X-Arcade's price).

Detail are on the link below:

Link: http://www.xgaming.com/pages/x-arca...ium=email&mc_cid=b1a5c66b53&mc_eid=9bf6ce7caa

ken
 
Good to hear they'll be back in retail. Not the first time at Fry's for them though. I saw X-Arcade Solos (it's the 1-player version) in Fry's several years ago, so it must be a new agreement between them.
 
Good to hear they'll be back in retail. Not the first time at Fry's for them though. I saw X-Arcade Solos (it's the 1-player version) in Fry's several years ago, so it must be a new agreement between them.

I have a solo I got at Fry's a few years ago, think I paid about $75 for it, I almost never use it though.....:eek:
 
Good to hear they'll be back in retail. Not the first time at Fry's for them though. I saw X-Arcade Solos (it's the 1-player version) in Fry's several years ago, so it must be a new agreement between them.

Yea a few vendors sold either theirs or the hot rod that use to be sold. I think gamestop carried the hot rod stick years ago but it might have been the x-arcade one.

Anyway if Fry's keeps the price at that point great. The x-gaming stick is a good quality controller for those who want to run mame. It also can work with consoles.

A friend used a tank stick on his mame cabinet. He modified the cabinet some but it is pretty close(I would have done it differently).
 
Those things are junk for sticking on a cabinet. They are fine if you want to use them with a console or stick one on your desk, but they are otherwise terrible.

You know how the guys on this messageboard laugh at the dumb looking mame cabinets that we see people build? The people on the mame cabinet boards laugh at people who put X-Arcade sticks on game cabinets.

Almost anyone reading this message board has the brainpower needed to build that sort of thing the right way. Buy an encoder, buy some wires, buy your controls and do it right. As an added bonus you can actually use good quality controls instead of the cheapest ones available.
 
Those things are junk for sticking on a cabinet. They are fine if you want to use them with a console or stick one on your desk, but they are otherwise terrible.

You know how the guys on this messageboard laugh at the dumb looking mame cabinets that we see people build? The people on the mame cabinet boards laugh at people who put X-Arcade sticks on game cabinets.

Almost anyone reading this message board has the brainpower needed to build that sort of thing the right way. Buy an encoder, buy some wires, buy your controls and do it right. As an added bonus you can actually use good quality controls instead of the cheapest ones available.

Do you own one? How do you know they are junk. I'm just curious. I was thinking about getting a tank stick.
 
Almost anyone reading this message board has the brainpower needed to build that sort of thing the right way. Buy an encoder, buy some wires, buy your controls and do it right. As an added bonus you can actually use good quality controls instead of the cheapest ones available.


Agreed. But not everyone has the time and cabinetry skills to be able to make one from scratch. If you do, great. If you don't, now you have an option.


ken
 
It has been a long time, but yes I have used one of those. Bought a game from someone who had one bolted onto a real cabinet, played Final Fight on it, it wasn't all the great. This was maybe 8 years ago.

The mame cabinet community has thoroughly trashed those things for years. Controls are cheap feeling, the sticks tend to favor the diagonals, and they look horrendous if you bolt them onto a real machine.

For a desktop control solution they aren't that bad, buy away for that purpose. I wouldn't waste my time building a desktop controller either. I would just use that.

But if you are doing anything with a real cabinet then please skip that thing.
 
It has been a long time, but yes I have used one of those. Bought a game from someone who had one bolted onto a real cabinet, played Final Fight on it, it wasn't all the great. This was maybe 8 years ago.

The mame cabinet community has thoroughly trashed those things for years. Controls are cheap feeling, the sticks tend to favor the diagonals, and they look horrendous if you bolt them onto a real machine.

For a desktop control solution they aren't that bad, buy away for that purpose. I wouldn't waste my time building a desktop controller either. I would just use that.

But if you are doing anything with a real cabinet then please skip that thing.

Thanks. I was under the impression they used high quality real arcade parts in those sticks.
 
They're all right! I gutted one to build a mame machine for someone and accidentally fried the I/O board they mailed a new one to me, no questions asked. Agreed, there's nothing like building your own, but as value for money they're hard to beat. But man, seeing them just bolted to a full size cab? Yuck.
 
Thanks. I was under the impression they used high quality real arcade parts in those sticks.

They do, in a manner of speaking. The microswitches are cheap though. You can easily replace them with e.g. Cherry switches of course.
 
When I first built my old mame cab, I bought the DIY kit from xarcade. I think I spent like $50-60 for the encoder, 2 joysticks and buttons. They worked well, the are 4/8 way if you flip the plastic on the bottom on the shaft. Big reason I got it as well was I had a TV in the mame cab so I could hook this up to my old Xbox and play soul calibur :).

I always liked them until one broke off the cab. Shotty craftsmanship on my part I suppose. I kept the encoder and Replaced some of the buttons and got sanwa joysticks instead.... And all my high scores went up! Lol
 
Those things are junk for sticking on a cabinet. They are fine if you want to use them with a console or stick one on your desk, but they are otherwise terrible.

You know how the guys on this messageboard laugh at the dumb looking mame cabinets that we see people build? The people on the mame cabinet boards laugh at people who put X-Arcade sticks on game cabinets.

Almost anyone reading this message board has the brainpower needed to build that sort of thing the right way. Buy an encoder, buy some wires, buy your controls and do it right. As an added bonus you can actually use good quality controls instead of the cheapest ones available.
+1

i actually built my own version using real arcade components before ever messing with a cab.
 
the parts they use in those suck. It's been that way for years. NO way can they compare to Happ parts.
 
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