Hori Fighting Commander OCTA Review The EVO-Winning Fightpad

Chikurin won EVO Japan 2024 Tekken 8 playing Lili on this exact controller — the wired Hori Fighting Commander OCTA, PS4/PS5/PC variant. That is not a sponsored talking point. That is what the pad on the tournament floor was.

PhiDX's post-EVO analysis argued that Lili's specific movement toolkit is faster on pad than on a Japanese Sanwa lever, and Chikurin's decision to switch from arcade stick to the OCTA was character-specific optimization. But the fact remains: a Tekken 8 world-class competitor won a major on a $60 fightpad in 2024, and no other $60 controller in 2026 has that footnote.

The short-throw octagonal-gate left stick is why. On a standard convex-gate stick, quarter-circle-forward motions require your thumb to feel out an arc. On an octagonal gate, the stick physically clicks into each of the eight compass directions — the geometry does the input for you. For 360 motion inputs (Zangief's SPD, Rufus's Messiah Kick, King's Muscle Buster), it's a physical shortcut. This is why Hori called it "OCTA" — the octagonal gate is the feature.

Combine that with the 6-button arcade face layout (two rows of three, matching a Sanwa cabinet) and you have a genuinely competitive fighting-game input surface. This is not a pretender.

The OCTA's D-pad is membrane-based, and it misses diagonals. Not sometimes — reliably, in strict-input games.

A Best Buy customer reviewer, who plays fighting games seriously and works with kids at a group home, called out that even the kids at his facility noticed the D-pad missed most diagonals. The Amazon Spain reviewer was blunter: "The D-Pad YET AGAIN is an absolute mess. The diagonals are NOT registered properly, there is no amount of software update that is gonna fix this. It is a physical D-Pad issue." A GameRant piece on the successor OCTA Pro said the base OCTA's D-pad "is its biggest downside" — "undeniably accurate" when it registers but "uncomfortable and sometimes misses diagonal inputs."

The Hori Device Manager companion app lets you adjust D-pad sensitivity. This helps for less strict games — the same Best Buy reviewer noted Street Fighter 6 is more forgiving than Tekken 8 and the D-pad works acceptably there. But for Tekken specifically, or any game where a missed down-forward-punch input costs you a launcher, the D-pad is the wrong tool.

This is why Hori released the Wireless OCTA Pro in 2025 with swappable D-pad modules. The membrane D-pad on the base OCTA is the primary reason to consider the Pro variant if it fits your budget.

Now the parts of this pad that are legitimately excellent.

The short-throw analog stick with octagonal gate is the reason competitive players tolerate the rest of the controller. Its throw distance is noticeably shorter than a DualSense or Xbox pad — you get to the extremes faster, which matters in fighting games where every frame counts. The octagonal gate provides tactile confirmation of each compass direction. Quarter-circle-forward, half-circle-back, dragon-punch motions all feel more mechanical than they do on a standard convex gate. If you've never played on an octagonal-gate stick, the difference is immediately apparent.

The six microswitch face buttons deliver a satisfying tactile click and low actuation force. Hori markets them as "highly durable and responsive" — reviewers largely agree, though the buttons are slightly larger than DualSense face buttons, which takes a few hours to adjust to. The 6-button layout means light punch, medium punch, heavy punch on the top row and light kick, medium kick, heavy kick on the bottom row — the standard Street Fighter and Tekken punch/kick assignment.

The right analog is not a full stick. It's a small slide-pad meant for menu navigation and in-game lobby movement. You cannot use it for gameplay. This is fine for fighting games (where you don't use the right stick anyway) but if you were hoping for a dual-analog controller for other genres, this is not the pad.

The OCTA is light — around 210g compared to the DualSense's ~280g — and the plastic feels correspondingly lower-density. Multiple reviewers have called out that the button silkscreening wears off with heavy use, the shoulder buttons need careful handling, and the overall build "feels cheap" (Amazon Spain).

The cable is a 9.8ft/3m detachable cable, which is generous. But the connector is a mini-USB or micro-USB style (varies by production run) — not USB-C. This is a real downside in 2026 when every other controller uses USB-C. Losing or damaging the cable requires buying a replacement Hori cable specifically, not just any USB-C cable you have around.

The controller ships without a carrying case. This is a $60 controller, not a $170 controller, and Hori did not include the packaging premium that Elite Series 2 or DualSense Edge buyers get. Fair for the price, but worth naming.

