Peripherals maker Mad Catz has been bagged up and tossed in the river of bureaucracy like a litter of new-born kittens: the struggling company has filed for bankruptcy and all of its directors have resigned. The firm's been in dire financial trouble for a while after it threw all of its eggs in the Rock Band 4 basket – it's no wonder they've been scrambled really.
At the time of typing, the organisation's assets are being liquidated. "The board of directors and management would like to acknowledge the outstanding efforts of the company's employees in support of its business, especially during the time that the company faced financial difficulties," it wrote in a statement.
Y'know this author remembers snagging a Mad Catz controller for his Dreamcast some 18 or so years ago. It was nowhere near as good as the official peripheral – which itself had buttons sharp enough to cause blisters – but it was made of translucent purple plastic and had rubber grips. It's a shame to see the firm end like this, but… Rock Band 4 – of all the games to bet a business on.
[source eurogamer.net]
Comments 17
I remember friends of mine buying PS controllers and memory cards by them and they were a joke. Controlls broke with ease and data on their memory cards would just disappear off of them at random.
I think it was due to Mad Catz that alot of people are weary with third party accessories.
@Tasuki Agree with you on the third-party accessories thing. My understanding, though, is that a lot of their more contemporary products — like arcade sticks — were of a much higher quality and they were starting to repair their reputation.
Then they poured every resource they had into Rock Band 4 and the game flopped hard. Whoops.
They were always the crap controllers you gave to your friend when they came over. This honestly makes me sad as they were a part of my childhood. RIP Mad Catz.
Mad Catz obviously had quite an impact on the fighting game community - it sponsored many of the scene's best players for years upon years. Bit of a shame really.
@ShogunRok Yeah, this is too sad, they really did seem to get their act together in later years
Mad Catz (And Pelican, too) Were terrible in the Xbox/PS2 years, but they seemed to pull a lot together. Glad to see at least PDP (Pelican) still goin' with good products now.
Recently, I was getting this company confused with Hori.
Mad Catz was the one that made the BAD, terrible GameCube controllers!
Damn, those things sucked so bad!
Pretty much broke as soon as they came out of the package.
I used to bring my GameCube ofpver to all my friends' houses and I'd leave my offial GCN controller home and only bring out these pieces of crap...
My friends had plenty of Mad Catz controllers, and I really felt sorry for them. Mad Catz were only really good for fightsticks. Wonder who Daigo will play for now?
I think Rock Band 4 is pretty good! It's probably in my top 3-5 most played games.
I had a wireless controller for the PS2 made by Mad Catz. It was crap. Sometimes it wouldn't work and it eventually just stopped working all together. I pretty much stayed away from this company after that. I heard they made some decent arcade sticks for fighting games though. Still sad to see a company go, hopefully the employees can find something out there for them.
I had a mad catz gamecube memory card, as soon as I turned off my gamecube it lost my saves, I left super mario sunshine on for a month.
@Gold_Ranger Oh man, I had forgotten how bad their controllers were for GC. The top buttons had those springs that felt like sponges.
"Rock Band 4 – of all the games to bet a business on."
Yeah that's crazy. We're they the only people that couldn't see the Rock Band/Guitar Hero fad was over? Guess they were.
The capcom madcatz tournament fightstick was the only decent thing they ever made.
I was lucky enough not to own anything they made but if they were really as bad as everyone is saying I'm surprised they lasted as long as they have.But betting on Rockband was pretty much suicidal.
I had two of their peripherals in the PS1 days - a steering wheel and a controller.
I speak only for myself of course, but given my personal experiences, I'm surprised they lasted this long.
I used to swear by Saitek PC gear, back when they were affiliated with Mad Catz. They made some pretty good keyboards and side keyboards! I personally didn't like the feel of the RB4 guitar though.
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