Best Flight Stick Setup EVER? - VIRPIL Constellation Alpha PRIME

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0:00 Virpil Constellation Alpha Prime
1:35 The Grip
3:23 The Base
4:25 Desk Mount Small
5:56 Customizing The Base
7:13 The Z-Extension
7:45 The Software
8:51 Gaming With Virpil
12:37 Virpils Support
13:29 Conclusion

[@88Spint]

base is made of aluminum, which is a little soft, so be careful when screwing and unscrewing the screws that hold it together. I broke one of the holes in the first week, by trying to force it in when it was slightly miss aligned.

[@sasairsoftde]

Ich hatte vor kurzem den Fehler gemacht mir den Schubregler zu kaufen. Der war so gut, dass ich Stick und Pedale auch ASAP benötigte. Allein der Gedanke das Virpil Equipment zu benutzen... und dann das Gefühl wenn du es wirklich gerade benutzt 🤤 Einfach nur geil das Virpil Zeug. Kann man aus meiner Sicht vergleichen mit einem Wechsel aus einem normalen Alltagsauto in einen richtigen Sportwagen. Es ist so präzise und fühlt sich einfach nur gut an. Mit dem Virpil Link Tool kannst du die RGB Farben am Stick auch im Spiel wechseln lassen, in Abhängigkeit bestimmter Gegebenheiten bzw. Regeln. Leider wird X4, soweit ich weiß, noch nicht vom Link Tool unterstützt.

[@88Spint]

Pro: Buttons all over. 3 four way hats, with a click, on each stick makes for great shortcuts. Some out of the way buttons are great for options menus and tasks that you do rarely or don't want to randomly press. Highly accurate and configurable. want a dead stick for helicopters? You can do that! Want a replacement for the throttle that dont go back to center? You can do that! All hats come off, thank god, for after market replacements if needed. Cons: Thumbstick placement is awkward unless you grip the stick really high and not easy to be accurate with. The hats are not the best, I recommend after market parts. Pinky switch is hard to reach for medium to small hands, as is the leaver switch which is a little short. It's a big chonky, making it a little hard to move the stick away from you if the thumb is not gripping the stick, as in if you are using the buttons. And finally: This is a high preforming stick, not plug and play. You NEED to fiddle with it and understand how it's made and how it functions as well as how the software functions in order to make it preform as you need it to. You also need practice, especially if it is your first stick! The button layout is not very intuitive and it is rather thick for medium to small hand sizes so you will need to move the wrist rest to fit your hand and holding position/style. Everything takes time so don't expect to take it out of the box and rip through the sky the same day. You also need to figure out the control scheme as that is NOT obvious. It's all personal preference but since you kinda need the same setup in all games you just have to try and try and try again. If you don't have pedals you will struggle with up/down or thrust forward/back on your left stick. Roll or Yaw on your right stick, and what to do with all the buttons you now have available. Things to try on two sticks: WASD on left stick, with levers on both sticks for going up and down. Pitch and yaw with roll on twist vs pitch and roll with yaw on twist on right stick. Also test if roll on levers, right stick or left stick feels better for you. Personally I am struggling with the control scheme. I like having Pitch and Yaw on the right stick with no twist as the twist was something I kept doing unintentionally on both sticks. I like the idea of left stick for up down left right motions but then what do I do for thrust. Having seen people use pedals for that I kind of like the idea of trying that. But I also want roll... So roll on levers or twist. But roll on feet also makes sense in my mind, but then I need up and down on levers which does not make any sense at all. And on top of it all airplanes and helicopters normally have Yaw on pedals!? My head..... what's a poor variety gamer to do about all this!? Just more stuff to test until I find something that works for everything to me.

[@88Spint]

Oh one final con, each button is labled as 1-32 rather then anything logical like: Trigger S1, Trigger S2, Hat A1-4, Hat B1-4, Scrollwheel up, Lever... etc. Makes it really hard to understand the UI prompts in games. Really wish I could just rename them but I don't think that's possible.

[@jcataclisma]

Actually, I had never thought about "a second joystick" previous to Captain's gameplays. Now I am on my way to the "Two-sticks" configuration to play both Arma 3 and X4 as well. Awesome tips, and thank you for the great review! If I currently had the means, you would have surely made me buy them!

[@CaptainCollins]

That sounds great! Yeah, I guess we all know that the means are limited for gear like that :)

[@reggie368]

Buttons everywhere ! Yay ! 😆 Cheers Captain ! 😃

[@CaptainCollins]

Pressing all the buttons for Reggie 🤗

[@reggie368]

@@CaptainCollins Yay ! 😆😆😆

[@NeoTechni]

I laughed at the Sherpa joke

[@CaptainCollins]

Glad you liked the little "loosening-up" :)

[@magicwordxyzzy]

I love how you use a left stick with a Z-angle adapter instead of a traditional throttle; seems like it would be far more compatible for most games these days. Holy Christ am I ever in the wrong economic class for that setup though!

[@CaptainCollins]

some people save up for vacations, why not save up for something like this. You don't need to rush it, take two years to reach it, it's 50 bucks a month. And yeah, angled stick is my way now for almost all games.

[@ArthurOseven]

Well made video Capitan. The sticks look awesome O7

[@CaptainCollins]

Thank you!

