To Wiz Or Not To Wiz ?


colt chillin'

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Joined
Feb 26, 2006
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104
my gp2x ended up collecting dust because of it's crappy joystick.

i just found out about the wiz, and the dingoo, and noticed... a d-pad!!!

i've been reading some reviews but i'd like some more opinions so if you guys are willing to answer a few questions... that would be nice...

+ is de the d-pad any good? let's say compared to a nds d-pad... i mean... i already saw a wiz d-pad mod thread??? :blink:

+ the d-pad layed-out buttons? i've been reading these are bad news, are they?


thanks!

ps:

not trying to start another wiz vs dingoo thread. i mainly need to know if the wiz's controls are anything like the nds's.
 
The first two questions are unfortunately very subjective and varies quite a bit from person to person. Unlike with some other platforms, it's really pretty across the board - some people love the controls, others think they're just okay, some think they're pretty sub-par. Few think they're completely awful, and I think more think they're above average than below average. I personally don't like them very much, although if you perform DaveC's dpad mod that could help things quite a lot. As it stands I like the Nintendo DS dpad slightly more and its face buttons much more.

Wiz will run a lot of those games significantly better than Dingoo, not in small part due to the optimized ARM interpreters being used in the Wiz version of MAME.

If you're willing to pay for it you may want to wait and keep the Pandora as a viable option too, since it'll have more power for MAME (will use the same optimized cores) and would give you another dpad/button layout to compare against. The Pandora's dpad has been tweaked by DaveC so I expect good things from it, and the buttons should be less cramped than those on the Wiz. Of course, if you're not willing to pay nearly twice as much then it's pretty moot.
 
I did the exact same thing with my GP2X. I hated that joystick, ruined the entire machine. Compared to the GP32 it was lousy.

I have a Wiz and think it is a brilliant machine. I don't see any problems with the d-pad myself. Perhaps it would be hard to do those rotating SF2-type moves, but I have nothing bad to say about it myself.

Get a Wiz, it is what the GP2X should have been.

edit: I like the buttons too.
 
(kolibri ?? you're here too ? and you have a wiz ? i didnt know you had a wiz. Cest moi renejr902 de yaronet)

i really like the d-pad. im very difficult too. i hate the gp2x stick. and i love the gp32 d-pad stick

the wiz d-pad is not so bad. all games i tried play like a DS d-pad, EXCEPT fighting games, a little harder to make move, but still possible.
 
Yeah, I've thoroughly enjoyed the Wiz's dpad (and other buttons) for everything except fighting games. And to be fair, I hate playing fighting games with any sort of dpad, so I don't think the Wiz is at fault here. But, I have to throw in the fact that I have small hands (even for a girl) and so it might be more comfortable for me than a lot of other people. Take it with a grain of salt (a grain with the words "the wiz's dpad is just fine" carefully engraved on it, that can be seen when inspected with a microscope).
 
For what it's worth, I have small hands too, even for a girl. And I'm not a girl :( Strangely I still find a lot of handhelds too cramped. It really makes no sense.
 
The Wiz pad is decent. It just had a pivot that was 1/2 mm too short making the whole pad sink a bit more than it should if you are playing some types of games. This is why i did that mod and afterwards it is pretty much as good as a DS etc. It took me a couple of months before I did the mod so you can see it wasn't so bad that I needed to change it right away.

I hear complaints about the buttons but I never really had a problem. I have average sized hands and I never thought it too cramped, I just press towards the outer parts of the buttons and Robotron and Smash TV play better than ever :p

I like the OLED screen on the Wiz because it is kind of ideal for those old MAME games, it looks good at any angle, even when you rotate to play vertical arcade games and the black level is best.
 
yeah the blacks level and the screen quality is AWESOME !!!!!!!!!!!!! REALLY AWESOME !!!!!!!!!!!!!! NO BLUR, or very very very very tiny blur in sonic games. LOL


cant believe the F-300 will come back with a lcd screen. its really sad. i just read that in another topic.
 
beavith said:
I love the gameboy d-pad, but i couldnt play Street Fighter II at all.

yeah we really need a Mame or snes emulator for gameboy. and a flashcard. and a new gb cpu. and a new gb screen. ah forget it too complicated. just DaveC can mod the gameboy to a powerful beast.
 
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The d-pad is fine, and it feels like a DS pad, but is a bit soft and lowly-pivoting, but it does get the job done.
As for the buttons, they just look like a d-pad. They do all work like buttons. They may look wierd, but trust me - they feel great!

Of course, it's all up to you. I'm just saying my opinions - you may think different.
 
I also thought that the stick on the gp2x ruined the whole machine, it was nowhere near as good as gp32 one. But the wiz controls are prettty good, I don't have my gp32 anymore so I can't really compare, but the controls are definitely playable. Above average for sure. The only caveat is that when rotated I find it too small to hold comfortably, which is a pity.
 
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