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[nkarafo]

So all these years the Internet told me how the 360 controller's Dpad is shit. The thing is, whatever issues they have are very easily fixable. I have three 360 controllers and only one was a bit off so i fixed it and now i have 3 controllers with very comfortable and tight Dpads.

Then i got a XBOXone controller (btw, i use all these on a PC). The Internet told me this one has a better Dpad. But i can't see it. The issue with it's Dpad is that it's very tiny. And at the same time it requires more pressure than even a tightened 360 Dpad. As a result my thumb gets sore because the pressure is targeted at a very small area of the finger while the 360 Dpad can be pressed much easier without moving the thumb to find the good pressure point. Additionally, the right direction doesn't click as nicely as the other three and needs a tiny bit more pressure as well and it feels kinda sticky (guess it's an issue with mine). I would like to fix it but opening the controller is much more difficult than the 360 ones and requires a special screwdriver that i don't have right now so i have to deal with this until i get one.

Anyway, using this Dpad is pretty tiresome and i have to say it's one of the worst i ever used, excluding crappy Chinese controllers that don't really count. Everything else is incredible, it has the best analog sticks and shoulder buttons i ever used. But the Dpad is literally painful.

Am i the only one thinking this? I started using my old 360 pads again and using those, so called "crappy" Dpads gave me a relief...

 

[Gavin Stevens]

I have to agree, Xbox have never had a decent dpad sadly, and it looks to me at a glance anyway that tradition will stay with the newer generation

Nevet has a problem with the PS4 one, or the switch pro. The default joycon dpad can fuck right off mind you.

 

[MiyazakiHatesKojima]

 

[xool]

Hard to believe it's worse than 360, Thought they fixed it.

No way was 360's pad ever acceptable let alone good, either for 4 way or ring select.

Absolute trash.

 

[DoctaThompson]

I hated the 360's dpad in all honesty, although I feel like it was the best controller at it's time. The xb1 controller dpad was "better", but still not the BEST. I used an arcade stick to negate that (I play a bunch of fighting games). But the elite 1 series had an amazing dpad, and elite series 2 is even better. But that's a fuck ton of money to spend on just a controller But still better than the ps3/ps4 controller IMO

 

[nkarafo]

Ι don't get what's especially bad about the 360 dpad. Can someone explain? I explained why i think the One's is bad and all i get is the 360 dpad is trash with no explanation.

I treasure comfort a lot. I play for many hours and the last thing i need is something being uncomfortable. The One's Dpad is exactly that for me. The 360 one is much less hassle and less painful for my thumb.

Now i'm not saying there aren't 360 controllers with a bad Dpad situation out there but because it's easy to fix i don't see it as a huge issue. I fixed one of mine and a couple of others my friends have. But you can't fix the size of the one's Dpad...

If you ask me, the worst thing about the 360 controller isn't the Dpad but the analog stick deadzones. These are all over the place and different for each unit. But they are still fixable using software.

 

[DoctaThompson]

Ι don't get what's especially bad about the 360 dpad. Can someone explain? I explained why i think the One's is bad and all i get is the 360 dpad is trash with no explanation.

I treasure comfort a lot. I play for many hours and the last thing i need is something being uncomfortable. The One's Dpad is exactly that for me. The 360 one is much less hassle and less painful for my thumb.

Now i'm not saying there aren't 360 controllers with a bad Dpad situation out there but because it's easy to fix i don't see it as a huge issue. I fixed one of mine and a couple of others my friends have. But you can't fix the size of the one's Dpad...

If you ask me, the worst thing about the 360 controller isn't the Dpad but the analog stick deadzones. These are all over the place and different for each unit. But they are still fixable using software.

If you pressed a specific direction with the dpad on 360, it would randomly input either the direction you intentionally selected, or it could pick 7 other directions to go. The 360 dpad could seriously be a great tool for selecting the lottery or used for bets, as it would be random EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. no person on street fighter 4 would be that ballsy to use the dpad. Even people playing non-charge fighters in sf4, would rely on the ANALOG stick, instead of the dpad to do forward, down, forward moves.

 

[xool]

Ι don't get what's especially bad about the 360 dpad.

Basically just pressing left or NW whatever and discovering that it's registered up or N ..

I think it's partially due to it being "non-segmented", party due to it being chunky and having a long travel from the pivot, and probably a lot due to the different placement from dualshock D-pad ..

...the way I hold controller - if I move thumb left-right on DS dpad that's left right .. on 360, because my thumb is at an angle across the controller left-right of thumb is actually from WNW to ESE .. (so indirectly due to different L thumbstick position)

..all three combined cause the problem imo.

Segmented dpad like Sony/Nintendo should've fixed it maybe ..

