Custom Saturn Fight Stick to Be Auctioned for Charity

A custom Saturn-themed fight stick is up for auction, and the proceeds are going to a good cause.

Sporting a white Saturn shape and decals with beloved Japanese Sega mascot character Segata Sanshiro on it, the fight stick’s auction begins today and runs until July 22.

The fight stick had been created to be an award to the top vote-getter in the SegaXtreme Sega Saturn 29th Anniversary Game Competition’s category for hacks, patches and translations.

But the winners of that category, the Stellar Assault SS localization team — which includes this reporter — declined all prizes to protect themselves from any potential legal action by Sega, not to mention because of the difficulty in splitting up prizes among 14 team members.

So competition organizer EmeraldNova came up with a solution: Put the fight stick on eBay and donate the proceeds.

Those proceeds will go to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, which was chosen by fight stick creator Haruman.

Haruman runs Haruman Customs, a U.S.-based business that creates unique bartop arcade kits and controller enclosures.

“I picked St. Jude because they help kids, especially kids with cancer, and I’ve donated to them in the past,” Haruman said.

The fight stick’s innards contain a modified Saturn pad’s circuit board harvested from a nonworking original controller donated by Saturn software and hardware retailer CronoLe. It’s been connected to Crown/Samducksa arcade buttons and a Sanwa joystick.

Haruman said creating the fight stick was a lot of fun. “Years ago, before I started my bartop and fight stick kit business, I used to hack controllers for people,” he said. “I started with Dreamcast controllers, Xbox, PS2, etc.”

Haruman doesn’t hack controllers much these days, since other companies specialize in fight stick boards now.

“That’s why I jumped on the chance to create this stick for the contest,” he said. “I was able to combine my old controller hacking skills with my fight stick kit that I currently create.”

The prize was arranged by Haruman’s friend and a previous SegaXtreme game competition winner, Malenko. Malenko designed the stick’s artwork, too.

EmeraldNova said he feels a little embarrassed about the prize being reallocated from its original intended purpose. “But I’m happy with how the contest turned out and I’m hoping the auction becomes something of an exciting conclusion to the contest,” he said.

Lacquerware, who led the Stellar Assault SS patch team as its translator and voice director, said he’s excited about the charity auction.

“Huge thanks to EmeraldNova, Haruman and everyone else who was involved in this contest and its outcome,” Lacquerware said. “I can’t think of a better charity to donate to.”