http://www.amazon.com/CH-Products-Combatstick-Programmable-Functions/dp/B00006B84W/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1335144760&sr=8-1

Seeing as how I have the Wing Commander games and plan on buying Hind and Apache as well, I figured I should invest in a joystick.
Any thoughts? Did I make a good choice or am I screwed?

Good choice. CH Products still has some of the best sticks around (it's not like they have that many anyway). It should work just fine for those games. I have their more simple Flightstick with which I've had a good time myself playing Privateer, Descent, Freespace...

Ive never tried anything from CH, let me know how fluid the movement is on the X, Y, axis.. im most concerned with hitches... logitech and saiteks all have a part where they "catch" and kinda get tripped up which can end a dogfight or crash your bird very quickly...

Oh yeah, I remember you from my other joystick thread. :)
I thought of going with your Flightstick suggestion, but then I found a good picture of that thing and saw that the head of that stick was pretty wide compared to the others with the buttons spread out. How on earth do you reach those buttons without breaking your thumbs? Uh, i'll try and let you know, though i'm probably not the best person as this will actually be my very first PC joystick.

The head may look awfully big at first glance, but it's not much more than a visual deception of sorts. It's actually one of the most comfortable sticks I've had. I have absolutely no problem reaching any of the buttons or the hatswitch with my thumb, and I have fairly small hands for a guy. The trigger button is also easily reachable.

In any case, I hope you'll have a lot of fun with your new toy. ;)

Indeed I will, though i'll have to beat the XBOX 360 version of The Witcher 2 first. ;)

It is indeed one of the higher-end joysticks.

Well, if you're looking for stick twist, it doesn't have that as far as I know.

Yeah, I've just seen the combined total of the throttle and foot pedal with the stick and I heard my wallet let out a little cry. Wishted atm, but will most likely pick up one of the Thrustmaster or Saitek budget HOTAS sticks. Ah k, thanks. Was wondering about that as well.

I've been wanting to buy myself an Extreme 3d pro for a while now, but it really feels like a luxury and I always end up using the money for other things. The cheapest I've found it is at $29 but what nags me the most is that the games I'm going to play with it are actually cheaper than the joystick... I've got both freespaces and maybe a bunch of racing games I could play with a joystick but none of them cost over $10. It makes it seem like any savings I made buying the games are lost buying the joystick to play them.

Good thing you already made your order, there's only one left in stock.

Can't go wrong there, CH is one of the best, although their joysticks haven't changed a lot since the nineties and are a bit pricey if you ask me.

The only thing you have to take care of as with all peripherals that use potentiometers is that they become internally dirty and the joystick input becomes jittery. You can clean the potentiometers with contactspray or videoheadcleaner.

Is it the Logitech Extreme 3D Pro?
I myself have the Force 3D Pro and to be honest I think it is a piece of crap, maybe the Extreme is better but don't buy the Force 3D Pro.
My Force 3D Pro has an enormous loose area in which there is no force or springloading so I have to increase the deadzone to 50%!!! so I don't start to drift all over the place and on top of that the forcefeedback completely sucks, it's hardly noticable and if you release the joystick it is still vibrating and doing things which is rather annoying and I have to unplug the powercord to make it stop. Too bad, I still have a original Microsoft Sidewinder Forcefeedback Pro, but it has gameport, no usb.

By the way, I noticed Logitech removed the Force 3D Pro from their catalog, so perhaps they saw the thing sucked as well.

with WHAT? :-D

The MS Sidewinder Precision 2 still serves me well, albeit it feels a bit odd to use such a big flightstick with a laptop.

http://rahulchand.blogspot.com/2010/05/microsoft-sidewinder-2-precision.html

I kinda liked the original MS Sidewinder 3D Pro better, it was smaller in size and simpler in design than Precision sticks. But I didn't have the USB version, so...

http://www.sunstorm.com/ceo/reviews/3dpro.htm

For space combat games, I'd definitely get a flightstick with a twisting stick. I'm unsure if those big bulky CH flightsticks have such feature, because it would be "unrealistic" (as if any of the PC flightsticks really are necessarily realistic, with their wide movements and such).

I still think a PS2 style gamepad would probably work quite well for old PC space combat games, as long as you were able to map the most often used keys to gamepad buttons. Which you probably don't, with all the communication keys and choices etc.

Now you mention it, I don't think that CH joystick has sticktwist, so you have to buy a rudderpedal set for that.

But I do not share your oppinion for using a gamepad, for several reasons. Lack of an axis that is not springloaded so you can't use a throttle, I know of a gamepad that has a thottle of sorts but still. Lack of buttons, everything can only be controlled by 4 thumb buttons and 2/4 indexfinger buttons and with the plethora of targeting options in Tie-Fighter or Freespace for example means your constantly reaching out for the keyboard and then I haven't even mentioned the energy management or view control keys. Lack of precision, well for a spaceflightsim a gamepad will do, but don't try to play an oldschool fps with a gamepad. That it is possible on a console is because they calculate a huge deal of autoaim/damage spread which makes it possible to play those games on a console with a gamepad.
It's some sort of alcohol