 

[bRacing]

In a world in which the Switch Pro Controller exists, no, the XB1 dpad is not the worst.

 

[JAMMA]

The Xbox one Dpad is always seems less sensitive on the right side, and the Dpad contact sticker/patch is prone to breakdown (the metal contacts wear inwards, causing double clicks). It doesn’t use a standard rubber conductive membrane.
I’d really like them to change it up in the future. I’ve had multiple controllers that have needed to be repaired. I don’t feel like it’s bad to play with myself as far as feel goes, it’s just that I always dread the day that my D-Pad may start going haywire.

Edit: For the OP, there’s nothing you really need to fix unless your buttons start doing the awful double or seemingly unlimited multiple presses. After a few years usually the Up on my D-Pads go into what seems like rapid fire. The repair is cheap enough but it’s a still a pain and shouldn’t be necessary.

Up is a weird one to go out, I must use more pressure doing the standard “down then up” dash jumps in fighters than any other direction.

Once again, IMO it’s a good feeling Dpad. I just wish they didn’t wear out on me.

 

[GHG]

It's awful, as were the original bumper buttons which they thankfully revised.

 

[DeepEnigma]

Water is wet, the thread. It’s always been this way.

Vita’s is GOAT.

 

[Shakka43]

My biggest problem with it is the location tbh, I got used to the asymmetrical sticks pretty quickly but the d-pad on the bottom part feels awful.

 

[LemmingWithaParachute]

Especially for fighting and games with items/weapons/effects assigned to the dpad. Its just a bad design in general. May as well have been a nipple 3rd analog stick.

 

[thelastword]

Was there any generation when MS had a decent DPAD.....You can't have expectations where there is no precedent....

 

[LemmingWithaParachute]

Was there any generation when MS had a decent DPAD.....You can't have expectations where there is no precedent....

This is the same company that thought that the tiles design in windows 8 were a great idea.

 

[darkinstinct]

Who uses the digipad in 2020? Even fighting games make heavy use of analog sticks. Dpad gets used for four functions in 99 % of the games, which map to up, down, left, right. Which the Xbox Dpad is fully capable of doing.

 

[zcaa0g]

You are doing it wrong. It actually has a responsive tactile response unlike the crappy spongelike PlayStation KiddyShock one. And don't be poor, get a good arcade stick.

 

[LemmingWithaParachute]

Who uses the digipad in 2020? Even fighting games make heavy use of analog sticks. Dpad gets used for four functions in 99 % of the games, which map to up, down, left, right. Which the Xbox Dpad is fully capable of doing.

I save my analog stick for vr porn.

 

[thelastword]

This is the same company that thought that the tiles design in windows 8 were a great idea.

Well they sure did, because they ditched the Windows Blades and went full fledged into tiles on the 360. I guess they were chasing the touch screen and mobile phenomenon at the time since Windows Phone was also a thing...….

Tiles are not the worst, people like pretty pictures, but they have to be fast, it can't feel like molasses......I like Sony's design because you see so much more info under a tile, you can link to trophies, communities, live broadcasts and friends right there and the side menu gives you a wealth on information, updates, customizations, store links etc....

 

[bRacing]

Was there any generation when MS had a decent DPAD.....You can't have expectations where there is no precedent....

360 S pad was a really good dpad, so yeah. But then again, you'd have to actually own Xbox products to have any idea what you're talking about.

 

[JLB]

regular xbox one dpad is perfect for navigating menus, but not optimal for games.
elite controller dpad, on the other hand, is superb.

 

[JLB]

This is the same company that thought that the tiles design in windows 8 were a great idea.

this is the same company that put a computer in half of human population homes.
not sure what anything has to do with a dpad, anyway.

 

[LemmingWithaParachute]

Well they sure did, because they ditched the Windows Blades and went full fledged into tiles on the 360. I guess they were chasing the touch screen and mobile phenomenon at the time since Windows Phone was also a thing...….

Tiles are not the worst, people like pretty pictures, but they have to be fast, it can't feel like molasses......I like Sony's design because you see so much more info under a tile, you can link to trophies, communities, live broadcasts and friends right there and the side menu gives you a wealth on information, updates, customizations, store links etc....

Windows blades has nothing to do with desktop. Yeah they went after the touch market while forgetting their largest consumer base is desktop/not touch based.

this is the same company that put a computer in half of human population homes.
not sure what anything has to do with a dpad, anyway.

If the keyboard for a desktop has had tried and true separate directional arrow keys since the inception of the keyboard... one would have thought that proven method along with the success of the ps1 controller would get carried over to a modern console controller. Literally had the R&D done for them.

