Lots of choices. Minimum list may include
8-way hat for views
twist stick for rudders
as many buttons, all over, as you can get (not just buttons around the hat on top of stick but on the base)
The ideal stick is one which lets you keep your hands on the controls and not the keyboard.
IMHO....some brands
CH Products...pricey as all getout. Think $300 although setups can be found online for $260 in places. Wear and tear....they last a while!!!
Seperate stick/throttle/rudders. Fighterstick is the best choice. CH seems to last the longest. I think I have 39 programmable buttons. Hmmmm, it might be 29 but who's counting. I use them all! They have gotten away from customer satisfaction when they changed over to usb, For those who have been around since the analog days the CH sticks were flash-abled. You would download your stick setup to the stick and it stayed there. Now you either create a set in AH2 or dl the stick set everytime you fire up your computer. With the older sticks you could yank your stick out of your computer and take it to the CON (for instance) and plug it into any computer and use it. I have no idea why they cut that out especially when the price is so high to begin with. At what point does a few dollar part cut into profits?
Thrustmaster
Original seperate stick/thr/rudders...all plastic. I just retired a set of pedals becauase I broke my last spare spring and they are hard to find now. 14 years of use....not bad. I was able to find a 10 pack of compatable pots for it but springs....rats!
HOTAS...first came out for lotsa bucks. Made of metal, weighted base incredibly heavy pull. This caused folks who already spent alot of money to have to spend alot more getting mods to make it a nice stick. TM missed the boat when they got bought out and stopped with any kind of decent customer service. Again this goes back years. The old TM sticks had a plastic shaft on the hat. They broke every 2-5 months or so. TM backed up their product with free replacement pots if you wanted to broke your hat. You could take apart your stick and remove/soldier in a new pot in approximately 5 minutes once you got used to it. I gather they figured a buck for a pot went a long way towards great customer relations. Come to think of it ...it did! They had a loyal following who bought and recommended sticks to alot of flyers.
Saitek
X-52 and Pro. Get peds too! Not a bad set for a lot less money. Say $100-200 plus $100 for the new pedals although you can get awway without peds. I won't but you might
. So will prolly save $100 for this setup over the ones listed above. Lotsa buttons, works good. Has some rotarys not really required for AH2 but can be used. The jury is out on how long they last. Some folks get years out of them, some don't.
I had one of the first HOTAS setups the X-36 USB. It was a backup in case my then worn TM setup wore out and I had to wait for parts. The rudders were on the throttle as a rocker in front. It was an excellent rudder system for guitar players as it took approx 30 lbs of pressure to use rudders. After flying with it for a month there was no sustained chord you couldn't hold. As far as using rudders for flying I kinda got used to NOT using em. The later models the X 45 and X52 got better as you had the twist stick rudders.
Then there is a list of many cheaper sticks....Evo's, ST290's, AV8r...the list goes on....I'm not fond of the 290's. They have buttons that surround the hat. You need a button on the base to set the "look up modifyer". After all you can't use the same thumb to move the view hat around while pushing the look up button...unless you have a HUGE thumb!
What's important for choosing a new stick is ask on the boards (help and training) after deciding what your budget can afford. If you love to fly, plan on doing it awhile, and have a budget that allows you to spend a few bucks then go ahead and spend some of it. If you're just starting out and not quite sure what you want then look at the $20-$30 sticks and get up and fly. The stick will last long enough for anything you want to do. If you stay with flt sims and afford it then upgrade when you want to. If life takes you in another direction you're not out much. I say go to the boards because I can guarantee there's 10 folks for every stick out there who have a valid opinion on whats good and bad about the stick they use.
As long as you go with a minimum required buttons/hat/twist stick/throttle you won't go wrong.
Hope this helps.
Ren
Opinions above are personal in nature from years of flying online using many sticks. They are not meant to dis any particular stick or manufacturer. They are a result of my personal use and interaction of sticks. Any stick chosen for flying AH2 is generally 100% better than using a mouse. Yes, a mouse will work but your enjoyment of the game goes up dramatically when using even a $2 garage sale joystick. That reminds me. Lotsa folks have used the now discontinued Sidewinders. I see hem all the time at garage sales and they normally go for $5.