The non-standard L3/R3 button placement (on the left shoulder rather than clickable sticks) is a design choice that some Best Buy customer reviewers dislike because it cannot be reverted through Hori Device Manager. If you rely on stick-click inputs, this can be a real workflow disruption. If you don't, it's a non-issue.

Hori Device Manager (Windows 10/11 only) is the OCTA's customization surface. Through it you can remap any button, adjust D-pad sensitivity across three levels, disable the analog stick entirely (tournament lock), disable the shoulder buttons entirely (tournament lock), toggle turbo, and configure profiles.

The tournament lock features are legitimately useful. Fighting-game tournament rules typically require you to disable any input surface not being used for gameplay to prevent accidental pauses or menu inputs during a match. The OCTA's software-based lock is cleaner than physical switches on some competing fightpads.

One Amazon Spain reviewer flagged that the app has a controller-mode-switching bug — the controller registers as a 360 controller by default but as a native PC pad when Hori Device Manager is open. When you tab out of Device Manager, the controller reconnects as a 360 controller and the settings changes don't take effect until you restart it. This is annoying but workable. Save your profiles, plug into the console you're playing on, and don't rely on live-editing during a session.

Device Manager is not available on macOS, Linux, or Xbox. If you're not on Windows, you use the OCTA with its default settings.

Hori released the Wireless Fighting Commander OCTA Pro in early 2025 for approximately $99-109. It addresses the base OCTA's biggest weaknesses: wireless connectivity, swappable D-pad modules (so you can replace the membrane pad with a mechanical alternative), full mechanical face buttons, and a real right analog stick for lobby navigation.

Tom's Guide's OCTA Pro review specifically called out that the wireless mode introduces no perceptible input lag in dozens of hours of Tekken 8 and Virtua Fighter 5 R.E.V.O. play — a legitimately impressive result for a wireless fightpad. The Pro also adds a cable-lock to prevent accidental disconnects during wired tournament play.

At $100+, the OCTA Pro is arguably the better long-term buy than the base OCTA at $60. But the base OCTA is what Chikurin won EVO Japan with. If you want the exact tournament-winning hardware, that is this pad, not the Pro. If you want the best fighting-game experience Hori currently makes, wait for the OCTA Pro to hit a sale and buy that.

The fightpad market in 2026 has narrowed considerably since PDP discontinued the original Fightpad-only design. Real alternatives at or near this price:

Victrix Pro BFG Reloaded ($169.99 with the Kailh microswitch Fightpad module): the premium fightpad. Modular, Hall-effect sticks, full mechanical face buttons on the swappable Fightpad module. Three times the price of the OCTA and worth it if you're committed to fighting games long-term. See our Victrix Pro BFG review for the full breakdown.

8BitDo Arcade Stick ($99.99): traditional Sanwa-lever arcade stick for players who want a real stick rather than a pad. Different input paradigm entirely — better for players who came up on arcades, worse for players (like Chikurin) who prefer pad geometry.

Qanba Obsidian 2 (~$300): tournament-tier arcade stick. Premium price for premium hardware. Overkill for anyone not already committed to the arcade-stick paradigm.

Hori Wireless Fighting Commander OCTA Pro ($109-129): the direct successor with the fixes the base OCTA needed. If your budget can stretch and you can wait for a sale, this is the better long-term buy.

DualSense (~$74.99 refurbished): if your D-pad experience with the OCTA is unacceptable, the DualSense's D-pad is legitimately excellent for fighting games. You lose the 6-button layout and octagonal gate, but you gain a competent D-pad.

Three and three-quarters stars. The Hori Fighting Commander OCTA is a $60 wired fightpad with tournament-winning DNA and a category-defining membrane D-pad problem. If you play Street Fighter 6, King of Fighters, or Guilty Gear where diagonal precision is less punishing, the OCTA is an excellent starter or backup pad. If you play Tekken 8 seriously — the game Chikurin won EVO Japan with using this exact pad — the D-pad limitation might paradoxically be a reason to look at the Wireless OCTA Pro instead, because the base OCTA's membrane pad is not what a tournament-winning Tekken player uses.

Buy the base OCTA as a starter fightpad, a stopgap while the Wireless OCTA Pro drops in price, or specifically for the octagonal-gate stick and 6-button layout combination that is otherwise only available at three-times the price on the Victrix Pro BFG. Do not buy it expecting DualSense-level construction quality — this is a $60 pad and it feels like one.

If you play fighting games competitively and can stretch to $100-170, either the Wireless OCTA Pro or the Victrix Pro BFG Reloaded is the better answer. If $60 is the budget, the OCTA is the tournament-proven answer.