Joysticks for Amiga

[Harrison]

I always found the feel of the two quite different. The Competition Pro sticks always felt stiffer and took more effort to manoeuvre, compared to the ZipStik which was slightly looser and less effort, making it nicer to use.

Can anyone remember what the joystick was called that had the variable stick tension? You could rotate a collar around the base of the stick to make the joystick movement stiffer or looser.

There was also a joystick released that had the Xybots arcade game joystick feature where you could rotate the stick 90 degrees left and right. This worked brilliantly for the game Xybots, where you rotate the joystick to rotate the character within the 3D levels by 90 degrees, allowing the actual joystick control for normal movement, but I'm not sure it was much use in many other games. Maybe useful in a Dungeon Master style graphical adventure/fps? I think that joystick was based on the Turbo Master II but I'm not 100% sure. Anyone know?

BTW, once I get the hardware section started I'm going to be including a hardware database that will work much like the game and demo sections, and I want to include a joysticks section. I don't want it to be as in depth as the Amiga Hardware site, but instead include the most useful hardware everyone used and knew about for quick reference, and include hardware manuals, any software it came with for download, images of the hardware and the packaging it came in. I'm hoping I can get this going next week.

[Sharingan]

The joystick with the variable stiffness thing was called Cruiser, no?

[Harrison]

The name Cruiser does sound very familiar so could be the one.

[Sharingan]

That would be this baby then:

[Demon Cleaner]

That one looks very cheap but seems to have the same shape as a Comp Pro. And the Comp Pro was very reliable and solid.

[J T]

That would be this baby then:

That was the shittiest joystick I ever used. The adjustment ranged from 'ridiculously stiff' through 'like bending a steel girder' to ' components completely encased in concrete'. Also very gay colours (even the name 'cruiser' has dodgy connotations).

ZIPSTIK FTW.

[Harrison]

Hang on! I feel very stupid now. I have one of those Cruiser joysticks!

In my defence I have a lot of joysticks for the Amiga (and compatible systems). Must be 30+ joysticks + gamepads. Over the years many have come with systems I've obtained or have been given. The one I have looks the same, but is plain black so none of the Amstrad/Fisher Price colouring.

In that picture is does look a bit similar in shape to a Comp Pro, but actually it's quite different. The base is much long with the fire buttons a lot further forward and the joystick close to the back of the base.