 

[Ahmed360]

Dunno man, Xbox One Controller is currently my all-time favorite Controller.
It just fits perfectly in my hands, and love everything about it, including the D-pad.
I purchased few (on different occasions) to play on my Gaming Laptop.

 

[HolyTruth]

Really? I think the dpad of the newer controller versions is great.

 

[JAMMA]

Who uses the digipad in 2020? Even fighting games make heavy use of analog sticks. Dpad gets used for four functions in 99 % of the games, which map to up, down, left, right. Which the Xbox Dpad is fully capable of doing.

Nobody uses an analog stick for fighters.

 

[dilbag]

I love the xbox controller its amazing... but has one flaw the D-pad is pure trash compared to the ds4.

 

[thelastword]

360 S pad was a really good dpad, so yeah. But then again, you'd have to actually own Xbox products to have any idea what you're talking about.

Do I have to show you mine...…..I still have a S-PAD and a wired controller. I stopped using the wireless S-PAD because the battery unit I bought for it stopped taking charges, some folk said to put a pin or some work around, never bothered, I used my wired controller to tear limbs in NG2.....

It's always funny reading these retorts......because anybody who feels the XBOX DPAD is straight rectal excretions have no idea what they are talking about, they never played the awesomeness that is the XBOX DPAD right? It's similar to the guy who accused me of not playing Gears 5, said PC had no HDR, till I took him a few pics at 4K, with HDR on my PC.....He skipped the post/reply and still accused me of not playing Gears 5 on the same page......It never gets old...

Windows blades has nothing to do with desktop. Yeah they went after the touch market while forgetting their largest consumer base is desktop/not touch based.

Windows Blades are the 360 blades, first OS menu....Almost like you had several windows open in win 95/98/ME.....They ditched that for tiles later in the 360 cycle....

 

[xool]

The Xbox one Dpad is always seems less sensitive on the right side, and the Dpad contact sticker/patch is prone to breakdown (the metal contacts wear inwards, causing double clicks). It doesn’t use a standard rubber conductive membrane.

[...]

Are those miniature metal buckle switches (like R3 L3 but smaller) .. if so yuk

They're definately going to have a finite lifetime.. rubber with conductive rubber bottom on conductive pcb should last until the rubber degrades, and I've never seen that happen.

 

[thelastword]

Nobody uses an analog stick for fighters.

Not true, I use the analog to play.....So does Nuckle Du, who uses the analog to always have a charge...…..I play Gief I use the analog for 360 rotations...…..Besides, I know many people who use just the analog to play as well.....

Hell, people use the guitar hero guitar to play SF, I know several guys who use keyboards...….I'd use all these methods than subject myself to the 360 DPAD in a fighter tbh...

 

[Mato]

It's horrible. I don't understand how it got greenlit. It's amazing how bad it is especially when you consider that XB1 controller R&D allegedly cost around $100 million.

 

[The Alien]

The D-pad is not great....regardless, I'll give the best controller ever made a pass here.

 

[hunthunt]

I remember the 360 one, easily the worst I have used since some fucking awful bootleeg NES controllers in the early 90s.

Did they change it?

 

[Xaero Gravity]

I thought so too, until I used the Switch Joycons. Holy hell that thing is garbage. Makes the XB1 dpad feel like the Saturn dpad in comparison.

 

[Spukc]

i think my xbox one dpad became shitty after a couple of months..
i don't really even use it tbh.

 

[Bryank75]

Fighters should only be played on dpad. I really don't consider xbox viable for fighters... Between the terrible dpad and the slow press on the face buttons, it really doesn't work.

 

[Bonfires Down]

I have a similar problem with my PC. The XB1 d-pad is now really sloppy about registering right press. And the 360 controller d-pad is completely unreliable about getting the right direction. But can either of these be easily fixed then?

Or should I get a new controller? The PS4 Dual Shock d-pad seems nice but I’m not a huge fan of the rest of the layout. The Switch Pro controller looks good but I hear it also has some problems with the d-pad? Is there some third party controller of good enough quality to use? Or should I wait for the new Series X controller?

 

[Sussoloc]

Perfect Controller: Xbox One controller with DS4 D-Pad.

 

[Fake]

I don't have a Xbox One controler right now, but I have three Xbox 360 controler and they have the worst dpad by far.

 

[KOMANI]

Xbox having a bad dpad isn’t anything new. Nintendo having a bad dpad is more shocking. The gamecube and the switch joy cons have terrible “directional pads”.

