Ikea Arcade Stick - Mini Edition Part 4

Continued from Part 3.

The greatest thing about this mini stick is that the art layers are a perfect A4 piece of paper! I chucked some photo paper in my home printer, and was able to bang this out in minutes.

A hobby knife made short work of the holes, and while it didn't leave a perfectly smooth edge, the buttons will easily cover that up.

I'm not good at photoshop at all, this was a frame i grabbed out of a gif of the Pokemon cartoon. :p

Because this stick uses a frame on both sides, i also get to have two arts! The bottom frame has a glass layer in it still, so it's more scratch resistant than the styrene in the top. For table grip and to prevent the frame from scratching wooden table tops, i also applied some little sillicone feet, like those pads you put in kitchen cupboards to stop them slamming.

And we're done! The frames are held on tightly by using the supplied spring-steel clips. Getting access to the inside of the stick is as simple as popping the clips off. It couldn't be easier!

While the USB cable doesn't disconnect like on fancy custom sticks, but it does store neatly between the frames when not in use.

You can also see the system buttons down the side. The indent prevents you from accidentally pausing the game mid-match.

So there you have it; an easy to build, cheap stick with smart features and a quality aesthetic. This thing hangs with the best retail sticks in terms of finish, and is unbelievably durable (if you drop it you can easily replace the impact-absorbing frames). For any money it's a good stick, but dollar-for-dollar it's unbeatable!