Can play with keyboard or is a controller required? Suggested controllers?

[morale-boosta]

I've played Street Fighter/MUGEN games with a keyboard just fine, but I don't know if anyone can play this game competitively with a keyboard. If it's unlikely, what controller(s) do you suggest?

[BenJ]

You can actually decently play with a keyboard, it's just near impossible to do with a grabbler.
As for controller suggestion, to be honest i'm still playing with the xbox 360 one, and after a hundred of hours i barely improved with it, i find it pretty hard, not being used to play with a pad.

Lot of people are saying a Playstation controller is better beucase of the d-pad, or one of those old fightpads from Mad Catz, but its getting rare so even more expensive, while prone to break easily.

I consider myself buying a fightstick, Hori and Qanba ones are actually affordable.

[Kruxt]

You can definitely play with a keyboard, just there is a huge learning curve.

Qanba Q1's run about 70 dollars, 60 if you catch it during a promotion.
http://www.eightarc.com/qanba-q1-xbox360/

[rektBBQ]

Some moves will be pretty hard to do with a keyboard. Like those super moves and include 2 full circles

[morale-boosta]

Just got the game. Yeah the grappling moves are way hard to pull off on a keyboard. Even half-circle-forward moves don't work consistently. So until I get a fightpad I'll probably stick to charge characters like Guile.

[Junior]

i play with keyboard and is fine for 90% of the characters buf if you want to play with zangief/hugo/hakan you will have trouble to play

[Mr Fantastik @LAN]

You cannot play competitively with the keyboard, there is no shortcut around that.

[Shrek]

Use the hitbox layout, then, eventually you can transition to a hitbox. www.hitboxarcade.com

[patoro]

Shrak_UK is right, use the hitbox set up. The hitbox set up has the thumb handling Up inputs.
I currently use a hitbox myself, but before that my set up was ASD and space bar. ASD being left, down, right, respectively, and Space bar being Up. The reason being is that with WASD or directional button set ups, it is unwieldy to have the any finger handle both down and up (especially when it comes to 360 inputs,). So by having Up being dedicated to the thumb you can "roll" the input one key at a time with each finger. so A,S,D,Space or Ring, middle, index, and thumb.
Lucky for us, SFIV has a large input leniency(meaning the game gives plenty of time for special inputs, thus leading to unique alternative inputs). For SFIV you dont need to perform a true 360 motion to get 360 or 720 moves, you just need the four cardinal directions all inputed in a small time frame. So you can actually do left, right, down, up+Punch, and get a spinning pile driver with zangief. So give that a try, input Left, down, right (in any order, so whatever feels best), followed by UP+proper attack buttons, and you should do 360's just fine.
As for 720's those are hard to do, even on standard controllers, To put it simplly, it is insane hard to perfrom a 720 on the ground. So the easiest and most common method is to jump, and input the 720 as you are falling so when you land you can finish the input by pressing the proper attack buttons. The reason why you can't perform a 720 is because the input is so long that after you input the first 360, you dont have enough time to perform the second 360 before you character jumps off the ground. It is possible to perform a 720 without jumping, it's just insane hard. An advanced method for performing 720s is to "hide" the input under another move. An example with Zangief would be Lariet into Ultra. You can peform a lariet (All 3 Punches/Kicks, the spin to win attack) to keep zangief busy and on the ground, while he is spinning input the 720 so that by the time he stops, and has recovered you have inputed the 720 and are finishing the input for ultra. So by performing any action, you can hide the 720 input behind it so a grappler can stay on the ground. Though with the example above it assumes you perfrom the lariet within grabbing range of the opponent and that the opponent just doesnt hit you out of the lariet. Though this could be applied with any action (Normal attacks, other specials, or dashing).
I wouldnt say learning keyboard is hard, it's just different. Though do note, the offline scene normally doesnt support keyboard, since it is usually held on consoles.

[morale-boosta]

I got this game 2 days ago, and I can already tell that the keyboard is too much work for me. I'll probably get one of those Mad Catz fightpads. I haven't yet learned characters' movelists to pull off specials and combos.