 

[grfunkulus]

I hated the 360's dpad in all honesty, although I feel like it was the best controller at it's time. The xb1 controller dpad was "better", but still not the BEST. I used an arcade stick to negate that (I play a bunch of fighting games). But the elite 1 series had an amazing dpad, and elite series 2 is even better. But that's a fuck ton of money to spend on just a controller But still better than the ps3/ps4 controller IMO

Fusion A pro controller. Own Elite 1 and owned elite 2 for a while before returning it. The Fusion's is so much comfier and satisfying to use, amd is pretty accurate to boot

 

[cireza]

It's actually quite good. Easily my favorite d-pad between Xbox, Switch and PS4.

 

[-Troid-]

Personally cross style dpads are the best and most versatile type of dpads and work well for both side scrolling games and fighters. Maybe that's because I grew up playing Killer Instinct and Street Fighter on the SNES, but regardless of the company making the controller I've felt this way.

The Xbox One Dpad is actually good; I play most of my fighting games on it and have almost zero problems. The few issues I've ever had is that the dpad sometimes wears on my thumb after longer periods of play, and I've had two controllers have issues with the dpad breaking, one of which I fixed myself easily enough by replacing the plastic membrane under the dpad.

Last gen I couldn't stand either the 360 or PS3 dpads for fighters. The 360 was a disc type dpad (which works okay when its larger like the madcatz SF4 fightpads) but it was too small to be accurate enough to do quarter circle motions.

The PS3 dpad being segmented has always made it hard to do any quarter/full circle motions; I can just never get my thumb to satisfyingly slide across it for input consistency. I thought the PS4 pad would be better because it doesn't look segemented, but playing SF5 and MKX on it I've experienced similar problems. It still feels like the PS3 dpad in that I can't get the sliding motion to input how I want it to.

Last gen I had to get fightpads to make my execution consistent.

The X1 pad is good enough though I can get basically any motion in any fighting game off just fine and I really think it's because it a cross style. I still have one fightpad for both the X1 and PS4, but the regular X1 controller works fine for me.

Also before anyone says "get a stick" for fighters, I had several sticks for the 360, but really I only liked using them for charge characters in USF4. Motion characters I just rather use a pad.

 

[nkarafo]

Who uses the digipad in 2020? Even fighting games make heavy use of analog sticks. Dpad gets used for four functions in 99 % of the games, which map to up, down, left, right. Which the Xbox Dpad is fully capable of doing.

I'm playing Subnautica and that game used the Dpad heavily for inventory usage and changing tools.

 

[nkarafo]

If you pressed a specific direction with the dpad on 360, it would randomly input either the direction you intentionally selected, or it could pick 7 other directions to go. The 360 dpad could seriously be a great tool for selecting the lottery or used for bets, as it would be random EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. no person on street fighter 4 would be that ballsy to use the dpad. Even people playing non-charge fighters in sf4, would rely on the ANALOG stick, instead of the dpad to do forward, down, forward moves.

I get what you are saying but honestly, i never had this problem personally. It just happens that my 360 pads have their dpads pretty tightened and while it's easier to accidentally press up or down than a cross style dpad, it's not something that happens to me. The one pad i had with a more loosen dpad could cause this issue but tightening it it's a very easy fix anyone can do.

The Xbox one controller isn't even an easy thing to open up. Not only it has those security screws, it also has some plastics that need to be prawned out and that seems like something that can be broken.

 

[Celcius]

One reason why I vastly prefer the DualShock controllers myself

 

[Hendrick's]

Not even Nintendo has a good D-pad anymore.

 

[MilkyJoe]

I've never used oy to play a game... Hmm

 

[Thanati]

So all these years the Internet told me how the 360 controller's Dpad is shit. The thing is, whatever issues they have are very easily fixable. I have three 360 controllers and only one was a bit off so i fixed it and now i have 3 controllers with very comfortable and tight Dpads.

Then i got a XBOXone controller (btw, i use all these on a PC). The Internet told me this one has a better Dpad. But i can't see it. The issue with it's Dpad is that it's very tiny. And at the same time it requires more pressure than even a tightened 360 Dpad. As a result my thumb gets sore because the pressure is targeted at a very small area of the finger while the 360 Dpad can be pressed much easier without moving the thumb to find the good pressure point. Additionally, the right direction doesn't click as nicely as the other three and needs a tiny bit more pressure as well and it feels kinda sticky (guess it's an issue with mine). I would like to fix it but opening the controller is much more difficult than the 360 ones and requires a special screwdriver that i don't have right now so i have to deal with this until i get one.

Anyway, using this Dpad is pretty tiresome and i have to say it's one of the worst i ever used, excluding crappy Chinese controllers that don't really count. Everything else is incredible, it has the best analog sticks and shoulder buttons i ever used. But the Dpad is literally painful.

Am i the only one thinking this? I started using my old 360 pads again and using those, so called "crappy" Dpads gave me a relief...

100% agree. It’s awful.