[@XxKidnoffxX]

Look very good. But if I take the dual stick bundle to play space games like you did here, can I buy the throttle too and just plug it instead of the L stick to play Flight simulator? And how you throttle with 2 stick?

[@CaptainCollins]

Yes, you can add as many components as you wish to your setup. You can even connect the throttle to the stick and only have one outgoing usb connection. You can also use all three and additional control panels :) With two sticks, you use one as throttle (I use the left, like in the video). It's more agile than a standard throttle.

[@XxKidnoffxX]

@@CaptainCollins wow thats cool, thank you

[@leroymay8156]

Sehr schöne Joysticks. Mich würden Details von Stick zur Base interessieren (der mini DIN Stecker). Ich kenne diese als äußerst fragil, wie ist das da ausgeführt, so dass es sogar drehbar ist? Ggf. kannst du das Ja in das nächste Video aufnehmen. Was mir nicht so gut gefällt, sind die Öffnungen zum Einstellen auf der Oberseite der Base. durch diese Öffnungen wird über die Zeit eine Menge Staub und Dreck seinen Weg in die Mechanik finden. Ich würde die wohl passend ausbohren, ein Gewinde hinein schneiden und eine kurze Zylinderschraube hinein schrauben, um die Öffnung abzuschließen. Was mich aber wirklich positiv stimmt ist bei 06:08 die Demontage der Anschlussplatine. Die ist gesteckt, über eine Pinleiste. Das iost richtig gut, wenn da Reparaturen oder ähnliches notwendig werden sollten. Daran allein erkennt man bereits die Qualität der Sticks! :) Beim RGB bin ich zwiegespalten, aber das kann man ja ausschalten. Wobei es natürlich mega geil wäre, wenn die Sticks automatisch die Farbe Cockpits (Reisemodus/Scanmodus) aus X4 übernehmen könnten. PS: Ich würde die den Gladiator abnehmen, wenn du ihn nicht mehr brauchst. :)

[@CaptainCollins]

Ohja, der Punkt mit den Öffnungen ist wirklich wichtig. Vielleicht sollte da Virpil auch Gummistopfen anbieten. Ich hau die mal an deswegen. Die Kabelverbindung ist an sich stabil, die hat einen Einrast-Mechanismus, aber das kann ich sicher mit aufnehmen.

[@talaes3603]

Man this looks amazing but WAY too pricey, Could you recommend any other setups?

[@CaptainCollins]

Yep, easy. Take a look at the VKB Gladiator NXT EVO. A third of the price, but still very usable and a great upgrade.

[@talaes3603]

@@CaptainCollins Cool, thanks they look good, i set a notification when they are back in stock.

[@arthasmenethil4399]

I want a flight stick :) Also: Algorithms

[@CaptainCollins]

Haha, it got you!

[@tomtato0815]

Hab selbst gerade meine beiden WarBrdD mit den normalen Costellation alpha grips und links die z Extension. Sind echt nice,... Werde mich demnächst mal in die Software stürzen

[@CaptainCollins]

Das kann übel enden, mit fast so viel "Spielzeit" wie X4 :D

[@Bennet2391]

This is surely an impressive setup, but i wonder if the software is compatible with linux, since X4 workes natively with linux. Special gaming hardware configuration software is usually incompatible, which would make the setup unusable. Also: Wouldn't it be great if the analog stick was replaced by a trackball, so you don't need to take your hand off the stick for map stuff.

[@CaptainCollins]

Okay, so... as far as I could see: you set up your sticks on windows (through vm ware or native) once and you save the settings. Those settings will be saved on the sticks themselves and you can just plug them in on Linux. There's this: "It should show up as /dev/input/js0 as soon as you plug it in. " (reddit) and this: "I just installed the packages sdl-jstest and sdl2-jstest from the AUR and I tested my joystick with those two utilities, the buttons and the axes behaves correctly." (github). Maybe that helps a bit.

[@Honey4YourBrain]

Can you release your mappings for x4?

[@CaptainCollins]

I work with Egosoft for new default mappings in X4, should be part of the currently running Beta :)

[@BauN3RD]

Why can't you refer to the other stick you were using if this video is not sponsored?

[@CaptainCollins]

Lawsuit I don't want to interfere

[@laserak9887]

I mean it's good, but not $1200+ good...no way

[@CaptainCollins]

Some people say it is. But I can understand that, my budget would never allow that. But if you can choose between one week vacation or having those sticks for at least a decade... Well 😅

[@aloowakp]

You have to bear in mind this is fairly niche low volume product, majority of the parts are metal and very high quality, plus the guys wanna make nice profit from it after putting so much time into r&d. There are cheaper good quality alternatives, like winwing etc, but if one can afford it virpil is the best. I moved from tm hotas to the set that captain uses and it's a night and day, maybe not 10x better (as the pricetag would suggest), but min 5x better :)

[@mijati260]

they send u the package for free ? a 9000 bucks package for free ? bro sticks for 10.000 ... wtf ... witch normal player can afford them ?

[@CaptainCollins]

It's 1200 for the sticks with mounts. There are cheaper options, you can get the HOTAS setup for less than 1000. I know it's still much, but not as crazy as you paint it.

[@mijati260]

@@CaptainCollinsok