Mark Julio has compared the Mad Catz Street Fighter V Arcade FightStick Alpha, which is available for preorder with this link on Amazon, with the Hori Fighting Stick Mini. Mad Catz’s community and sponsor manager first stated that his company’s product is a little bigger when compared to Hori’s stick. He also believes that the Alpha features an actual arcade layout in terms of size and feel, which makes it more accessible to him. You can find his comments about the comparison from Twitter below:
@Zerpin I’ll post a side by side pic when I can. It’s a little bigger. The takeaway here is the MCZ one has a real arcade layout.
— Mark Julio (マークマン) (@MarkMan23) December 3, 2015
@pattheflip it’s similar in size, however the key takeaway for the Alpha is we present it with an actual arcade layout (size and feel).
— Mark Julio (マークマン) (@MarkMan23) December 3, 2015
@pattheflip personally I always liked the mini-hori except for getting used to the smaller lever/buttons. So that’s how Alpha was born. — Mark Julio (マークマン) (@MarkMan23) December 3, 2015
In related news, Mark Julio also confirmed that the Mad Catz Street Fighter V Arcade FightStick Alpha is going to be “mod friendly.” With that said, it won’t be as easy as the Tournament Edition sticks when it comes to modifying. He also said that the Alpha has been engineered so that it won’t easily slip off your lap and/or desk:
You can mod anything! But yes, the SFV FightStick Alpha will be mod friendly to a degree. Not as easy as TE/TE2 tho. https://t.co/7Xsc5CKWYZ — Mark Julio (マークマン) (@MarkMan23) December 3, 2015
@gcyoshi13 @pattheflip we’ve taken precautions to ensure it will stay in your lap/on your desk. Padding/engineered stoppers. — Mark Julio (マークマン) (@MarkMan23) December 3, 2015
The Arcade FightStick Alpha will be released on the same day as the Street Fighter V videogame, which is slated to arrive early next year on the 16th of February.
The above-mentioned Hori Fighting Stick Mini is also getting a new iteration in the near future. The Fighting Stick Mini 4 is expected to come out in North America later this year on the 14th of December. If you are interested, you can check out Hori’s petite fighting stick with this page.