The Pikachu version of the Hori Battle Pad for Wii U has been released in the United States region. If you haven’t done so already, you can purchase the new iteration of the third-party controller with this page on Amazon.
For the uninformed the Wii U Battle Pad is manufactured by Hori but is also officially licensed by Nintendo. The gamepad is shape almost exactly like the official Gamecube controller and has many of the same buttons. With that said, the new product has a bigger d-pad in addition to adding a fourth shoulder buttons. The ZL and ZR buttons also use short strokes instead of being analog. Lastly, the Hori Battle Pad comes with turbo support as you can set intervals of 5, 10 or 20 presses per second.
The Pikachu version uses the yellow color in addition to featuring an imprint of the pocket monster in the middle of the pad. Hori previously released a Mario and Luigi version.
The Turbo Battle Pad was created primary for use with Super Smash Bros. for Wii U, which came out last November. If you are looking for an alternative to the Gamecube controller, then you should check out Hori’s product. You can also use the same third-party controller in games that support the Classic Controller and Classic Controller Pro.