Old Skool N64 Optical Replacement Joystick Sharpshooter

Like many others my OEM N64 stick reached a point of no return, with the innards worn out & the accuracy & tight feel of the controls gone. The N64 analog stick has a great design for its time, but fails in the long run with every part being made of plastic that grinds itself away . This innards of this new stick aren't an exact 1:1 replication so you wont be able to use parts from it to replace anything in your original stick or vice versa, however they did successfully manage to recreate the feel & accuracy of a brand new stick. In my testing, there was the most minor of dead zones (if any at all, its been over 20 years since I used a brand new N64 controller), all degrees of movement from the original are accounted for in even the smallest of movements, & the stick snaps back to center nice & tight. The only real caveat is that while they were able to replicate the original stick so well they also replicated its one fatal flaw. All parts including (and especially) the inner "bowl" that the bottom of the stick sits in are made of plastic & it still will suffer from the plastic of the stick grinding away at the plastic of the "bowl" it sits in, this isn't the end of the world though. If you search through Youtube on how to refurbish & repair N64 sticks, the most common step to a more long term solution is to lubricate the inner "bowl". Those Youtube videos HIGHLY RECOMMEND disassembling the analog stick & use silicone/PTFE grease to at least lubricate the bowl & the bottom of the stick, whether or not to lubricate all plastic on plastic contact points seems to be a mixed opinion but lubricating the bowl is essential to its long term life. I disassembled mine & did notice a residue in the bowl, perhaps the manufacturer lubricates it, however I took no chances & greased it up, hopefully this will help it last much longer. In conclusion I definitely recommend this as long as you take that critical step in lubricating the bowl, if not this will likely last you as long as an original stick & you'll have to replace it sooner than later. There are many good videos on Youtube of how to do this & a simple 3oz tube of slicone grease costs less than $5 so there's no reason not to take this simple step.

I love this stick. It is the closest thing to an authentic feel that is available. Sadly, to get that authentic feel it still uses the plastic parts with potentiometers for readings. It wears out just like the original stick. Open up your stick and apply some lube for more longevity.

Everything seemed to work well while using the Sharpshooter. However, two things I did notice. First, the stick travel was not as smooth as an original unit. This wasn’t bad, it just felt a tiny bit gritty. Something that I could forget about once into a game. The second item was a small waggle area (a few millimeters) in the stick’s center area. The original did have a small bit of waggle area but it did seem like it was a smidge less than the Sharpshooter. So far, I have put a few hours on my Sharpshooter stick and I’ve been pretty happy with it. I was glad I could save my old controller while keeping the classic feel. I’ve bought aftermarket N64 controllers and although they get the job done most feel light/cheap in the plastic they use for the housing and buttons. Doing something like replacing the thumb stick adds new life to your old but otherwise fine N64 controller.

Let's start with with the sharpshooter isn't. It isn't the best-feeling or best-built or most modern N64 stick replacement. It does not improve on the design or action of the original N64 stick in any way. It's actually a little worse than the OEM stick for build quality, with a slightly grittier feel, looser tolerances, and lighter plastic. You can fix some of this if you want to open up the unit and very finely resurface and lubricate the parts inside. It's not necessary but you can and it does help. So why is this the best N64 stick replacement available? It all comes down to the stick gate and sensitivity. Of all the N64 controller and stick replacements I've tried, this is the only one that replicates these properties of the OEM stick. Take a look at the image attached to this review for some testing data. I've also confirmed this empirically by playing some of my favorite N64 games with very finicky stick inputs. Mario 64 feels just like it should, and I was actually able to tackle the Master difficulty in F-Zero X for the first time on a non-OEM controller, without constantly losing grip or flying off the track. The data from the test app shows it's a tiny bit off but it feels just right to me. This stick replacement isn't perfect, but it's the best you can get right now, and it nails all the fundamentals.

Easy to replace and works great!

You can feel a internal bur when you move the stick. It is enough that it makes clicking sounds when you move it up and down. Other than that i was satisfied but if the stick feels bad then it doesn’t mater. It wasn’t worth sending back. Hopefully mine isn't a representation of what everyone else is getting. :(

I bought two of these to replace GameCube style sticks I had in my original N64 controllers. They're a 1 to 1 recreation of the original optical style sticks. This includes the plastic bowl and stick design. These come with a thin layer of oil in the bowl from the factory but it's not enough to keep the sticks from feeling grainy. I disassembled the stick modules and cleaned the bowls with a q tip and alcohol, I then re-greased the bowls with silicone SuperLube and reassembled everything. This eliminated the grainy feeling and the sticks are now perfect for games like Goldeneye and Quake II where stick sensitivity and deadzone are important. I'm rating 4/5 because I had to disassemble and grease them, if you're not comfortable doing that then I wouldn't recommend these sticks. However if you're willing to go through the effort, these are almost as good as OEM sticks.

I got two, played a while and tested with that soft you can use over a flashcart, the results were a rubbery, squeaky feel, with poor results on the accuracy tests for one of them. The bad one was off from the start (Y -18) apparently because it was assembled in haste and the parts inside poorly aligned. After applying white lithium grease on all friction parts inside the squeaky rubber feel was mostly gone, and careful reassembly fixed the center and accuracy test. However a little issue remains at the top-right corner where the stick seems to bump on something and that's a bit in the way of smooth movement there, no huge deal but still a bit annoying. CONCLUSION: not good out of the box, probably not very durable overall, it requires white lithium grease and careful reassembly to become useable, but once that done the feel is acceptable, the sensitivity and accuracy good-enough so that you can actually play most games.

Works great feel like the original. Is the one to use to repair those old remote.

me encanto fácil de instalar excelente producto y buen precio

Unsure if something else with my controller is faulty, but it worked very well until it started drifting again. The game also didn't recognize the controller when it was plugged in, and had to remove and plug it in multiple times until it did.